06-07-2025
Aussie fisherman stunned after tagged marlin's 13,600km journey makes history: 'Exceptionally rare'
A black marlin's incredible voyage across the Pacific Ocean has made history books, two years after it was tagged and released by a Queensland fisherman. Carlos Zambrana caught the fish on the Australia Day long weekend of 2023, and had no idea of the journey that lay ahead of the juvenile gamefish.
In the two years that followed, Carlos didn't give the fish another thought. He's a member of the Redcliffe Peninsula Game and Sportfish Club, and told Yahoo News the marlin was originally caught during one of their annual tournaments off the cape of Moreton Island.
"This particular marlin was caught early on day one of the tournament at 9:29am. As the marlin was a juvenile, it did not take long to get it beside the boat,' Carlos said.
'The fight was approximately 10 minutes. Once beside the boat, captain John Eagle tagged it quickly with a tag pole and off we went again in search of our next marlin.'
Unfortunately, Carlos didn't get a photo of the fish at the time because of the fast pace of the tournament, but he estimated the fish weighed around 15kg based on its size of 1.5 metres.
In late March this year, 13,600km away near the coast of Costa Rica, a fisherman landed an impressive 130kg marlin. While the fish was being filleted, the crew onboard the Wingman found an odd device embedded inside the flesh.
That device turned out to be the same NSW DPIRD tag that Carlos' team applied more than two years ago. The fish had gained around 115kg in that time, growing around the tag and damaging part of it.
Thankfully, there was enough information on it for the fishermen to eventually link it back to the NSW Government's Game Fish Tagging Program, the largest program of its kind in the world.
The data revealed the marlin swam more than 7,360 nautical miles between the continents, and is officially the second farthest distance travelled by any tagged fish within the program.
The current record for the longest journey stands at 7,780 nautical miles, and was another black marlin that was tagged off Yorkey's Knob in 1996 and recaptured in 2000 – also in Costa Rica.
Carlos said he was amazed when staff from DPIRD reached out to confirm that the fish was his catch from 2023.
'I was truly excited of the history of the catch and amazed at the distance and journey these wonderful creatures take over a short period of time. I was also contacted by the people from Costa Rica as they were also excited and amazed,' he said.
'The information that's captured on this program is truly amazing and gives great insight on these great creatures.'
The Game Fish Tagging Program has tagged more than 170,000 fish in the 50 years that it has been running, however less than one per cent of marlin species have been recaptured, a spokesperson from the NSW Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development Fisheries told Yahoo News.
'While black marlin recaptures do occasionally occur in both Australian waters and nearby international waters, particularly around the Pacific Islands, long-distance recaptures like this are exceptionally rare,' the spokesperson said.
'Several black marlin have been recaptured in places like Hawaii and the Central Pacific, but this is only the second time a black marlin has been recaptured as far away as the Western Pacific Ocean off Costa Rica.'
The spokesperson said the marlin's rapid growth rate while expending energy to cross the Pacific was an 'impressive feat'.
Anyone who catches a tagged fish should report the find to the Game Fish Tagging Program.
'The Game Fish Tagging Program is a citizen science program and without the tagging and the recapture reporting by anglers, commercial fishers and others, the program could not operate,' the spokesperson said.
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