Doing whatever it takes.

So, we fished the Halibut tournament today and caught this Black Seabass. It took about 40 minutes to get it to the surface, it was a hell of a fight. Once up, we snapped a few photos and pulled the hook. It had 4 other hooks in it, three were foul hooks in the dorsal and pectoral fins. Mostly rock fishing rigs with long lines left and one in the mouth with the line cut right at the hook. It's nice to see another angler gave this fish a chance.

After a few photos we went about the normal routine and tried to revive. Dragged it a little, gave it fresh o2 and it kicked hard. No matter what, it kept coming up. We debated using our rockfish deflater but none of us were 100% sure on how to go about doing it right so we vetoed the idea. Next, we tried putting a hook in it's mouth with the barb pinched flush and tying it to the anchor to descend it. Every time it got to 12-15 feet it thrashed and broke the 40# line and floated back up. We worked on this fish for a good 30 minutes before I decided to jump in with it.

When I got in, I turned it over, layed my hands behind the dorsal and swam forward for a few minutes to get it breathing. It started to show signs of life but just wanted to float belly up.

I took a long deep breath, gave it a good bear hug and dove as far down as I could with it. The first try it kicked hard but turned back over and floated. The second try I got a little deeper, kept her right side up and pushed it off my chest as hard as I could face first facing down. She kicked hard and down she went. I can't even begin to explain the force I felt from that massive tail.

My fishing buddies said they could see her 20-25ft down, and she kept descending. She was definitely the biggest black I've seen in SD, I estimate 120# . I know of a few caught over the past two weeks and it's awesome to see them so active lately.