By Capt. Tred Barta
In the late 1960s and early ’70s, my entire goal in life was to catch more bigeye tuna than any man alive. I would never have expected that my desire to know more about the Northeast canyons would eventually involve 50-foot boats, airplanes and the purchasing of underwater submarine salinity and sound reports established in World War II. Nor did I expect that I would discover and form the first application of bigeye tuna fishing as it revolved around warm-core eddies and currents along the 100-fathom line.
My discoveries, success, and failures were often criticized violently by the community of offshore fishermen. They felt I was irresponsible, arrogant, and obtuse and that I would constantly put my crew and myself in harm’s way. If they only knew the truth about the risks we really did take. I think there might have been even more criticism.
In the early to mid-1980s I had convinced many fishermen in the Northeast canyon community that not only was I right about water temperature, currents, salinity and warm-core eddies but my detractors also started using my techniques with great success.
Len Belcaro, owner of Offshore Satellite Services and the previous owner of Big Game Fishing Journal, developed and today runs one of the greatest tools for fishermen worldwide. By following and translating satellite data for the fishermen,
