I was standing on the dock at Fisherman's Landing, but if I closed my eyes as I spoke to Bruce Posthumous, I could have been on a crystal clear salmon stream in the Gaspe Peninsula.
Why was I making the connection of two such diverse places? After all, Fisherman's Landing is where big ocean fish are brought back from saltwater sportfishing trips for processing. The Gaspe is a magical place in northeastern Quebec where most of the Atlantic salmon that are caught are released as part of the fishing religion.
I made the connection because Point Loma angler Bruce Posthumous, whose name literally means "after death," is a man who is all about giving fish life after the catch.
Posthumous does very well on sport boats that target cow-sized yellowfin tuna. But he'd do very well on a beautiful salmon stream in the Gaspe, too.
On a recent long-range trip aboard the Royal Polaris, Posthumous released four giant yellowfin tuna that Capt. Roy Rose judged, one and all, to top 200 pounds. Rose felt they easily would have joined the 29 yellowfin Rose weighed in at the dock after that Royal Polaris trip to the Hurricane Bank. But in his typical understated fashion, Posthumous didn't think any of the tuna he released topped 200 pounds.
Posthumous figured he released 25 big yellowfin tuna on that Royal Polaris trip that took advantage of the wide-open fishing that has been at the Hurricane Bank for more than a month. Posthumous's release total was one fewer than what Delta pilot Tim Turis of Atlanta said he figured he released on the recent record-setting long-range trip on the Excel, where the anglers caught and kept 41 yellowfin that were 200 pounds or more.
But unlike Turis, Posthumous released everything except a couple of wahoo he caught on an iron jig. He kept them because he didn't want the crewmen to risk injury by trying to unhook a wahoo from a jig. Posthumous, a vegetarian who doesn't eat meat or fish, gave one of the wahoo to the crew and the other to some other anglers.
His fish-processing fee for his "catch" back at the dock: zero.
"I love this," Posthumous said. "There's no kind of fishing like this kind of fishing. And being able to release a big fish is an option we have in fishing. We don't have that option in hunting. Fish swim away. I hate to kill a fish, and I love seeing them swim away. It's like a wrestling match. Just because one wins doesn't mean the other has to die. These are incredible fish and they deserve to live to fight again."
How many of us can relate to that statement. What I mean is, how many of us have ever caught 100-to 200-pound tuna or fish of any kind that big and released them?
I reached into my own fishing creel of experiences and found a couple of bull sharks (unknown weight, but huge) that I cut off while fishing with guide Pier Milito in the back country waters of the Florida Keys a couple of years ago.
Fishing for tarpon, I hooked the first bull shark and muscled it close enough for a look.
The second bull shark was cut loose early on in the battle.
Of all the fish I've reeled in and and released, the Atlantic salmon I've caught in the past two years at the Gaspe have meant the most to me. The best was an estimated 28-pounder in June that measured 40 5/8-inches long. I know that because after I battled it for an hour and had it tuckered out in the shallow water, guide Bill Greiner asked me to take some leader out of his top pocket, stretch it the length of the salmon and cut it.
That piece of leader and my memories of fighting that fish long past sunset are all I have of the experience. I hope that it returned to the Atlantic Ocean and is preparing for another run up the York River.
My experiences fishing for Atlantic salmon changed my thinking about fishing, especially catch-and-release fishing. Before my two trips to the Gaspe, I wouldn't have understood what Posthumous was talking about. But today I do. I share the thrill of the catch and the joy of watching a fish swim away.
"I'm not any less intent on catching the fish," Posthumous said. "I'm just happy to see it swim away after I've fought it. I don't like to lose fish. I'm just as disappointed as anyone else when one gets off or cuts my line. I want to be able to get the fish close enough for the gaff. I just hope the fish isn't as tired as I usually am at that point.
"I've been releasing big fish for over 10 years," Posthumous added. "It's a good thing for fishermen to do. It's been good for freshwater fishermen for a long time. And it's good for ocean fishermen to do, too. It shows that we're being responsible stewards instead of keeping everything. I don't need to kill a big fish to feel good about my trip. Billfishermen release fish. Why not long-range fishermen? Why not tuna fishermen?"
Ed Zieralski: (619) 293-1225; ed.zieralski@uniontrib.com
