Monster halibut caught on Rapala XRap Magnum in Port Hardy

OutdoorsRep

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Went fishing with a group including guide Mike Kelly from Tides and Tales & Codfathers Charters out of Hardy and we got into an absolute beast halibut. We like experimenting trolling different lures and decided on a Rapala XRap Magnum 20 Red Head. Saw a couple bumps on the line, then nothing, so decided to bring the rigger up keeping the line in the clip, and BAMMM right at 50' the line just takes off and starts spooling the mooching reel! We worked our way back gaining line and finally after about 30 minutes got this beast to the boat. Here's a video about what happens next....

 
Sure was! That was an awesome looking fish. Excellent, truly professional job on the release too guys. The big girl never had more than her head out of the water, and yet you managed to get a great video and some really awesome stills- that's how its supposed to be done.

CP
 
Sure was! That was an awesome looking fish. Excellent, truly professional job on the release too guys. The big girl never had more than her head out of the water, and yet you managed to get a great video and some really awesome stills- that's how its supposed to be done.

CP
Probably a little trickier in rolling seas and some tide thrown in.
 
That is perfect release !!!love how you guys did it .
Wish some of the other people would do the same but some have to stroke their ego and put it into boat and hold it up....
great job guys you can tell thats a monster...
Wolf
 
Kudos to the releaser! I get a bit skiddish when I get close to a pair of treble hooks with bass! And that's only with a tiny (by comparison) fish! Glad no one ended up with a hook through the hand :)
 
The tail rope hali glory shots!! What a joke....

The people doing that are well aware that more of those fish are dying than living.
 
This video gives me so much more confidence now in my thinking. My aunt purchased a bunch of these stickbait / jerkbait style lures for me from a garage sale and I was looking at them thinking, "man, these might work while anchor fishing on the Columbia"?

They look like they'll work similar to a kwikfish/flatfish so I was thinking about giving them a try sometime.

Anyone else thinking this might work? I guess I'll have to try it if a halibut will hit it!
 
Textbook release. Well done!

Its amazing the size of fish you can catch with such light tackle.

Thanks for sharing the video.
 
I use a similar sized rapala for lake trout and northern pike.
 
Halibut are the toughest fish in the ocean.
It takes a lot to kill them.
yeh thats why we are slapped with a kill quota towards our quota. We have guys that want to post how big a fish they got by holding it up and doing a video of it my hope one day is they implement a law to stop these ego mongers . let the fish go like the video have WAY more respect towards guys that do that....
 
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