Story
Captain John returned from a vacation in New England, and had a Charter for Wed. morning. He had a great day, so he called to see if I wanted to fish with him Thursday morning. I called a few friends, and we quickly put together a crew.
I was most interested in the water quality south of Deale. We still have a fair amount of debris in our neck of the woods
It's not that you can't get out and fish, but the captain must be on constant lookout for logs/sticks. Your eyes never come off the water directly in front of the boat
The last time I tried trolling with Mako Mike, we also picked up a fair amount of grass on the lures, making trolling tedious.
We left the dock a 7am and headed to an area John did well the day before. We trolled a few "marks"; and John said we would give it to 9am in this spot. Tawn, "Lucky Strike", was out there with us scouting as well. The seas were rather sporty with good three footers rolling a 46ft Markley when we were turning sideways in the trough.
Luckily, at 8:30, Captain John said, "pick em up" after only catching a few "dinks".
We ran south and found an area with good bait and a few marks. Over went the trolling gear. Not too long afterward, we spotted birds working. From this time (9:30) until we picked the rods up (1:30pm) we had constant action moving from one bird show to another.
I won't lie, we caught a lot of undersize rockfish, but we picked up enough keepers to make the day enjoyable (9 rock; two over 30 inches, most 23-25 inches). We also caught 10 nice Spanish Mackeral, and PLENTY of bluefish. It's fun to see some on the boat catch their first Spanish
We had four very experienced fishermen (mates) onboard, and we needed every one of us
The action was fast and furious. We trolled 7 rods, and often had 7 rods hooked up
Because the boat is sooo wide (beam) we could get away with running the same distance and weights on the both sides. We had 8oz back 10 bars (100 ft); 10oz back 8 bars (80 ft); 16oz back 5 bars (50 ft) on both starboard and port gunnels. A sole center rod with 20oz back 4 bars (40-45 ft) completed the spread. Everything caught.
Getting the rods back in the water quickly was the key. Precise placement kept the tangles to a minimum, and Bruce, Ronnie, Mako Mike and I kept shaking fish in the coolers and resetting rods for the others to bring in. Action was so furious that sometimes we had baits just dragging below the surface waiting to be put out when the boat came off a turn, and they got hit as well
Like I said, precise placement of the lures and the rod placement was key. When action slowed, I would check the line angle or rod placement. Occasionally, I would find something amiss. "This ain't right" I would say and grumble while resetting. Mike finally had enough and said, "For God's sake somebody please get me a snickers bar for Marty"
Tis true, I have a habit of taking over the back deck after mating with John for three years
Mike asked me if I was doing my best Dave Carrarro impression (Wicked Tuna), because he has everything "just so" on his boat
I drank a few beers and settled down
Back at the dock, Captain John filleted a bunch of bluefish and cooked them up in his deep fryer for us to sit under the cabana at Herrington Harbor and eat some of our efforts. It was delicious.
Rain started falling on the drive home; it was a wonderful day on the water with friends. No debris seen down south !!!!
5th