Not much beats catching a bucket list fish. Especially if that fish happens to be a blue marlin. And it’s double special to do it on a boat captained by your son.
Paris, Texas resident Danny Kilcrease had been wanting to get down to Port Aransas and fish with his son, Grant, who captains the 72-foot Viking Blue Rush 2.0. It finally happened on Oct. 11, when Danny was visiting his son for a baby shower and the boat had an open spot for a day offshore. Grant and Danny headed out with the boat’s owners to look for billfish at several of the offshore Fish Attraction Devices (FADs) located miles off the Port Aransas shoreline.
“I’d never been fishing for blue marlin,” the elder Kilcrease said. “But it’s always been a bucket list fish for me. Grant said there might be a billfish or two around, but to go four-for-four on blue marlin was a dream day. It’s the best trip I’ve ever been on. I was blessed to be able to take a trip like that.”
Grant Kilcrease, 31, graduated from Texas Tech with a degree in wildlife management, but a summer job before his junior year of school changed his professional pathway.
“My dad knew some folks on Texasbowhunter.com, and he sent out a note asking if anyone could use a hand for the summer,” Grant said. “I winged it that first summer, but I loved it. I moved down here after graduation and thought it would be temporary. It turned out not to be temporary, but I am blessed to be here and it’s awesome to get to do this.”
Capt. Kilcrease said this season has been the best billfish action along the Texas coast in his 10 years of being offshore.
“There are a lot of factors like current, weather and the presence of bait,” he said. “This year was really good with how the currents came up from the south, we had good bait and really good weather, so we got a lot of fishable days on the water.”
Danny said the boat made several passes near the FADs the morning of their trip, with anglers hooking mahi mahi and blackfin tuna very near the buoys. The marlin came a little farther away – up to a mile from the devices.
“That’s the only structure out there,” Danny said. “Every time we went by, we caught a mahi mahi or a tuna. It’s only about 3- or 4-feet of bouy above the waterline, but they attract a lot of life.”
The boat owners caught the first several marlin before retiring to watch the Texas/Oklahoma football game while Grant continued trolling.
“I caught the fourth,” Danny said. “The other three were caught on the small rig, so the fight took longer, about 25 minutes. The fish I caught was about 250 pounds, and he hit the teaser first, and the deckhand put the bait right by the teaser. I could put a lot more pressure on the fish due to the 170-pound leader and bigger reel. We had him beside the boat in about 7.5 minutes.”
The last fish of the day put on the best aerial display.
“He jumped close to the boat,” Danny said. “He got up on his tail and the deckhand was a little worried he might come in the boat. He was real green. We backed down and grabbed the leader. It was a good release.”
All of the marlin were in the 200- to 250-pound class.
Both father and son are still smiling thinking about the great day offshore.
“It was awesome,” Grant said. “Really special. The only reason I’m here is because he reached out. It was really cool to get him on his first blue marlin with me as the captain.”
Dad agreed.
“It was a special day,” Danny said. “Everything was perfect.”
