Customer Fishing Reports / Testimonials

Official TFF Doce Tuna Charter Post-November 8th-10th, 

Mark

I can tell you the Pi-Xiu jigs caught the first two yellow fin on the boat. That is a sweet and compact jig. You still get the weight if you want it, just in a small package. They worked great.

JIG

I got two YFT 55-60# and 70-75# on the H4L Wingman blue swimbait, with stock hooks/rings. It was a great bait. Would have had a third on it as well but for a broken line. I fished one of the Poseidon poppers too, and really liked how it sat level with the water and threw a nice wave each pop. I didn’t get anything with it, but then again I switched baits a lot and didn’t get anything more with any of those either.

Bazztex

I had 8 good hook ups on YFT… 3 shorter YFT to 30″ keeper sized fish on the Silver Jiao Long H4L jig and a dozen BFT. One huge YFT that slammed and hooked up on a Dorado pattern Mayhem H4L surface stickbait and took 23# of drag for a good 30 seconds twice before pulling the hooks but one rod bending epic battle while it lasted. I had another huge blow up on a Wahoo pattern H4L Siren V2 Popper but I had to raise my rod tip to let a hooked up angler down the rail at the time and was unable to hook up. Many thanks for the H4L Tackle several nice fish were caught on their lures and they have a new customer 4 life in me.

Cod Pollock Jigmania w/ Garone Custom Rods 

Finally had another weather window to put a trip together again. The action started off okay in the morning with a pick of school sized cod on bait but it wasn’t what we were really hoping for. Midday the gates opened and the ocean came alive with breaching whales, porpoise, sharks, birds, and bait being chased. Sure enough the cod and Pollock woke up as well, beginning with my buddy Nick who was squidding with an H4L Mungus jig and found himself tied into a 30LB cod that was followed to the surface by another cod just as big! The bites started coming faster, all on jigs, and soon the Pollock took over with one, two, three on at a time with 25-35LB class Pollock.

“Mungus jigs catch everything”

 

Great Fishing Trip in Fujairah 

I put on a Kracken 180 in hopes of hooking a bigger fish. Well it didn’t take long to get hooked up i think the 1st cast I hooked a small bull Mahi.  We headed over to check another spot after about 10mins we get to the spot. First cast I’m hooked in to a fish.  I think there were around 10 in the boat around 9am. Then I have a big bull chasing after my Kracken stickbait. So I have my Girlfriend cast a minnow bait out where the bull was seen.  I spotted a big Mahi and give a little instructions she comes tight on her first big cow mahi. It was great to see her getting into it. I ended up getting two mahi at once on a sliver Kracken. After catch 20+ Mahi on the Krackens I wanted to change things up and try popping a jigging for them. I hooked on a Pink Poseidon Popper and watch these fish crash the popper left and right I lost a few nice fish but landed at least 10+ more on the popper.

 

 

 

Mr. Brown May 

I used your jigs out of Port Aransas and I gave one to a fellow fisherman on the boat! I caught approximately 20 Blackfin and 3 yellowfin! One of which was my personal best 117lbs. (Chunk) the guy I loaned the jig to caught approximately 30 Blackfin casting your jig! They were taking it on the dive! Keep making quality lures Mr. Roman, and I’ll support your company just like I do Shimano (nearly all my gear). I’m going to fish Venice, La with the jigs I got from you and see how well they work. You had so many to choose from, I wanted to sample all of your new ones. What I got will have to suffice for now! Thanks again brother!

 

Hot Night in TX! 

Very Nice AJ around 80#’s on H4L Jigs Goober. It was fun watching Luke fight that AJ. He was literally asleep 5 min before….Hell of a way to wake up!

 

YFT –  Freeport, TX

Luke picked up another 45# yft on the jig – again using his Hooked 4 Life jig so we’ll enter that one in the new contest as well. Things slowed down and the radar showed rain building around us. Made me nervous. It was building around 3 sides and looked to develop on us, or just by us, so made the decision to motor back to the other rig just in case lightning developed. On the way back, saw and heard 3 good claps of thunder so regardless of where they were I was happy with the decision – storms never made over to the other rig.

