11/8 – Today was my “off day” of the week but it was so pretty and slick calm, I agreed to mate for my friend, Captain Dean Lamont on a king mackerel charter. After playing with some albies and jigging some bait, we went off to the king mackerel grounds. I told Tom, Tom (yeah – that wasnt confusing) and Russ that I knew it was going to be a hot bite but I had no idea how hot it was actually going to be!
Within 30 seconds of putting the first line out, we had our first run – a 16lb king that quickly found it’s way to the box. Over the next hour we experienced absolute pandamonium – constant hookups and knockdowns – as six 15-25lb kings made their way to the box. After that it was all catch and release – my goal was to get the guys a triple hookup but i couldnt get two lines out before we had a fish on. After releasing several more 16-20lb fish and finally acheiving a triple hook-up, we decided to hunt for a big one…so I put out some mondo-sized baits. Five minutes later a huge fish skyed on our baits and we wrestled a citation 35lb class fish to the boat (bottomed out a boga before being released).
“Tired” of the king bite, Dean and I stopped trolling so his clients could cast to some of the plentiful albacore. With two instant hook-ups and me coaching the anglers, Dean broke out a 10 weight with 450 grain sinking line and started dredging a big gaudy fly. BANG – on his first cast he brought in a 8-10lb class king! When it comes down to it – King Mackerel on the fly rod is not nearly as hard as it sounds. The most important thing is finding a good concentration of kings (which is not all that hard) and it’s simple after that – when fly fishing for these guys it’s often very productive. While live-baiting is still king, using a fly is much easier then light tackle – a fly coming to the surface suspends on the pause unlike a jig which sinks very quickly. It drives them bonkers!
Our guys thought this was so cool that they all decided to try it even though they had never picked up a fly rod, EVER. Tom #1 was first – as I tried to hook one on a maria plug – I heard “I GOT ONE!” and Dean and I swung around to see Tom with a doubled over 10 weight. Five minutes later, a 10lb king came to the gunnel…on his first cast ever with a fly rod!! Russ was next…he struck out on his first cast but on his second cast he hooked up! Ten minutes later, a 12lb king came to the boat! Tom #2 was next – he missed his first 5 or 6 strikes before hooking a biggun’. In fact, this fish was so big that within 60 seconds, 90 feet of fly line and over 350yds of backing was GONE – with a few wraps of backing left, we started chasing the fish. The epic battle lasted ten minutes before the fly line came back through the guides…and the fish pulled the hook. We were really dissapointed…but I estimate the fish at over 30lbs, easy. On his next cast after the biggun’ pulled a hook, a king followed his fly to surface and he expertly flipped his fly to the cruising king which smashed it! Sight fishing for kings! