Maui doesn’t have really good traditional flats to target bonefish. It isn’t where you go when you have bonefish on the brain. Everyone knows that.
So… I was kind of surpirsed to find myself on a flat in Maui with a guide sightfishing for bonefish… and FINDING them.
What?
Yeah… I sightfished bonefish in Maui.
Did I catch these bones? No… no I didn’t, but I had many legit shots at good sized bones.
As Johann, my guide, said “You are doing everything 95% right.”
That last 5% seems to be important.
I went out with Johann Hoogland from Hawaii Fly Outfitters. He was a legit, good guide who put me on fish, even when conditions turned on us and we had 15-20 mph winds and no light. I had shots at 6 bones when we had essentially 10 feet of visibility. I saw maybe 20-25 fish, total… singles and doubles and fish from 4 to 8/9 pounds.
I’ve had days in the Bahamas where I had fewer shots.
The fish are hard. The are picky and spooky and the strip is different, but that’s one of the things about this that is fun… figuring it out, learning new stuff, fishing different water. This isn’t a fishery where you’ll find muds or schools of 90 fish. For that, head to the Bahamas. This game is different.
I really had no idea Maui bonefishing could be so high-quality. It was a revalation to me and bumped Maui up on my list. Add to that everything else that Maui has to offer and, yeah, I’m sure we’ll be back. We snorkled, we zip-lined, we saw whales, we had many over-priced cocktails, we had a lot of pool time, there were surf lessons and I put the hurt on some Coral Hawk Fish.
The fishery isn’t big, like most of these Hawaiian Islands, so, if you go, try to respect the fishery and those working in it.
Give Johann a call if you are heading out there. I know I’ll be doing that when I head back.