Got there just before day break and was teased with some bft topwater action. Stephen finally got a nice topwater strike and brought in a 45# yft (on a H4L topwater so he’ll enter a pic as well!). Decided to head in a little early and dodge T’storms. Good news is they never materialized, only had to go in between 2 the entire trip home! Fully expected worse.

Stopped at a different structure and the snapper were home. Everyone (but me!) helped put a limit of 8 – 12# snapper in the box.

Overall a good trip. 4 yft, 35-45#; a 35-40# mahi: limit of 8 – 12# snapper, 3 bft kept. Oh, I did catch about a 40# AJ but let it go since out of season.

 

Gom YFT – 

The crew came together with partner Luke on the sidelines: Josh and Stephen (Gluconda), and his friend John. Got an early start and with good seas had plenty of time to stop at Sunrise for some AJs. They were home but we were unable to get them out of the rig except for 1 undersize variety.Continued on and not much to show at first rig. Pressed on and next rig I had 2 yft hit my home grown painted popper. A 30 and 40#er in the box. Bft were active on topwater and swimbaits as well. Back to first rig – again nothing, back to second rig and Josh and John put 30#ers in box. In the meantime, plenty of Bft jigging up. Slowed down so back to first rig. No topwater action to speak of so we’re jigging – my line gets tangled with Josh and then I’ve got a fish on – resolve issues, bring it in and a 30# yft in the boat! Surprise!

Couple of fish on topwater and swimbait and then John gets a yft on the jig. Daybreak and nothing going on again at first rig – roll the dice and go to the second rig – spectacular aerial show with tuna hunting down and chasing flyers. They scared ’em into the air and 70 yds later they busted them when they land. Had one chasing a flyer towards the boat and he nabbed it not more than 40 ft from the boat. That fish had a determined and pi@#ed off look on its face! Also had his big brother busting just out of range – had to be a 120# fish – beautiful! Try as we may, they avoided us.

Stopped at the first rig on the way home and bigger fish were chasing the flyers up from weed patches so we gave it a try. Josh, stephen and John all boated 40 – 50#ers. Well, ok, Stephen’s was only a 75%er (big cuda?). May have been able to get our limt but I needed to get heading home.

Total of 10 yft, 30 – 50#. Two on the jig (H4L Jig goober and Pink Siren speed jig), 8 on poopers and swimbaits (magaroni caught 3, and a couple on H4L Tuna Candy popper). My first custom painted popper had a great start but didn’t last with all the strikes, tuna tore it apart (orignally a manufactured lure that strikes took painting off so I re-painted on my own!). Probably caught 75 bft and kept 9ish (15 – 20#).

 

Kianah’s Sportfishing Cancun

Hi everyone,

After speaking with William of H4L jigs we decided to get some of their jigs for the boats in Cancun.

The unique shapes and the variety of colours have made a big difference on the outcome of the fishing days when BOTTOM fishing is requested.

As an example a trip that we had with a customer from Brazil, a hard core jigger, the Grand Slam started the day based on an 8 hr charter and ran to sailfish grounds. Within the first hour they had a double header of sailfish and a single. The 3 fish were released and moved to do some jigging.

Within 20 minutes they were jigging

As they arrived on the spots they had singles, doubles and triple headers and they fought 18 amber jack’s and cut the trip short as the customer ran out of air. LOL

We specialize during the winter months to target sailfish and since we are in prime season for amber jack’s, jigs do make a difference

Cheers from Cancun.

Kianah’s Sportfishing Cancun

 

 

 

Brennan 

I got my jigs in right on time….they look and work great!!! The YFT love them also, here is a shot from Thurs night!! Awesome product!!

