STRIPED MARLIN
Galápagos Islands
LAND OF THE STRIPED MARLIN BY GUY HARVEY This story is an excerpt from Guy Harvey’s Underwater World
A The striped marlin is the most abundant marlin species in the Eastern Tropical Pacific. They usually hunt in small packs, often working with marine mammals such as sea lions and dolphins in their search for prey. Acrylic on canvas, by Guy Harvey.
s part of my dedicated series on billfish for my television show, Portraits from the Deep, our intrepid team of producer Ken Kavanaugh and two amazing cameramen, Rick Westphal and Dee Gele, flew to Guayaquil, Ecuador, on Jan. 30, 2006, for a flight out to the Galápagos Islands the next morning. The word about the striped marlin in the Galápagos was that they were numerous and BIG! We flew out to San Cristobal to spend a few days fishing with Tim Choate, who was trying to set up a charter-fishing operation. Not as easy as it sounds, but Tim had successfully pioneered offshore fishing in Mexico, Brazil, Costa Rica and then Guatemala. Now he had turned his attention to the Galápagos. Kathy Espinel, owner of the Hotel Miconia, met us at the airport. San Cristobal was a small, quaint town with an inviting waterfront and sea lions lounging all over the place. We wandered around the municipal dock and watched as the crew of a local snapper fishing boat unloaded a catch of Pacific cubera snapper and smaller yellow snapper. Hundreds of them. I wondered where these fish were heading, probably back to the mainland. GHOF.org | 69
