Historically, GT have been limited to the western Pacific, found as far east only as Hawaii. GT, one of the world’s most powerful nearshore game fishes, are also one of the post popular among anglers from Hawaii to Australia. They are known to reach weights in excess of 160 pounds.

Ross Robertson, Ph.D., and colleagues have termed the vast distance between Hawaii and islands far off the coast of Central America as the “eastern Pacific barrier,” noting that it presents a formidable open-water obstacle, discouraging transpacific migration of shore-bound species.