 

Luke

GOM Tuna Trip – Nov 30 

Things started out kind of slow… and then got slower. Weren’t marking anything at the first stop and after an hour and no hits/marks, moved to another rig. Started marking some fish and we get a bft and then Luke jigs up a 70# yft – got her on a 300g H4L Pink Goober

GOM YFT – Oct 24

It was game on! The bft start coming up and tearing it up – 2 of us got 5 in a single pass. Luke gets a 31incher yft on a pink goober, I get a 28in on a glow goober. David has a 80lber on a tuna hunter, I have a 80lber on a TH jr, Monte gets an 80 lber that almost pulls him in the drink with his new tuna sniper – 18000 Saragosa, David has another 80lber on a TH, I get an 80lber on a TH jr, and Luke follows up with an 80lber on a Charkbait (blue sardine) Toro. And there were the bft in between. About a 2 hour action packed frenzy.

Oh yea, this story would not be complete without a “discussion” on David and Monte trying to gaff Luke’s fish. I swear they were trying to club it to death or just pi#$ it off so it could take those 2 extra 100 yard runs on Luke. Pretty comical (now).

The fish box was full, we were worn out (popped our butts off prior to the frenzy) and decided to crawl back in at 430. Made 21 miles bu sunup and then enjoyed the 1-2s back in.

Kept 8 yft: 6~80lb, 2 just legal (caught early on or we’d never have kept them) and about 35-40 bft (kept 2 as we thought that might be all the meat we were gonna get!).

Tuna Hunters and Jrs; pink and glow H4L Goobers, magaroni and toros

 

 

Andrew, Justin, Mark

Incredible NJ YFT/Bigeye Jiggin and Poppin! 

Andrew, Justin, Mark and I enjoyed a remarkable trip to our local NJ canyons last night. While the recent reports were mediocre at best I just had that gut feeling that something would happen for us if we just gave it a shot. We got a little bit of a late start and arrived at our destination in the dark, with only one other boat anywhere close to us. We found the water we were looking for and got ourselves situated around 11pm. Around 2am the action began when Justin came tight on the first fish of the night, a 50LB class YFT. A quick glance at the sonar and I see the tuna were now stacked up from 60-120′ down! I dropped my H4L Mungus down to 100′ and after a few handles turns I was tight to a yellowfin and this just set the stage for the rest of the trip! From then on it was a steady pull of YFT in the 30-60LB class until a large school of 70-100+ pound bigeyes came right under the boat into the chunks and pushed out the yellowfins! By now dawn was starting to get near and we could see the bigeyes gobbling up our chunks in the lights no more than 20 feet below the boat! We quickly put our jigs right in front of their faces and we could actually see them attack our jigs while we had no more than just the 25′ wind-on leader off our reel. Unbelievable!

Final tally nobody really knows as there was way too much adrenaline pumping choas for hours on end to actually be counting that kind of stuff! We estimated we probably caught a combined total of about 40 yellowfin and bigeyes from 30-100 pounds between the four of us plus countless other hits/strikes/boils/etc. We were back at the dock by 11 am, exhausted. I’ve been on some good canyon trips in the past but never has it been so much fun being able to now catch all these fish on jigging and popping gear the whole time. Another great trip for the memory books!

 

Bob 

Phyllis Ann 8/5 Bluefin.. Bloody Decks

We went 6 for 7 on some blue fin (all on jigs).  I jigged up 5 of the 7 on a pink/silver 150 gram Cyclone.  I really like the finish and (more importantly) the action on that jig.

 

 

Mihca, Kylee

 

We broke the Mattgorda jettys around 8am to find the seas bigger then noaa’s prediction. We went to check out a few place to fish for next week. we ran across a broken up weed line and put a 4 line spread out. we put out a couple skirts, and a couple Dandys out the in the corners. It didn’t take long for the chickens to find the lures. we trolled the scattered line pick up a few kings on a wahoowhacker color Dandy and a nice Cow Mahi on a Blue mama Dandy. We made are way to the snapper spot and pick up a limit a snaps. I drop a few jigs and got one snapper a Atomic Orange Leviathan 250g but no photo’s. I stopped jigging because I was getting cut off by kings or something with sharp teeth. we free lined out a few baits and picked up a couple kings and a nice Ling. then headed out to a near by rig and picked up a couple more kings on the dandys. stayed there for about an hour and ran back inshore to try to find the weed line since the seas started to lay down. Nothing was around so we went over a few near by rigs and did some trolling.

We boated about 15 kings on the rigs, and we were only trolling two Dandy’s.

