Half past five in the morning, somewhere over the Princess Alice Bank, and the skipper eases off the throttle. Nobody says a word. Every eye is not on the water but on the sky. Because there, a few hundred metres off the beam, a cloud of shearwaters hangs over the sea and keeps folding down into it. Beneath them, and we all know it aboard, the water is boiling. And beneath that, deeper still, hold the yellowfin.
Popping for yellowfin off the Azores is, to me, one of the most honest forms of big game there is. No fighting chair, no half-dozen rods fanned out on the troll, no waiting on chance. You cast with your own hand, you work the lure with your own body, and when a fish of twenty, thirty, forty kilos rockets up out of the blue and inhales your lure in a wall of spray, you feel it right down to your shoulder blades. But popping is also the most demanding game of the lot. Anyone who just holds the rod up and hopes goes home empty. Three things decide it: the right lure, the right retrieve, and reading the birds.
Why the Stickbait So Often Wins Off the Azores
There are two basic surface lures, and both have their place. The fat, big-cupped popper is a caller. It throws water, it makes noise, it drags a wide trail of bubbles behind it and pulls fish up from the depths that aren't even feeding yet. The stickbait, by contrast, is the seducer. It mimics a fleeing baitfish trying in a panic to get away — and that is exactly what a hunting yellowfin wants to see.
Off the Azores I find, year after year, that the sinking stickbait brings the most fish once the tuna are already active on the surface. The reason is simple. When the birds are working and the water is breaking, the table is already set. The yellowfin are chasing small baitfish — often mackerel types or squid — and they're tuned for speed. A popper that splashes loudly and comes in slow feels almost too ponderous at that moment. The sinking stickbait, on the other hand, can be ripped through the zone in a flash and hits exactly the reflex that makes a fish snap.
I almost always keep both rods within reach. If a school is still holding deep and needs to be drawn up, the popper comes out, because its bubble trail runs across the sea like a group of fleeing baitfish and pulls the predators into casting range. But the moment I can see them feeding, I switch to the stickbait. For lure size off the Azores I usually run something between 160 and 190 millimetres and 80 to 130 grams, depending on how far I have to cast and how big the baitfish are that I can see under the birds.
The Fast Retrieve: Why Hesitation Gets Punished Here
The most common mistake I see in guests is a retrieve that's too slow and too cautious. Fishing for perch back home, you might like to let the lure glide and pause. With yellowfin, that's the sure road to a missed take. A yellowfin tuna decides in a split second whether the chase is worth it. If the supposed prey doesn't move convincingly, it turns away.
With the stickbait I run a fast, aggressive retrieve — short, hard downward strokes of the rod tip while I reel in briskly at the same time. The lure should shiver just under the surface and keep breaking out sideways, like a fish swimming for its life. What matters is the rhythm of ripping and reeling with no slack line forming. If a fish comes in behind it — and you'll often see this as a dark shadow or a bow wave — then whatever you do, don't slow down. Quite the opposite: I put in an extra gear. Nothing triggers the strike more reliably than prey that appears to be getting away.
With the popper the timing is different, but the lesson is the same. I work it in strong pulls so it throws a good chunk of water on every stroke, and I only let it sit briefly between the pops. Pauses that are too long cost you fish. And when the hit comes, you wait a heartbeat until you feel the full weight, then drive the hookset home with your whole upper body. A yellowfin has a mouth like bone. A timid strike isn't enough to set the hook, and you'll lose the fish within seconds of the fight.
Reading the Birds: Your Most Important Fish Finder
Off the Azores you don't fish on blind luck over the seamounts — you follow the birds. The Cory's shearwater, which the Portuguese call cagarro, is my most important ally out there. These birds know long before we do where the baitfish are holding, and when they start dive-bombing into the water, it means the tuna are driving the bait up to the surface from below. What you see from above is only the tip of a hunt that began deep down long ago.
It pays to watch closely how the birds behave. If they're just sitting quietly on the water, bobbing about, usually nothing is happening — they're resting or waiting. But if they're circling tightly packed and diving actively again and again, then something is going on beneath them. And when the whole picture suddenly explodes — the birds lifting and dropping and the sea foaming white in one spot — then it's time to move fast. These surface blitzes often last only a minute or two before the school sounds again.
That's exactly where the skill lies. You don't drive right into the middle of the school, because nothing spooks feeding tuna faster than a propeller over their heads. I have the skipper position the boat on the edge of the activity, with the wind at my back, so I can cast the lure into the zone without us barrelling over it. Then every second counts. Cast out, get in contact immediately, fast retrieve, and if nothing happens, straight back in and cast again. With breaking fish you rarely get a second invitation.
Not every flock of birds means yellowfin. Sometimes there are only small bonito or mackerel underneath. But off the Azores in high summer, when the water is warm and seamounts like Princess Alice or the Condor Bank form their upwelling edges, it's often enough the big yellowfin pushing the baitfish up. And then you get a chance no spread of trolling rods in the world could ever offer you.
Your Tackle Has to Stand Up to This Fishing
I'll be honest — this is not the place to cut corners. A forty-kilo yellowfin on the surface will tear apart any tackle that's too light. I fish rods in the PE 8 to PE 10 class, paired with a big spinning reel in the 14000 to 18000 size, with a drag that holds well over ten kilos and still runs smoothly. For mainline, a braid in that class, and to it a fluorocarbon or mono leader beyond 130 pounds — heavier still for the real giants.
Where most fish are lost is in the connection between lure and line. Split rings and hooks have to match the class, not whatever happens to be lying in the box. I've watched a split ring that was too weak get bent completely open on a fish of barely fifteen kilos — and that was one of the small ones. Use strong split rings rated for big game and equally heavy treble hooks, or a well-matched single-hook setup with an assist line long enough for the hook to grab properly on the take. Check it after every fish you land. A bent hook or a chafed spot on the leader will otherwise cost you the fish of your life.
My Takeaway
Popping for yellowfin tuna off the Azores rewards the angler who is prepared and acts fast. Keep the stickbait ready when they're already feeding, and the popper to call hesitant fish up from the depths. Work the lure aggressively and never slow down when a shadow comes in behind it. And trust the birds — they're your best scout on that wide open sea.
One last thought from many summers out there: bird activity alone is only part of the picture. When the windows really open depends on the interplay of water temperature, current over the seamount, tide, and time of day. These days I let HookIQ bring all of that together for me, so that in the morning I know which hours over which ground hold the best cards, instead of leaving it to feel alone. The rest is a long cast, a steady hand, and a watchful eye on the sky.