PORT ANTONIO, Portland — The Richard Stewart-owned Diana captained by Greg Lue-Tenn captured the 47th Port Antonio Marlin International Tournament after tagging and releasing eight marlin.

They won the Appleton V/X trophy ahead of Feeva, whose crew tagged and released six marlin and walked away with the Maritime Transport Services Limited Trophy, with Daddy’s Dream, whose crew tagged and released five marlin taking third place and the Chemquip Water Treatment Trophy, as all three have qualified for the 2011 Bonnier-IGFA (International Game Fishing Association) invitational world offshore championship to be held in Cabo San Lucas, Baja California, Mexico, May 8 to 13.

Wendy McMaster of Reel MacCoy, who landed the only marlin in her category, got the Peter Desnoes Red Stripe Light Beer trophy while successfully retaining the female angler title, and Krishna Vaswani of Daddy’s Dream was the top male angler winning the Philip Matalon Trophy, with the top junior angler being David Levy.

Integrity and Touch of Class also tagged and released five marlin each.

Fifty-five marlin were tagged and released; 26 lost and two landed but one was disqualified as it was not at the required weight making it a total of 83 marlin and the most successful tournament in recent times.

Over the four days of fishing 117 anglers participated with 99 Jamaicans; 10 Americans; four Canadians and one each from the Grand Cayman, Honduras, British Virgin Island and Barbados.

Steve Anderson won the 26th Fisherman Canoe Tournament on the boat King of the Sea for his 129-pound and 115-pound catches on Wednesday.

“It was very, very exhilarating because it was a lot of action,” said Richard Stewart. He added: “We lost only one fish at the boat side on Tuesday, we were very lucky, we got two on Monday, three on Tuesday, three on Thursday and none today, strange enough. We had a very good team. This is one of the better tournaments in terms of the number of fish caught and also one we enjoyed, we have been having great weather.”

Danville Walker, who was on Diana, tagged and released the first marlin for the tournament. He share his first experience: “This is my first tournament and the first time I have actually caught a fish. It was very exciting for me, the government is fully supportive of the sport fishing industry and as a member of the Port Authority Board it is very important that I come down and see the facility first hand. I was very happy when Mr Stewart invited me,”

On the impact of the tournament, he said: “The government has to support this as it provides employment and it is a very important part of our tourism industry and in particular for the people of Portland. Anything we can do to develop this industry… I believe is worthy.”

Tournament chairman Dr Ron DuQuesnay was elated: “The fishing has been excellent, the weather has changed, the weather was great, and we had a beautiful five days. The women anglers did very well, one female angler went out in an 18-foot boat and the boat broke down and they used an eyebrow pencil and stopped the gas leak and they got the prize for perseverance.”