Mako Shark Fishing out of Venice, Louisiana - February 24, 2017© Photos Posted by Mark Miller © Hi-Res Source
My son Paul works in Venice, Louisiana as a professional mate. Sometimes they get some off time and go on fun trips and this was one of those times. Jake and Paul had been wanting to catch a large Mako Shark for some time and they invited me to go try so I eagerly accepted. We were hoping to also get some Yellowfin Tuna but they did not cooperate on this day. We left out at sunrise and went to the East Lump where the previous day several nice Yellowfin Tuna were brought in and also several Mako Sharks had been taken over the past month. Along the way out, we started by catching four Amberjack to use as fresh bait and then proceeded onsite to start our first drift. Just toward the end of our first drift, there were several boats fishing very close by and one of them, the Sea Chaser, dragged a trolling bait right across our drift lines. We reeled it in and cut his lure off. Then he wanted it back and poorly maneuvered his vessel into ours in the process and broke one of his fishing rods. After all that commotion cleared up, we were just thinking about resetting as we had no tuna bites at all. I dropped a jig to the bottom and brought up a White Snapper (Porgy) that we were gonna use for live bait. I rebaited my jig and just started dropping again to catch another when a very large Mako appeared out of nowhere and started chomping down on our Chum Bag. We got a rod hooked on her but she just kept munching on the bag so instead of wasting time, we just hit her with the Flying Gaff. There was a pretty good battle that ensued and I took quite a few pictures and video as you see below. We did not have a come along or a block and tackle so we ended up getting 5 more guys off other neighboring fishing boats to get on our boat and help us heave her in. It took all 9 of us to accomplish that and it was not easy. I had a GoPro clamped off on the T-Top which captured the Shark coming in. We then headed straight back in to deal with the monster fish. The behemoth weighed in at 804 lbs (365 Kilos) and had a length of 11'-10"TL (3.65 meters), and 10'-8"FL, and a 67" Girth. It was truly an Epic, Once in a Lifetime Experience, that I will never forget. On top of that, the meat is quite tasty and we had lots of it.
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