Well, what can I say. Last day of the Maryland season was spectacular
We had 50* weather, light and variable winds, and most importantly; lots of nice fish
Knowing we would have a nice moving current if we could launch at 7am, we hustled down Rt 2/4 to get to PLO just around daybreak. As we traveled past Huntington Md, I got a call from Tawn saying he had just seen us trailering down the road
We launched and headed in the direction of last weeks successful spot near Green 65. As we approached, Jason got out his stabilizer binoculars and did a sweep looking for bird activity. I found some nice bait balls and we slowed to trolling speed only to find more bait. I decided to put out the boat rods and scout the area. We trolled about 15 minutes without any hookups and spotted Greg Buckner in the Miss Susie to our starboard. Jason threw the "glasses" on him and we saw someone reeling in an empty umbrella, then another, until he finally picked up and ran south-west at a fast clip.
We debated as to follow him (surely he had just received good intel and was running to fish). Jason spotted birds where Greg was heading, and we began pulling rods as well. Half way through the 8 rod spread, birds descended on an area right in front of us (about a 1/4 mile away).
Put 'em back over I hollered. We got 6 back in the water when a huge pile of fish showed on the screen (the biggest of the day)
Watch your rods, I yelled. One rod went down, two, three, four, five, and six followed quickly. Jason, Alan, and Lou were laughing and winding fish. They called for me to come grab another rod that was bent over significantly. With all of us fighting fish, I was glad that Bill builds a boat that tracks straight and has a second station
Fish were all over the deck. Nice fish too. Most were in the 26-27 inch range, and because we were meat hunting for Lou and Alan; along with the fact that Jason was itching to break out his jigging rod, we put most of them in the box. Alan was struggling with what appeared to be either a BIG fish, or two on one umbrella (last week I only had one lure on each umbrella, but I put double lures on some of them this week):roll eyes:
Alan would reel a few bars and rest, reel a few bars and rest; I said, "Alan, you do realize that hole in his mouth is getting bigger don't you?" He said, "I know, but this is a big fish!" Well, as you may have suspected, it was a big fish, with another nice fish on the second lure. Lou netted both fish and Jason helped Lou lift them both into the boat.
We quickly surveyed the fish in the box as well as those still flopping under the stern fish box, and tossed some of the smaller (yet fat) 24-25 inch back into the drink. This left us just a couple short of our limit. I swung around and made another pass through the school, and we kept the two largest to fill our limit.
It was 8:20 am and we were done.
I thought Jason was going to dance a jig (pun intended), because now we could go chase birds and jig for a few hours
And jig we did; we ran into Breakaway (Jeff Banks and Jim Catterton on Jeff's 27 Judge) as we chased one bird show and another. On occasion, they would go to one group while we checked out another group and compared sizes of fish. As we headed UP river, the fish appeared to get smaller than those in deeper water. We ran back out to where we had such success trolling and within a quarter mile of our waypoint marks, we found a nice grade of fish again.
Most of our jigging fish were smaller than the trolling fish, but occasionally, we found fish up to 29 inches to jig. Alan got the hang of jigging (he had never caught a fish jigging) and fought a big fish all the way to the boat, only to have it break the leader line and swim off
Jason, Lou, and I continued to bring fish after fish over the gunnel.
I decided to fish until 12 noon, and we left the fish biting. As a matter of fact, I started the motor and slid off toward Cornfield Harbor, and the screen lit up again with a big school. I thought Jason was going to have a heart attack as I slipped over the school and opened up the Honda to make the quick run back to the ramp.
Not many photo's taken today (we fished instead). With this being the last day of our season, everyone kept their hands on the rods instead of the camera. I do have one photo of Jason with one of the nicer grade of fish we were jigging.
It has been a wonderful year. I gave up mating on the charter boat so that I could get on my boat more frequently; and it was quite productive. The season isn't over, there's still Virginia and the coastal waters off O.C. to investigate, but those will only be attempted on "perfect" days that will be few and far between.
The sun is setting on 2014, and I'm glad to have found even more anglers with whom I can share this watery world.
It is with great anticipation that I look forward to 2015. I couldn't be happier with the boat or the fishing opportunities it affords me.
Have a great Holiday. See you on the water soon.
5th (Marty)
PLO 12/15/14 w/photo
Sitting home with the damn flue.
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