Marlin

[el_carpo]

Those fish are bigger than most cars!!!

I mean holy freaking cripes man! WoooohooohoohoohOOOOOooooo! Amazing pictures in this thread! AMAZING!!! I've never seen fish like these. The biggest thing I've ever hooked in my fishing life was a yacht! I bet those fish probably fought better than said vessel too! Nice going guys! Dang!

[Barrymundi]

Great pictures, smiles on the faces say it all

Al

[philip_thomson]

man every single picture of a marlin or sailfish i see makes me want to get out and catch one even more. the closest i have been to chasing billfish was chasing garfish in the noosa river only the size and fight has nothing on the marlin . hopefully chrissy this year ill get out and find one (fingers crossed)
well done guys on all those great fish
cheers philip

[MrLuminous]

surely thats not all the marlin caught by the fishermen on this site
wheres the rest ??? ??? ??? ??? ???

[vertico]

I want to catch a billy!!!!!!!

[jeffo]

not one of my fish but a photo taken on the boat i fish on.

[vertico]

nice jeffo

[Burley_Boy]

Ok Rob, now if i was to catch one of these "little" chaps, how do I NOT kill myself nor damage the fish. I mean If i was keeping any fish this size I'd most likely want to bash its brains to bits before I got it in the boat and if I was not keeping the fish I'd be worried about hurting it or me or both.

[jeffo]

burley boy- id hope if you were to catch a marlin you would do the sunsible thing and let release it!!
firstly you should be using a nice long strong leader (5 foot+ of 100-150lb would be good), having this trace alows you to angle the fish once hes at the boat.
a nice pair of gloves is the second thing you will need to have to best avoid injury.
i wont go through the whole process of leadering just say that once you grab it HANG ON!! (watch out because they have been known to jump and do silly things boat side! )
once the fish is beside the boat you want to either grab its bill or use a bill rope/snooter. a marlin bill is very sensitive and they dont like it to much when you grab hold!! never have the bill facing at your body!
that is a basic run down on what i do when leadering a fish. its much easier to get a video to see how the gun deckies do it if your serious about catching a billfish

[SNELLY]

Jeffo,

That pic of you with the small Marlin - Is that the tag sticking out around where it a#se is ?

Snelly

[jeffo]

thats the tag snelly...the tag shot was a bit dodgy but not as dodgey as it looks in the photo. the new pink tags are pretty long and free swinging. the tag shot was just below the lateral line (not very desirable ) those tiny marlin are VERY hard to tag in the water...capture points for fish are only given once the tag goes in wich creates pressure to tag the fish in the water. id like to see the rules changed so that points are awarded as soon as the leader is grabbed... that way the fish can be bought right up beside the boat for tagging.. more fish friendly!

[Mortalkombat]

solo black hooked 5 caught 1 that day around 50kg on 8kg theres nothing like the sound of a screaming Tiagra 16 beuuuuuuuutttiful

[Mortalkombat]

blue around 110 kg we hooked 7 caught 3 all around same size what day

[Burley_Boy]

Thanks Jeffo. No I would not be keeping the billy but I'd rather not leave a large lure in his gob either. So my question on handling a large animal like this was more about how you would be able to let him go without hurting him.
I'll go with the "don't point the sharp part at your own body" advice, sounds perfectly sensible to me.
I've had both eels and sharks in the boat and a couple of times I have wished I had been somewhere else at the time!

[Dirty_Mole]

they would be so hard to get in the boat and you would bloody need a chainsaw to fillet the thing