Fly fisherman catches threatening world record marlin after 3-hour battle

Kona, Hawaii is one of the best places in the Pacific to hunt big blue marlin, so it was a logical destination for Ian Keinath. The 37-year-old fly fisherman from Montana has been chasing marlin for 16 years, with the ultimate goal of catching an IGFA world record blue marlin on a fly.

Keinath finally got his chance on September 11. He and four others raced out to sea that morning from Honokohau Harbor aboard Kenyath’s 40-foot Gamefisherman, Last chance.

“It was the second day of my six-day trip, and it couldn’t have gone better,” Keinath said. Outdoor living. “We caught seven marlin that day, one of which was huge at 700 pounds. I hooked a 175-pounder on the fly, but only held it for 30 seconds before losing it.

“But at about 3:30 p.m., just before we started for the day, Captain Tracy Epstein spotted a few fish on our Omni sonar. He went out there and reeled them in with a trolling lure and then pulled them close to the boat so I could cast one with my fly rod.”

That’s when an aggressive marlin rose from the depths, dragging a long trolling lure behind it. Boatmate Kyle Vannatta teased the fish close, and when the marlin charged the lure, Captain Epstein put their boat in neutral so Keinath could cast an 8-inch streamer to the excited fish.

The marlin struck. The fly line went taut. But then the hook pulled free of the blue. Keinath quickly pulled the fly line free to cast to the fish again. That triggered the marlin to turn around again, attack the fly and take it a second time.

The second hook was better, leading to a three-hour, bitter battle between the swordfish and Keinath, who used a 12-weight Hardy Marksman fly rod and a Mako 9700 reel.

Read more: Fishermen try to catch a swordfish while it is flying. That is almost unheard of

“The blue one went wild and did a series of five jumps in the first 30 minutes I had him,” said Keinath, who lives in Kalispel, Montana. “Then he went deep.”

Over the next hour, the fish would rise again, make a few more jumps, and then dive back to the depths. Finally, with Keinath applying maximum pressure with a light, 12-pound test tippet, he got the marlin close to the boat, where his boat crew attempted to gaff it. But all three men missed the fish with their eight-foot gaffs. They merely glanced at the marlin’s tail and sent it diving deep again.

“I’m surprised the leader didn’t break after the blunders missed their target,” Keinath said. “I really didn’t think we’d get blue after that, because the sun was already going down.”

And at that point, Keinath explains, the battle had reached a stalemate. He had maxed out his reel, but couldn’t get the fish back up. To help the fish to the surface, the captain pulled his boat away from the marlin. As the fish came to the surface, Keinath worked it close to the transom for another chance to gaff it.

“But right up to the boat, the fish was going back and forth at the stern, and I couldn’t quite get him positioned for the gaff,” Keinath explains. “He kept switching sides. But he was pretty tired, and I finally got his head up. That’s when Jarad Boshammer got the first gaff in his side.”

Kyle Vannatta and Chip Van Mols immediately hit the fish with two more gaffs. The three men then pulled the Pacific Blue Marlin up and into the boat.

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“We all started screaming and slapping our hands and backs,” Keinath says. “Then we went back inside because the sun was going down and we wanted to get the fish weighed on certified scales.”

Back on land, the marlin weighed 106 pounds 8 ounces. This surpasses the current IGFA 12-pound test tippet record for Pacific blue marlin, and it is currently listed in the record book as “pending.” (The IGFA recognizes both “line-class” records for conventional tackle and “tippet-class” records for fly tackle.) The standing record, from Costa Rica, weighed 104 pounds 2 ounces, and was caught in 2007 by Enrico Capozzi.

“I’ve now caught the Hawaiian billfish slam on the fly,” says Keinath, who is retired and spends most of his year traveling the world catching fish. “It took a long time and it was a long, three-hour battle that I will never forget.”