A lot of news
 

At the risk of sounding like I'm "pimping" the charter boat I work on, or "whoring" some of the lures my captain sells, or even advertising for my electronics guy that just installed my HDS sidescan/downscan, here's a long report.
If you are adverse to any of the above, put me on the "ignore" list. There are too many people on the board that can learn "something" from my reports. As you will see, even I learned something this week after all the years I've spent on the water.

As many of you are doing, we decided to downsize our spread this week from large 9 inch shads off the boards with 22 rods:eek: to a summer spread of 9 rods with spreader bars and and umbrella's. I'm familiar with umbrella's with "storm" lures as baits. Not so familiar with the spreader bars.
In order to gain information about spreader bars, I contacted a captain on the eastern shore who is known for running nothing else during the summer and early fall. Captain Charlie Schneider (Big Will Charters) who runs out of Dogwood Harbor on Tilghman Island, met me for a tour of his boat and lunch, where we discussed lots of imformation pertaining to the use of spreader bars.
Charlie runs storm shads early in the season and switches to metal (tony's) when the blues arrive. Charlie was a wealth of information to a first year mate:D.
On the morning of our first summer trip (yesterday), I arrived at the boat early to switch out our large baits off our umbrella's. I placed 6 inch storm shads on all 5 umbrella's we run. Good 5 lines prepped and ready to fish:).
I brought two more umbrella's from home already prepped from off my boat so I wouldn't have to waste time making up rigs in front of the customers. I now had 7 rods ready to fish as soon as we found bait running south from Deale.
Water quality improved the farther south we ran. Found bait and dropped the 7 rods over. Tide book called for high tide at Plum Point at 8:30 am. (hint hint). We trolled southeast, south west while I grabbed two spreader bars and began putting them together. Captain John sells a metal spoon out of Marty's, Anglers, Tyler's, and a few other places. I've never fished them, but have put one over while trolling large baits this spring just to see what kind of action they produced. They have a nice wobble in the water and the nice thing about them is the faster you troll the tighter the wobble (they should be great for blues and spanish). Anyway, I put two together and put them out in the spread.
Water quality continued to improve but the customers were getting antsy. I explained we were at or near high tide and I didn't expect things to "break loose" until around 9:30 am. At 9:37 the first fish hit a stormbrella and the skunk was off the boat. I apoligized to the people for being off by 7 minutes and blamed it on a bad nights sleep the night before. They said they would have been really impressed if I had told them which rod was going to catch the first fish (tough crowd).
Fifteen minutes later, all hell broke loose. Fish were coming over the side so fast, it was hard to get the rods back over. Umbrella's and spreader bars were sitting on the gunnels as I removed more fish off the hook.
Captain John and I had a small bet as to what would catch best, my storms, or his spoons. Remember, I had 7 rods with shads as opposed to his 2 rods with spoons. As a fish would come over the side, I would say "love those storms", and he would say "looks like another spoon".
One of his spoon rods went down hard, I yelled "nice fish", and the customer pulled in the first double off his spoons. We did miss several nice fish at the boat, or close to the boat. One of the things I don't like about the storms is that while their hooks are laser sharp, they are very thin. They don't bend or break on me, but if a fish fights hard on the way in; or worse yet, spins, it makes a hole in the jaw and the thin storm hook can "fall out" if pressure is not kept on the fish.
As things slowed, John's spreader bars began to catch much better than the storms (2 to 1 in fact). I finally had time to switch out more umbrella's for more spreader bars, and the catching picked back up. Perhaps the metal flash was a better attractant? John's hooks are bigger than the storms so fewer "lost" fish? For whatever reason, we ended the day with more spreaders than umbrella's:rolleyes:. I had to agree, I was impressed with both the spreader bars and John's lures.
Captain John said, "If you think this is fast action, wait until the blues get here". Another thing I like about John's lure is that it is long enough to hold when the blues and spanish come in. If you are used to a drone, clark, or even a 15 tony, you know there is not much lure to grab on to. John's spoon eliminates that problem.

All of the above is good information. The fact I work for Captain John is irralevant. Those that know me, know I wouldn't prostitute myself for a lure that cost a couple dollars. Those that don't know me can kiss (well you get the message). Put a couple of John's lures on either your umbrells or spreader bars and see how they act.

After I got home, showered, and relaxed; I got a call from Craig White (Chesapeake Installers) and he wanted to come over and put in my new sidescan/downscan for my HDS unit. It is all installed and I'm ready for the spot to arrive and start livelining on my boat. I have been so impressed by the unit on Don's boat (Hunter), Baldzilla's boat, and Walleye Pete's boat, I just had to have one.

Enjoy the fishing, smaller fish were caught deep (full of mayworms) and larger fish came from mid water or near the top. I covered the water with everything from zero weight out 200 ft to 20 oz. weight out 60 ft. and everywhere in between. Six rods on a private boat with 8'6" beam would be plenty of rods. The one's where we had a "quick release" at the boat didn't interefere with us catching a limit and more. Lot's of 20 inch fish with a few mid and upper 20's mixed in.

