Fishing...

Milne Bay is a virtually undiscovered sport and game fishing oasis. Even in the slowest fishing months of the year, the catches can be pure adrenalin and the action hot and fast.

Fishing is incorporated in two ways into a Wild PNG adventure. You can join a dedicated sport/game fishing adventure where you'll be amongst people with a serious passion for heavy gear fishing or you can take whatever oportunities present themselves to dangle a line or throw a lure during one of our cultural adventures we are renowned for.

If you're just after a bit of fishing on the side, then we have heavy handlines and light sport rods and reels available for you to use. If you want to bring your own rod and reel, and maybe troll for Wahoo, Spanish Mackeral, Tuna or Marlin occasionally, then by all means do so.

Dedicated Sport/Game fishing adventures

If you're way too serious about your fishing for that, then you should join one of our dedicated sport/game fishing adventures. Contact us to find out when the next one is on, or put a group together for yourself (See our special offer for the group organizer !).

During the June trip, we filmed the fishing from 4 cameras which is currently being professionally editited into a feature length documentary for release later in the year, in the meantime to wet your appetite, I've thrown together a rough cut promo of the trip from 1 camera. You can watch it now as a streaming video, or download it. The 'rough cut' promo video is over 1 hr in length. The best way to view it is to download it and burn it to a DVD. Then you can watch it on your Flat Screen TV with all your mates.

So how does the dedicated fishing adventure differ from the cultural adventure ?

They differ in many subtle ways, although you will spend time in similar places and will experience similar cultural experiences. During a dedicated fishing adventure, we provide a 19-21' dinghy with outboard and skipper exclusively for every 2 fishermen. This vessel becomes 'Yours' for the duration of the trip. It is available whenever you want to fish, day and night. During night fishing, we require that you remain in sight of your overnight accommodation at all times. From Dawn to Dusk you are free to roam from reef to reef under the guidance of your skipper. (From time to time due to weather or other conditions, we may require you to remain in a specific area for the safety of your vessel. )

Each fishing vessel is given 400 ltrs of outboard mix to use for the duration of the fishing adventure. This is plenty of fuel and more ! If for some reason, you find yourself chewing through your fuel faster than it will last, you have a few options. You can lend fuel from another vessels supply who has used less than you (You'll need to ask them for the favour!), you can reduce how far you travel to your fishing grounds each day (Most fishing grounds are close to each outpost and there is no real need to travel long distances), or you can purchase additional fuel from what we have it available at the outpost. To date, we have not had a single boat burn more then 400l and on average, you will probably burn around 300-350l if you are 'going hard' !

We have found that even the keenest fisherman slow down during the week and find themselves spending time taking long walks around islands visiting remote villages or taking part in daily life with the locals.

What can we target ?

Milne Bay hosts some of the worlds best game and heavy sport fishing just about anywhere at just about anytime. Even though a species is not 'in season' doesn't mean you wont get one ! Typically fishermen target Wahoo, Spanish Mackeral, Giant Dog Tooth Tuna, Yellow Fin Tuna, Marlin, Mahi Mahi (Dolphin Fish) with plenty of by-catch along the way like Rainbow Runner, Giant Trevally, Shark-Tuna, Shark and all manner of reef fish.

You'll need heavy serious gear to work these large fish from the sport fishing dinghy's which add a whole new dimension to the sport of the day. Casting Lures and Poppers is also productive, bringing in some huge Coral Trout and Giant Trevally.

On a recent trip in June (The quietest fishing season) we caught the following between 8 fishermen, over 4 days, based at ONE island !

• 30 Yellowfin Tuna up to 10kg
• 37 Spanish Mackeral up to 27kg
• 10 Trout (Coral,Coronation etc..) up to 9kg (Not targetted, this was a by catch !)
• 13 Dog Tooth Tuna up to 34kg

Along with countless other species such as..

• Shark Mackeral
• Skip Jack
• Rainbow Runner (Small fish, great fighter)
• Huge Barracuda
• Enourmous Red Bass
• Blue Spot Trevally
• Sharks
• Salmon
• Scad
• Mackeral Tuna
• Giant Trevally

What do we do with all the fish ?

We encourage a catch and release policy. We recommend you keep one fish for the nights meal and one fish for the staff and release the rest. The skipper will often ask you to keep fish and hand them onto the local communities as you pass them during the day. We encourage this as it helps them, and gives you a chance to make new friends when you come bearing enourmous fish as gifts. Bear in mind that these guys don't often land a large fish as their gear is primitive by our standards and one 10kg Tuna will probably feed the entire village for the night. Release anything else that is not to be consumed that day.

From time to time we encourage release of all fish of a particular species or as directed by the Papua New Guinea Fisheries department. We want to preserve this wide expanse of virgin sport and game fishing for generations to come and enjoy the thrill of a big fish fight.