11/11/13 Cove Point Area

[5th Tuition]

Bruce Lewin (Hook 'em) called in to work and took the day off to go fishing with Lou and I today. With Tawn's post of nice fish,overs and unders, south of Chesapeake Beach, I just had to give the Cove Point area a try today.

Because it was a scouting trip, we didn't leave CB until about 8am. We cleared the bridge with room to spare (low tide) and opened the judge up for a quick ride south. Winds were more than I anticipated and more out of the north west (yeah I know that's Kim Kardashian's babies name).
We saw some small birds working, but not much under them. We ran over lots of bait, and when we came upon 78A we saw charters working the area. I slowed, watched the meter and the charters. Saw several small fish (23 in range) boated, and decided to stick to the original plan and continue south.

Surely we would run into more birds and boats We arrived near the power plant and slowed to look for bait. Zip, nada, nothing no birds, bait, or boats. I started across the channel and found enough bait to put out the spread. We ran all 6 in. baits or spoons. I stayed long enough to give it a good try, but now, those 23 in fish up north looked pretty good

I swung the bow northward and we SLOWLY trolled back toward 78 & 78a. The closer we got, the better the bait got. When we got close enough to see the charters (probably on their second trip of the day) a rod got hit, but didn't hook up. I trolled a while and then checked the bait, the shad had been shoved up over the hook we reset the bait.

As we crossed the channel from west to the eastern side, a boat umbrella went down. Good, skunk off the boat. I watched the screen and told Bruce that I had lost the bait. Another rod goes down, soon another, and while unhooking a fish on the deck, another. We picked up five fish in about 30-45 minutes. One was an 18 in fish that we all agreed to toss back. We had 25,25,20,20 in the box and had about an hour to still troll. Surely we will pick up two more for our limit

As you can guess, those were the last fish we saw Well, at least we had some meat in the cooler and some good information. Had we stopped at 78A earlier, I have no doubt we could have had our limit early in the day. But, we would have always wondered if those 30 inch fish were further south.

It turned into a beautiful day on the water with friends (that's what we all say when we don't catch our limit of big fish).

BUT, I did get to see my Gannets never saw them diving, but they were flying and saw a couple sitting on the water. So in conclusion, it's close to busting wide open, but not quite ready yet. If it doesn't rain or snow tomorrow, I'll clean the boat. It will be ready for next time the winds lay down

5th (Marty)