Have fun.
5th (Marty)

Marty.. me, you, Lou, and Gary need to hook up for a chumming trip... (if I can find time to ever go fishing again)

I thought this was going to be a post about LTJ. :D Great Intel for you trolling guys, way to put this together Marty…

Great report - F...K anyone who rags on you.

Once you get that side scan dialed in - want to go anchor hunting ?

Steve; the rod you made for me used to sit "displayed" in the living room. It has now moved to the back kitchen door, where it is closer to the boat. I will be carrying it with me as soon as we start seeing more birds working fish instead of "tide lines".

5th

Thanks for the info Marty. Probly be in that area this weekend............Mark

Great report:) One of the best I have read this year!

and I think the drum are calling too:D Say when...............Gary

Great report Marty....sucks that you have to preface it with a disclaimer.
I wanna go drum fishing too!

Good stuff marty...back when I use to troll I use to like to use storm tandems...I would run the short line with a 1oz egg sinker right on the front of the storm...it kept them from tangling...(Note ...I will deny I gave out any trolling info)....:D

I have never seen anybody "whoreing" boats out?....You mean like mentioning your boat brand that you sell for someone every 5 seconds?....very strange...thanks for the heads up...:confused:

BTW sounds like good fishing....

Well we were back at it Wed. with a couple of my CBA friends (Don-Hunter, Bill-smellslikefish), a good friend I share boats with (Mark), and my cousin (Charles). The Captain brought along some buddies as well.

We ran south from Deale with the intention of looking for fish where we left off last time in the Plum Point area. On the way down; John saw nice bait with good marks mixed in. We slowed to trolling speed and the bait continued.

Putting out 9 lines with 4 experienced guys was quick to say the least. Soon after, rods started to go off and we were bringing a variety of size rock over the side.

This was a fun trip with guys who had just finished the tropy season, so we weren't keeping 18 or 19 inch fish. We had some even shorter than that, all fat with mayworms. The 21 inch fish went in the box and Pat (John's friend) hooked into a nich 28 inch fish that made the others look really small.

This was going to be too easy. But never count your chickens before they hatch. The bite died and we either lost the school or the tide changed quicker than predicted from the computer. I always have the tide change written down on a piece of paper with me when I fish, but I always need to remember this is an approximation. With several days of south wind, a lot of water was pushed north and it's possible the tide started to run out earlier than I expected.

We ate some lunch, told some stories, and trolled to new fishing grounds on the Eastern side of the bay. Where's the bait? Captain John said "pull the spread and let's go back to out orininal area". Turned out to be a good call.

We got back on the bait, with some fish here and there. Small keepers again went back. The action was not hot. Then, as he made a turn, boom several rods went down. We could once again pick through the ones we wanted to keep. As John continued to make lazy turns over the bait, the action continued. My cousin, who rarely fishes, brought in another 28 incher to make his day.

We ended with a limit of fish, but had to put our time in to get them. We pulled rods at 1pm and headed back to Deale.

If we learned anything yesterday, it was to first find bait, and second get lines as deep as possible. I even considered "bottom bouncing" with a 28 ounce sinker off a threeway and a lure of choice behind it.

It's hard to believe these fish will hit a lure with a belly full of worms. I can't wait for the mayworm hatch to be over with. Fishing should improve when we are not compeating with the worms.

5th (Marty)

Nice report Martin

Whore :)

Had a great yesterday Marty. Had a great day aboard the PATENT PENDING (410-703-3246) and once again Capt. John put us on the fish....Don

Marty I bought some of those spoons at the Tri State show in Deale a couple of months ago but haven't had a chance to use them yet.

You can also buy them at the little cafe/restaurant there in Deale...South County Cafe I think?

You got me pumped to get them wet now! Mike and I are heading out for a few evening hours tomorrow....maybe I'll get a chance to get some pullage with them. They look FANTASTIC.

If you don't have spreader bars, run them as a single lure off small umbrellas or as a tandem off large umbrellas. You might also want to take off the 6 inch storm shad teasers and replace them with twistertails or eel tails as teasers. I have been running 3 spreader bars with 20 ounces out 5 or 6 bars out of a 9 rod spread:D.

I haven't fished the upper bay in quite a while, but if the fish are feeding on mayworms, get your lures close to the bottom.

You might even try bottom bouncing one of John's lures off a threeway swivel with 28 ounces of weight.

I might troll the Lovepoint area. Best of luck.

Marty

Marty, The new gig suits you well. Certainly is getting you on the water frequently. I appreciate the invite. I hope to join you next time. Finding time to get on the water with three kids doing stuff has been tough.. but school is almost out.

BTW, keep posting away and dont worry about those who may Judge you ;)

We didn't spend much time out yesterday...the wind was pretty gnarly.

Ended up doing a little Perch fishing in the creek for a little while until the storm came.:(

Only casted the spoons a few dozen times. Took me a while to get the action I wanted but I can't wait to spend some real time working them.

Spot - The South County Cafe is Capt John's (CJ) restaurant, the guy who actually makes those lures (CJ Spoon).....Don

Excellent report. Thanks for the info.