Had the pleasure of having Pete and Joey from Long Island, Gregg from Raleigh and my son Stephen from Pa. on board for a day offshore.
The plan was live chumming , however, the mullet that were in the marina for the last month vanished almost overnight. There were some of the 12 inch + size fish, but the finger mullet were gone. Furthermore, my castnetting skills left the marina also, things weren't looking good for the live chumming.
Not to be discouraged we pushed off in the cold water and headed about 55 miles out to the break. The temp went from 56 to 68 degrees in a few hundred yards. Things looked right, except for an empty sounder. We tried that beak a bit and then pushed offshore a bit more and picked up a nice wahoo on the troll. Still no life showing on the sounder we headed in a bit to try some jigging.
We found a few patches of fish and it was drop down and everyone would hook up with AJ's .Gregg scored his first grouper on a butterfly jig which was released to see another day. There was some serious tackle testing going on with the Long Island crowd determined to break something....everything held together. The drift was screaming over 3.5 kts so it was tough to stay on top the fish. The drift was too fast to get down to the triggers so it was pretty much a pull fest on AJ's. The ocean gave up some great visuals of dolphins, turtles, and dozens of big hammerheads and other sharks cruising the surface.
I seriously enjoyed the day even though the fishing was tough. We cruised back at 40, and opened her up to 50 once we were back inside and made it in before the sun went down. A beautiful day spent fishing in T-shirts in Feb. cannot be beat !!
The plan was live chumming , however, the mullet that were in the marina for the last month vanished almost overnight. There were some of the 12 inch + size fish, but the finger mullet were gone. Furthermore, my castnetting skills left the marina also, things weren't looking good for the live chumming.
Not to be discouraged we pushed off in the cold water and headed about 55 miles out to the break. The temp went from 56 to 68 degrees in a few hundred yards. Things looked right, except for an empty sounder. We tried that beak a bit and then pushed offshore a bit more and picked up a nice wahoo on the troll. Still no life showing on the sounder we headed in a bit to try some jigging.
We found a few patches of fish and it was drop down and everyone would hook up with AJ's .Gregg scored his first grouper on a butterfly jig which was released to see another day. There was some serious tackle testing going on with the Long Island crowd determined to break something....everything held together. The drift was screaming over 3.5 kts so it was tough to stay on top the fish. The drift was too fast to get down to the triggers so it was pretty much a pull fest on AJ's. The ocean gave up some great visuals of dolphins, turtles, and dozens of big hammerheads and other sharks cruising the surface.
I seriously enjoyed the day even though the fishing was tough. We cruised back at 40, and opened her up to 50 once we were back inside and made it in before the sun went down. A beautiful day spent fishing in T-shirts in Feb. cannot be beat !!
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