I can probably write a book, albeit not a thick one, of the myriad of things that happens when fly fishing for sailfish and the things I have personally seen go wrong.
This short video is just one of the instances caught on video, I hope you enjoy watching it…
What Are Things That Can Go Wrong?
These are some of the incidences that I have witnessed and probably missed out some. But I’ll come back to add on to the list when there are new “sightings”!
Unlike any regular fly fishing outings, fly fishing for sailfish is a team-sport. There are a couple of people involved with specific duties and everyone must be in synced to have a good chance of success.
Bad Coordination Between Teaser-man, Captain and Angler
Fish shows up behind a teaser and teasers are:
- Brought in too slow and fish swims away, or too fast and angler is not ready.
- Multiple fish show up behind all spreads and chaos breaks out. No focus on most aggressive fish and lines are everywhere making presentation difficult.
There is at least one person on the teaser rod, usually two and sometimes more than two. The ‘teaser’ is very important and should know what to do and preferably enough experience to know what to do according to the fish’s reactions.
The captain should know how to manoeuvre the boat accordingly when there is action so as to let the teaser do its job and give the angler the best shot.
When the main teaser-man shouts “cast”, the captain must hear that and throws the boat into neutral and angler makes the shot.
- Boat makes a wrong turn and fish looses interest or gets spooked
- Boat accelerates at the wrong moment resulting in a lost opportunity
- Fly line gets tangled and cast goes out too late
- Fly line gets tangled with teaser line
- Knot on fly line as fish takes line
- Fly line wraps around rod but
- Fly line wraps around everything around, reel handle, foot, GoPro, you name it!
- Broken hooks during hook-set
- Broken leaders (thick leaders) during hook-set
- Fly reel disintegrating leaving no drag or coming apart
- Hard strip-set with reel banging into boat and getting deformed
- Wayward backcast that catches things other than fish
- Sailfish eat so vicious rod and reel are pulled of the hands of angler and goes flying
Know something that I missed? Leave a comment below.
More about fly fishing for sailfish in Kuala Rompin Malaysia
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