Total for the day
Limit of kings (6) caught 20
Limit of Snapper (6)
Mahi (5)
Ling (1)

 

Mr. King

BFT & Pollock Jiggin – Late Report – 

 

 

So, I wasn’t able to make it out last weekend with the boys, but after talking with them and hearing about what they encounter on their trip, I knew I needed to get out this past weekend.

We ended up running out early Saturday to make it to the grounds as the sun came up… immediately started jigging around the scallop boats, looking for some good marks, etc… when all of the sudden the Garmin crapped out… at least we made it out to the grounds with the radar…

We continued to work around several different Scallop boats and didn’t see any action or anyone doing anything. So we proceeded to jig blindly around one of the Scallopers, seemed like all of the other boats around us were, chumming and dunken scallop snot…

Sure enough… All of a sudden, I felt what we’re all addicted to, set the hook a few times and yelled over to the boys “Fish –On”…

I was using my 450g BH/PE8 as my 250g BH/PE5 setup was in the “shop”. Let me tell you these fish are fighting like much larger fish, and they’re a blast to catch…

After some short work, but with some effort, we had a pissed off green fish on deck. Quickly took some pictures, got him on ice and got back after it… We stuck to Jigging and Bill was rewarded shortly after the first hookup, and he had a blast fighting the fish on his JM 300g, these fish are not coming in easily… after getting the fish to the boat, green and pissed, off it made a few more runs before we were able to bring him into the boat (just using the jig to slide him in the door), we took a few picture from the tower of the tag-and-release of Bill’s fish

A little while later, I came tight on another one, which we followed the same procedure of tagging and releasing the fish, as quickly as possible. We went 3/3 on the BFT before we decided to go and jig up some Pollock (AKA. North Atlantic Amberjack), we went 5 for 8 or so on some really nice sized fish…

The hot jigs for the Pollock where the H4L Mungus jigs… they have been working really well for me on Tuna/Amberjac and its turns out that the Pollock liked them just as much and I’m pretty sure the cod will like they as well

 

Greg and Justin

Panama 

Well..as I expected..just when you think you figured out the pattern..things change. On our way to the bank we ran by a log that Justin pulled a nice dorado off of..sweet..skunk off. We then ran into a spot of dolphin. I got EXPLODED on by a larger grade tuna that by some miracle did not come tight….on to the bank.

Things definitely looked different. The bright side was that Justin managed a large reef donkey in the 60-70lb class while making bait. We struggled for 2 hours to scratch a couple bonito for bait..not good. We had one half hearted bite from a marlin that didn’t come tight. We were positioning ourselves to take off for Montuoso around 1:30…however at 12:30 we got the call…”Macho..Macho..Macho…TUNA..TUNA..TUNA!!” WHat I heard was..”TORA..TORA..TORA!!” Vamanos!! We got there around 1:15 only to find a huge spot of tuna surrounded by 5 or 6 center consoles. It was like the SE corner of Stellwagen (minus Dom screaming on the radio!! just kidding..not really)

They had a decent popper bite going while we were running over. When we arrived on scene we got a couple on poppers with some other half hearted boils….hmmm..I wonder if the fish are staying deep with the boat traffic? Well..if you can’t pop em..JIG EM! I saw a HUGE reading at 120ft. I dropped an H4L Mungus jig down and got SLAMMED on my third pump. This fish was pissed! I SWORE it was a 100lb fish..it was about 70 or so. We proceeded to pummel the fish on jigs until Jeffery, the mate and Macho’s son said “NO MAS!!” Thats a good day.

BTW..the hot jigs were H4L Mungus and Cyclones…FEAR

 

 

Greg

 Great day on the CR/A-salt weapon

With the 60 being down for some repairs, Adam put us on a-salt weapon. We had a great day. Lots of surface action, plenty of bites on komodos and jigs. The hot jigs were h4l cyclones, but the tridents also worked. Any color really, although blue or blue and pink were getting a few more opportunities.

We went 7 for 15 or so that we came tight on. We had a load of other blowups on the poppers.

