After a successful career as a Florida kayak fishing guide, Adam Fisk moved to Panama to ply his skills at the new Los Buzos Offshore Kayak Fishing Resort. Every day, Fisk targets tuna, roosterfish, grouper and other exotics in the Pacific Ocean. His black marlin though, is truly something remarkable.

How a 450-pound black marlin put Fisk’s skills to the test

After fighting the black marlin for more than four hours during a 10-mile sleigh ride, Fisk may have made kayak fishing history.

Adam Fisk's Black Marlin
Adam Fisk’s Black Marlin Shows

WHO

I’ve been kayak fishing for 14 years. After catching pretty much everything swimming in my home waters of West Palm Beach, Florida, I took a job with Los Buzos Kayak Fishing Resort. Two winters ago, I hooked a marlin estimated over 600 pounds. The fish towed me at 10 miles an hour for three minutes before dumping my spool and breaking the line. My thumbs were blistered for weeks. The experience opened my eyes. I would be ready for the next billfish.

WHERE

Los Buzos is a seaside resort catering to kayak anglers. The day was calm with light wind and no current. I was a mile-and-a-half offshore fishing for bottomfish in 120 feet of water. The marlin hit a live bigeye trevally I had freelined just below the surface.

WHAT

The marlin looked 12 feet long. After reviewing photos and watching the video, several professional marlin captains estimate the fish weighed 450 pounds. As the huge marlin towed me offshore, I called the resort and had them send a Panga to back me up. The fish was towing me at three to four miles per hour, all the time heading farther offshore. The power and size were overwhelming. I had the fish on my heaviest outfit, an Accurate BV2-1000 spooled with 80-pound braided line and a topshot of 80-pound Diamond monofilament. The fish jumped a half-dozen times then dove down and dragged me for 15 minutes before repeating the show. It showed no sign of slowing down.

WHEN

I hooked the fish on August 26, 2018 at about 1:30 p.m. I held on for four and a half hours. The sun was setting when I finally touched the leader. During the fight, the fish dragged me offshore. At one point, it turned 180 degrees and charged me while greyhounding across the water. I got nervous thinking the fish might stab me with its bill. Thirty feet from the boat, the marlin turned and headed offshore again. The fish dragged me almost 10 miles before I got the leader to the rod tip. With the release official, I tightened the drag and broke the line.

WHY

Catching a black marlin shows the limitless capability of a fishing kayak. I never felt at risk. I think I could release a bigger one.

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Ric Burnley
Kayak Angler editor Ric Burnley has been kayak fishing since the dawn of the sport. In 2007, Burnley wrote The Complete Kayak Fisherman, with chapters on how-to make a PVC rod holder and glue a fish finder transducer to the hull. In 2013, he landed his dream job as editor of Kayak Angler magazine. Burnley is a regular contributor to Salt Water Sportsman, Sport Fishing, Outdoor Life, In the Bite and other print and online publications. Burnley lives in Virginia Beach with his wife, adult daughter, daughter’s boyfriend and daughter’s two cats. Experience In 2004, Ric Burnley stole his first milk crate from behind a 7-Eleven and fashioned it into a gear crate for his Ocean Kayak Prowler 15. Many years and many milk crates later, Burnley has witnessed the rise of kayak fishing from a bastardized fringe element to a legitimate industry with millions of devotees. The journey to becoming an angler started early in Burnley’s life. His father, Eric Burnley, is a renowned outdoor writer and former fishing guide, so the boy grew up in the cockpit of a charter boat and in the pages of national magazines. After college, Burnley lost easy access to his father’s boat, but not his passion for fishing. Once he had exhausted the limits of land-based angling, Burnley decided to try out a new thing called kayak fishing. About the same time, Burnley was looking for extra work to pay for his expensive addiction. His father, editor of the Mid-Atlantic Fisherman Magazine, offered him freelance assignments for the weekly publication. That led to a position as regional editor at Salt Water Sportsman, publication of The Complete Kayak Fisherman and editorship of Kayak Angler. Meanwhile, Burnley and his partner-in-crime, “Kayak Kevin” Whitley were exploring the boundaries of kayak fishing. With the bountiful Chesapeake Bay and Atlantic Ocean as their playground, the two anglers were the first to target big red drum, cobia, trophy striped bass, monster black drum, sheepshead and many other species. Once inshore species were exhausted, Burnley loaded his kayak onto motorboats and fished for bluefin tuna, blackfin tuna, king mackerel and amberjack. All the while, Burnley shared his experiences and knowledge with anglers through print, photos, video, radio, seminars and online. Almost 20 years later, Burnley continues to fish obsessively and share the stories. His recent projects for Kayak Angler cover the latest trends in forward-facing sonar and remote-controlled electric motors. Over the past two decades, kayak fishing and Ric Burnley have come a long way from PVC rod holders and stolen milkcrates. Education ● Radford University: BA English; Virginia Teacher’s License. Highlights ● Other Interests: Mountain biking, traveling, hiking, surfing and skateboarding ● Day Job: High School English teacher at an alternative school for at-risk students Fun Fact Ric’s name is a contraction of Eric. Ric is named after his father, Eric Sr. To differentiate between the two Erics, Mrs. Burnley removed her son’s E. To this day, she writes the boy’s name ‘Ric, with an apostrophe replacing the E.

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