Wednesday evening
 

Went down to do a good cleaning on the boat. When I arrived I found Marty's boat in the driveway on the trailer and Marty sitting on the picnic table. He looked like a little boy that someone had just taken his candy away :( I questioned what was wrong and he couldn't get boat in the water due to the flood tide. Well to make him feel better I told him I would take him fishing as soon as boat was cleaned and the frown turned upside down. We hit the water around 5:00 and was greeted at the shoals by peanut bunker busting everywhere and once we located some fish Marty started tossing fubber and me metal. Marty was first to hook up with a nice 23" and it was released. I then hooked up with a fat 26"+ fish and after Marty put his best Jimmy Houston move on him it was put in the live well.( we were not planning on keeping so cooler and net back sitting on the dock.) Action continued for a couple hours and after keeping another two over 23" we headed for the barn. Great nite on the water with Marty.

Thanks for turning that frown upside down:D

When we cleared the Bodkin Channel (and said "Hey Jake" to my uncles ashes at #5 day marker) Mike asked "Which Way? Left or Right?"
Uncle Jake rarely lets me down, so we turned in the direction I felt called:)

At first, I was nervous. Didn't see much of anything flying or breaking. Saw a friend of Mike's out trolling, and not producing:mad: Then we saw a ton of eel grass floating along a tide line that would have made trolling difficult.

I was beginning to wonder if Jake was toying with me:eek:

Mike said, "You take the wheel. I have to kill some of these flies". They were voracious last evening. Mike had the deck looking like rabbit poop was all over it:eek::eek:

I spotted some action in the distance and we ran to a productive area where we stayed for almost 2 hrs (until sunset). At first, fish were deep, and as our drift took us up and over a hump, we would pick up a few nice fish on each drift.

As the evening grew dimmer, the fish came up to feed and birds helped show the way. Instead of a few fish under us, it was "Game On".

Not all big fish, but the quality of keepers was fantastic. It would go something like this, 19, 18, 19, 26, 19, 19, 18, 29, 19, 18, 25. Heck, I can deal with that:)

Not planning to keep any fish that evening, Mike left the net at the dock (mistake). I got his 29 in the boat and a few other keepers (we were releasing 23 and under). Mike hooked up another real nice fish, and when it came boat side, I reached over to lip it when it suddenly went berserk and threw the treble into my knuckle. At first, Mike said "Wait until I post on CBA that Marty lost my big fish". But when I came up from the gunnel with his lure in my hand, he softened:eek::eek:

Luckily, THE BONE kept it from digging deep into my thumb, but it is sore today:mad:

I certainly didn't think it would be a problem launching my boat (extremely high tides from Jose); but Mikes invitation to fish made the evening a good one. Always a pleasure to fish with Mike, and Jake was right once again:):):)

5th

Nice work boys!! Sounds like keeper Fish have been scarce lately.