 

Nathan

Big E Trip

Holy Crap! The YFT loved those Dandy swimbaits. They were hot for the pink ones. I boated 2 with that pink one, and lost one at the boat. I posted pics in the Big E thread………..Thanks again.

 

 

Yellowfin All over BoomVang!!!!!!!!! 

I went with BJD76 to test out some new gear. It was a sloppy ride out, but it wasn’t so bad out there until late. when we arrived there was only one boat fishing. It didn’t take long for Bruce to get hooked up on a nice YF on a popper. Then Luke hooks into a nice YF on a Goober jig. Jason was one of the new guys on the boat and has YF come unbuttoned on a chunk, but brings in a nice YF later in the night on a Goober also. I get a nice hook up to have it come unbuttoned. but on the next drift i get a solid hook set, and work that bad boy to the boat.

It was pretty fast action 60+ pound YF jumping all over. we lost a lot of fish. only a few fish were chewed up by cudas. Only 2 jigs and one stickbait were taken by cudas.

I took the Pluto 9000 out to work it over on tuna, and it did a great job caught a lot of blacks. Jason brought his YF in on it. I had a few big boys get off but the reel was a trooper. it had a smooth drag no binding, and it had the drag to get the fish to the boat.

The jigs that put a hurting on the Tuna were the H4L Goober and Siren 300.
Poppers were Strike Pro Tuna Hunter Jr.

Total for the night
6 YF, 2 (20-30) 4 (60-80)
20+ BF
0 Cudas

 

Boomvang  Bite On!!!!!!!!!!!

The Bite was on Guys!!!!!!

I got a call from Bruce (bjd76) Tuesday night. He asked me if i was interested in doing a overnighter at Boomvang. Bruce had just bought some of the jigs I sell. So I said why not it would give me a chance to meet a customer and share any tips I could offer. Also I wanted to trying out some of the new jigs on the tuna. I also got to meet some other great 2coolers I just don’t know there handles.

We launch out of BB around 1230. we stopped at Tequila to try to pick up a couple grouper on the way out. Greg brings in a nice Yellowtail seabass after a massive tangle up of mine and his line. we did about one more drop with nothing to show. So we head out. We show up to BV about 530pm and there is no other boaters. As the sun starts to set we start jigging. on other the guys hooks up with a black right off the bat. I get hooked up to a small keeper YF. We get positioned for another drift and I get hooked on to a nice fish on a Siren 300 jig. After about 10-15mins first nice YF hits the deck 65-70#’s. another boat joins of from NA. Tuna are busting the water everywhere. Bruce get’s hooked up on a nice YF on a Popper. After a good fight he gets the fish close to the boat and we see the fish is tail wrapped before we could fix it the fish takes off and cuts Bruce off. That YF was in 60+ range.

we caught tons of BF and the cudas were getting there far share we managed to keep about 12 nice BF. The one boat that was there hooked about a 200# Mako. The bite slowed until about 3am then picked up hard from about 3-5 we boated 3 Nice YF Ranging from 95-50# and lost a few good fish that came unbuttoned. Greg was the first one to bat. he was doing some chucking. he left to get a beer and a good fish took off with the chunk. peeling drag. After a good fight we are wondering what the fish is because it’s not acting like a Tuna. the fish come up way out from the boat then in to the light to were we can see this is a good size YF. I put the gaff right behind the head and haul this beast over the side.This fish was pushing the 100# mark. Luke was the next to bring in a nice YF on a jig. Luke was in for a long fight and almost got spooled. This fish did not want to come up. I could see the Cudas following this fish around. After about 20+ mins. I get a gaff in the fish and another 60#’er hit’s the deck. Bruce was up next he was determined to redeem himself. This fish hit a chunk and hit it hard. after a short fight a nice 50# YF hits the deck. the sun was just coming up about the time we got in position to do another drift. we didn’t get anymore hit on the chuck, but i was able to hook a nice fish on a jig before it came unbuttoned. I did get hooked back up but only with a BF. After that we called it a day and headed in.

Total for the trip
6 YF 20-95#’s
Countless BF 12Box 10-20#’s
1 Yellowtail Seabass