Rare, Huge 179-Pound Bigeye Tuna Landed Off Louisiana by Experienced Woman Angler

Look at this Tuna caught off the shores of Louisiana!

“Charter boat deck hand London Rosiere started the autumn tuna fishing season in a big way during a trip out of Venice, La.

London Rosiere started the autumn fishing season off in a big way when on Sept. 24 she hooked, fought, and boated a massive 179-pound bigeye tuna while fishing offshore of Venice, La., according to Louisiana Sportsman.

Rosiere was working for Paradise Outfitters, and she was on a trip with Capt. Andrew Bateman. Fishing for tuna had been slow in recent days, as a cold front had hit the area hard and only small tuna were being taken.

“A few of the other boats had only caught some little peanut yellowfins,” Rosiere reported to Louisiana Sportsman. “I got the hit on the first bait I sent out.”

The bait she used was a standard Louisiana one for tuna, a hornbelly baitfish (Atlantic Bumper) rigged to a 5/0 circle hook. Using a Penn 30-wide loaded with 60-pound braided line with a top-shot of 200 feet of 60-pound monofilament line, Rosiere got to work battling the big fish.

“It kind of got tired or died, because it started to get easier to bring it in after about a half hour,” she says. “Right when I went to go gaff it, we thought it was a bigeye.”

Rosiere has seen and caught bigeye tuna previously off Louisiana, but they are an unusual catch from the Gulf of Mexico.

“They are so rare,” she said to Louisiana Sportsman. “They are fatter. They have shorter fins. The bigger eye and they just look different (than yellowfins).”

Only four other bigeye tuna are listed in the Louisiana record book. None are noted in IGFA as having been caught from the Gulf of Mexico.

Rosiere’s rare Louisiana bigeye tuna will rank as a tie for the third biggest fish of the species caught in state waters. The other 179-pounder was taken in 2012 by angler Dominique Chagnon.”

To read the full story from Sportfishing Magazine, click here.

Photo credit: Original Author

---