Australian Game Fishing Charters

Game fishing in Australia can basically be described as any type of fishing that is specifically targeting any of the offshore game fish species for the purpose of sport and tag and release ? that being any of the billfishes, mackerel, wahoo, tunas or dorado. It is different to sport fishing, which tends to be inshore fishing for specific species on light lines. Game fishing has its roots back in the 50?s when the marlin men like Zane Grey would go to sea with the original big game Penn and everol reels to catch the biggest fish they possibly could. These men were the first people to pioneer the massive black marlin scene, catching fish up over the 1000lb mark. There is no doubt that fish this large had been caught before but these blokes made a sport out of it and game fishing began. Back then there were no tournaments or line classes. The boats themselves were not fitted with fighting chairs or outriggers. These guys fought the fish with very heavy stand up gear and lots of stamina. These days, game fishing is a billion dollar industry.

From the boats to the tackle to the motherships, the professional crews and the television coverage, there is not a single aspect of game fishing that is not expensive. For example a middle of the range 80lb rod and reel from penn or shimano is going to cost you over $2000. This is where the industry really kicked off. The sheer cost of having the boat and all the gear put game fishing well out of the reach of the average fisherman, and it still does. The guys that had a bit of money started to charter their boats out to the public and taking paying customers meant that they could do what they love and make a living out of it. The guys that wanted to catch a big marlin or sailfish could do so without the massive expense, And so became the game fishing industry.

It is hard to say just how many game fishing operators there are today but there would be hundreds if not thousands in Australia alone. So it is hard to put a price on what a single marlin is worth to the economy. Surely with all the effort and cost that goes into catching them for game and with all the boats practicing tag and release, that each game fish is worth far more alive than served up on a plate in a restaurant. In some countries, marlin and other billfish are heavily longlined for the purpose of food.

Game fishing spread through the world like surfing did. It became one of the must do things for big businessmen to do on their sabbaticals. Places like ">Lizard Island were discovered off the far north Queensland coast and Australia became one of the favored destinations in the world to come and catch a big black marlin. The lizard island game fishing club was born and now has many members. In the 20 year history of the competition there have been over 3850 marlin tagged and of that only 22 have been presented to weigh in. The rest were all released and some of which have been recaptured in different parts of the world. This in itself proves game fishing as a sustainable industry capable of generating large sums of money with minimal impact to the environment. The continental shelf off Lizard Island is the largest known spawning aggregation of giant black marlin in the world and fishermen and boats from all over travel here annually to experience the ultimate in game fishing.