GUY HARVEY, PH.D.

A successful artist, scientist, conservationist, and businessman, Dr. Harvey has done it all.

Guy Harvey is a man of many titles: Doctor of Marine
Biology, artist, videographer, conservationist, TV host, diver,
fisherman, and devoted family man.

Harvey’s skill as an artist is self-taught. He started by painting
flowers native to his Jamaican home, but soon graduated to
game fish. His pen-and-ink series of drawings illustrating
Hemingway’s Old Man and the Sea brought him huge
recognition. Today if you attend any nautical gathering in the
world, you’ll see people wearing Guy Harvey shirts.

Harvey’s conservation credentials are no less impressive. He
founded the Guy Harvey
Research Institute at Florida’s
Nova Southeastern University
and the Guy Harvey Ocean
Foundation, his personal
foundation for research and
conservation. His TV series
Portraits from the Deep also
delivers a strong conservation
message.

In addition, Harvey has
authored two coffee table books,
Portraits from the Deep and
Santiago’s Finest Hour. His
documentary TV show, Billfish,
A Challenge for Survival,
highlights the plight of this
species through-out the world’s
oceans. In short, Guy Harvey is
one of the world’s foremost
experts on billfish.

FRANK JOHNSON

Countless billfish have been brought into the spread thanks to Frank Johnson’s famous swimming soft-headed Mold Craft lures.

Whose offshore fishing arsenal doesn’t include a variety of
Mold Craft soft-head lures? Well, they were developed by
Frank Johnson, an inventor, fisherman, lecturer, and
conservationist. He also designed the aluminum unibutt, which
combines reel seat and butt, and the Roller Troller outrigger
clip, both of which are now produced by Aftco Manufacturing.

But Johnson’s notoriety is really due to the lures, which have
been responsible for many billfish tournament victories and
countless big-game world records. In 2007 his Mold Craft Wide
Range and Super Chugger lures were named first and second
among the top ten lures of all time by Marlin magazine. He also
developed the realistic Squirt Squid, Tuff Hoo, and fender
teasers.

Johnson is also an accomplished angler, having caught a
grander black marlin on the Great Barrier Reef, bluefin
weighing more than 700 pounds, and countless billfish,
including a grand slam, which involves catching three different
billfish species in one day. A strong conservationist, he was also
the first to step up with a large donation for the International
Game Fishing Association Junior Angler Gallery at its Fishing
Hall of Fame and Museum.

Johnson is now semi-retired, but you’ll still find him at boat
and tackle shows, tournaments, and wherever offshore anglers
gather.

ELLEN M. PEEL, J.D., LL.M

Ellen Peel fights for billfish conservation mainly by promoting education.

Ellen Peel, president of The Billfish Foundation (TBF)
since 1995, has had a major influence on fisheries
management, especially regarding billfish. When she took the
helm of TBF, she expanded its mission from supporting the
scientific study of billfish to promoting education and
advocacy. Since then Peel has also expanded TBF’s vital
tagging program and its annual recognition of, and awards to,
the world’s top tagging anglers, captains, and mates.

She is not only involved with National Marine Fishery
Service (NMFS) management plans, but with
International Commission for the
Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT)
and Inter-American Tropical Tuna
Commission (IATTC). Peel was at the
forefront of ICCAT’s first international
billfish conservation measures, battled to
keep longlines well offshore in Mexico, was
involved with officials in Peru to give game
fish status to billfish, and supported efforts
to keep longlines out of California’s waters.
As a result of her leadership, TBF recently
entered into an agreement with governments
in Central America to develop a regional
billfish-management plan.

Peel points to the continuing pressure
from commercial longline and purse seine
fleets as the biggest threat to billfish
resources. “Solving that problem will be the
ultimate victory,” she says.

This article originally appeared in the October 2009 issue of Power & Motoryacht magazine.