Outdoors column: Big tuna haul at Meatfish Slam

A superb early-season offshore bite and very nice seas made for great fishing in the 7th annual Meatfish Slam last weekend out of Georgetown Landing Marina.

The numbers of blackfin tuna and dolphin caught by the 14-boat field were outstanding with several wahoo sprinkled in during fishing on Saturday and Sunday. In particular, the dolphin action has been very good over the last week.

John Horton, General Manager of Georgetown Landing Marina, noted that numerous dolphin weighing 20 pounds or more were caught during the event.

“I bet we had at least 20, 20-pound dolphin weighed in,” said Horton. “That's pretty good for this early in May.”

Three boats weighed in all three species, led by Earl E Bird, which won the top prize in the tournament – First-Place Aggregate to go with Big Dog Aggregate – with a total weight of 80.8 pounds. Critter Gitter was second with 78.6 pounds.

“They had some good size fish but they didn't have the biggest of anything,” said Horton of the Earl E Bird crew. “They caught all three and that is kind of the point of the tournament.”

Christy II weighed in the 1st-Place Dolphin, a 35-pounder, just beating Blurred Vision which took 2nd with a 34.4-pounder.

Jump Blues landed the 1st-place Tuna, a 32.8-pound blackfin followed by Pain Killer with a 23.8-pounder.

Salty Maintenance brought in the 1st-Place Wahoo, a 50-pounder with Critter Gitter catching the second-place fish with a 38.2-pounder.

Will Keelin was the top Youth Angler with a 29.4-pound dolphin caught aboard Earl E Bird while Ellie Hopkins was the top Lady Angler with the 32.8-pound blackfin caught aboard Jump Blues.

Horton noted most boats fished in the vicinity of the Georgetown Hole.

IFA Redfish Tour

The finish was as close as it gets at the weigh-in of the first-regular season tournament in the IFA Redfish Tour's Atlantic Division Saturday at the Carroll Campbell Marine Complex on the Sampit River in Georgetown.

For the local team of Bub Mitchell and Tim Ward, both of Georgetown, the results were gut-wrenching.

The duo of JD Nobles of St. John's, Fla., and Kyle Craven of Macclenny, Fla., won the tournament with a two-fish aggregate weight of 9.24 pounds.

Right on their heels were Mitchell and Ward, at 9.23 pounds.

“That's hard to swallow,” said Mitchell. “If it had been by a half-pound or a quarter-pound it would have been easier but not by one one-hundredth of a pound. It's tough but we're thankful to get second place, so it's got its pluses too.''

While Nobles and Craven ran south of the South Santee River to catch their fish, Mitchell and Ward stopped just north of there and fished on the South Santee itself.

Mitchell and Ward used two artificials to catch their fish on the day – a Berkeley Gulp 4-inch swimming mullet (white or pink) under a popping cork and a spinnerbait.

“We had gone there Friday and found some fish but most were too big and some were too small,” said Mitchell, who was fishing in his first IFA Redfish Tour event. “We went back to see if we could if we find some in between.”

The duo did find some in between, right at the upper end of South Carolina's slot limit of 15 to 23 inches. They weighed in a two-redfish limit with the fish measuring a near-perfect 22 and 22 3/4 inches.

But it just wasn't meant to be for the home team at the weigh-in.

“I set the bar a little high (for the first tournament), but I'm hooked now,” said Mitchell.

Another local duo – Stuart Ricks of Myrtle Beach and Michael Dorman of Aynor - finished third with a two-fish aggregate of 9.0 pounds.

The next stop for the IFA Redfish Tour is at Houma, La., on May 30. All teams that enter a minimum of two events and compete in at least one event will qualify for the 2015 IFA Redfish Tour Championship.

Far Out Shootout

This event out of Ocean Isle Fishing Center gets underway this weekend but considering sea conditions are forecast to be atrocious it will be next week before the event really gets cranked up.

Boats competing in the tournament can fish any one day beginning Friday until May 16. Entry fee is $300 if entered by Friday and $350 if entered after. Prizes are awarded to the top 3 overall teams weighing in the heaviest aggregate weight of one tuna, dolphin and wahoo. Prizes are also awarded for the largest tuna, dolphin and wahoo weighed in.

For more information, call 910-575-3474.

Waccamaw Audubon Society

The Waccamaw Audubon Society May meeting will be held Thursday at Christ the Servant Lutheran Church, located at 2105 Hwy. 501 across from Horry-Georgetown Tech. Refreshments available at 6 p.m. before the meeting starts at 6:30 p.m.

The speaker, Peg Howell, will discuss current events associated with the potential oil and gas drilling off the South Carolina coast. Howell has a BS degree in Petroleum

Engineering from Marietta College and a MBA from Harvard Business School.

This story was originally published May 7, 2015 at 5:48 PM with the headline "Outdoors column: Big tuna haul at Meatfish Slam."