Conference wahoo::fishing-v2

    If you REALLY want a fish that'll give you a fight, find a bonito. Or a
    false albacore. You can find them this time of year off Menemsha in
    Martha's Vineyard, and sometimes they get up off the Rhode Island south
    coast. Not up to the cape itself very often, but they have been seen in the
    canal on occasion. Don't know where else to find them. 
    
    leo

    	He may be mistaken but the Captain of the boat I went out on and
    caught the skip-jacks refered to them as false albacore also. They
    do put up on hell of a fight.
    
    	RAYJ

    
    I've heard them called Bonit"a" [pronounced "BON EAT AHH"] which are
    yellow fin tuna.  I hooked up on something just beyond the islands off
    the Cape that spooled my reel and straightened a steel snap swivel.
    The Captain (of the Rosie S. also of Hyannis) said, "Looks like a 
    Bonita...  you'll never land it."  He was right.
    
    Tim

 What they call "bonita" are usually really called "little tunny." They can be
distinguished by having squiggly markings (similar to mackerel) along the
sides. I think another name for these fish is false albacore, but I might be
mistaken. True skipjacks have parallel bars on the underside; 6 or 7 I believe.
They are the only tuna with bars under the lateral line. I'm pretty sure we
don't get any of these south of the cape. I know we get little tunny. They
put up a surprisingly robust fight for their size. They are not good eating.
I'll try to remember to dig through my old issues of SWS and SF to find the
tuna identification issue...

 Bonita are definitely not yellowfin tuna.

 The Doctah

    	Maybe the fish I caught were false albacore then. I do remember a
    striking resemblence to the mackeral coloring. 
    
    	Ditto on the "not good to eat". I tried one once cooked a variety
    of ways but there is just no way to get that HEAVY fishy taste out. My
    dog liked it though.
    
    	We were trying for yellow fin at the time. This was in N.J. by the
    way.
    
    	RAYJ

    
    Doctah,
    
    I stand corrected (I guess 8))  I said I'd "heard" them called Bonita,
    but that is along the lines of you call'em croppy, we call'em crappy
    and lots-o-folks call'em panfriers. 8)
    
    I never saw the fish, just a smokin' reel!
    
    Regards,
    
    Tim

     I have retreived the relevant issue of Sportfishing magazine. It is
    the June/July 1988 issue, and the article in question is called "Tiny
    Tuna."
    
     Little tunny and false albacore are the same thing.
    
     In the atlantic, we have the little tunny, the atlantic bonito, the
    blackfin, the skipjack and the albacore. (The black skipjack occurs
    only in the pacific.)
    
     Albacore: plain fish with no streaks, iridescent blue line along the
    side when first brought in, identifying feature is a sharp white border
    on the tail fin. It also has very long pectorals (most albacore caught
    in the northeast are longfin albacore.)
    
     Blackfin: another plain bodied tuna; back is blue back, belly is
    white. Finlets are dusky, with no more than a trace of yellow. Along
    with the albacore,it is one of the two "white meat" tunas.
    
     The three tunas referred to as bonitos are the little tunny, the
    skipjack, and the atlantic bonito. The easiest way to tell these apart
    is to remember this: little tunny has wavy lines on top, atlantic
    bonito has straight lines on top, and skipjack has straight lines on
    the bottom. The picture of the atlantic bonito also has dark vertical
    bars along the length of the fish from the top to three fourths down
    the side.
    
     Good article.
    
     The Doctah

	Speaking about tuna, what about tuna steaks ?   I love the
	stuff but some is better than others.

	The common type of steaks are usually sort of a light reddish grey
	color that sometimes have a small deep red/brown section that reminds 
	me of the stuff canned by Nine-Lives/Purina.   That part is *Extremely* 
	strong tasting and my cats go nuts over it.  Big difference in the 
	taste of that section over the main part.

	The question I have is that I've seen steaks at a local place
	for sale that is very red throughout and I avoided it because
	I thought it might be from the section that is extremely strong
	tasting.   Is this just a different type of tuna ?   For about $7
	a pound I thought I'd ask first.  Anyone follow me ?

	Thanks,
	Ken

    My guess would be Bluefin tuna. There has been alot of it around
    this summer. The quality of the meat isn't good enough for the 
    overseas market. Like a good cut of beef, they look for the
    marbling-fat in the meat.
    
    Steve