Canyon Runner: Clinic On Tagging Big Bluefin Tuna in North Carolina

Capt. Mark and the Canyon Runner crew have been enjoying world class fishing for large bluefin tuna in North Carolina recently.  These images courtesy of their site tells the story well.  This year, tagging has become part of their program which we are grateful for.

Here is another great shot from the crew of a bluefin that has already been tagged (you can see the tag in the upper shoulder), and is having the hook removed pre-release.  The color of the water is amazing in this shot.  No wonder the bluefin are staging there for the early Spring.

Pictured below is another large bluefin tuna, as the AFTCO tag stick looms ready to deliver another tag into the shoulder before releasing the tuna to fight another day.

Here's a post from Adam LaRosa from NJFishing.com that speaks to the volume of fish they are catching and to their tagging activity;

"I really can’t understand why my guys our out there all by themselves when the fishing is as good as you can ever experience - but such has been the case the last few days.

In the last three days they released at least 35 bluefins over 73”. On Tuesday the fish bait in the water on our 48 Viking was engulfed by a 91” 450 pound Bluefin that was fought for 3 hours, tagged and swam away nicely. They then spent the rest of the day jigging and popping captuing another 7 bluefins with an over and under to take home and 5 bluefin over 75” to 80” that were tagged and released.

Meanwhile, our second charter fishing with Capt. Denis Ednee of the A-Salt Weapon did non-stop battle with 70-80” fish during the 3 hours while Capt. Mark was hooked up to the 450 pounder. They release 7 of these fish for their days total.

Capt. Mark DeBlasio estimates we tagged approximately 50 bluefins over 73” thus far this season that all swam away nicely so it will be very interesting where these fish show up. (We tagged well over 100 yellowfin last summer and got a bunch of returns back already and funny enough all these fish swam east).

While we are fully booked on our boats there are plenty of great boats available so please call Pirate’s Cove Marina – 252-473-3906 – and get yourself down there. It just doesn’t get better than this at any point of the summer off so you owe it to yourselves to enjoy it."

We will have some final tagging stats when the fishing calms down, but it looks amazing.  If you want to go and tussle with a big bluefin, now's  the time.