Albacore Tuna: The Hunt is ON!
It is time for the yearly makeover here on the Harvester, taking her from a heavy hauling machine to a sleek albacore tracking machine. We start by taking off the hauling equipment like the crab block, long line hauler and the deck table that we use for holding and setting the long line gear. Then give the boat a heavy scrubbing, paint the trim, and add the small hydraulic tuna pullers and landing table. All this takes about four days. Meanwhile in the evenings we keep a close eye on the terrafin sea surface temperature charts. They tell us where the water temperature is ideal for the albacore, between 60 and 65 degrees. Over the past two weeks we have seen that the warm water has moved from 100mi to 40mi off the coast of Charleston.
They're within 50 miles now and we're out there NOW so stay tuned. The Catch is ON!
We'll update soon .. gotta love this time of year!
UPDATE: Left at four in the morning on Tuesday and fished half the day afternoon Tuesday and all day Wednsday for 330 fish at 65 miles off the coast of Winchester bay average size 15 pounds for 6000 lbs total. Weather was good and we offloaded and are heading out again. We expect to have fresh canned tuna available by this Monday.
Last run was fantastic. Best albacore fishing we've aver had. We pulled 527 on Saturday the 11th of July and 180 on Monday for about 10,000 lbs of albacore tuna. The guys at the cannery just about crapped their pants and had to hire on some more workers to finish processing. We were 32 miles off Winchester Bay taking a chance on close in we hit the mother load and plugged the boat. No other boats in sight the whole time sorry guys.. you were too far out!
So the canned albacore we JUST CAUGHT are available for you and your family. You can order on line and/or visit our spot at the Eugene Farmers Market. We are working on local pickup locations which will be ready soon
Enjoy!
Capt Tyler and the Harvester Crew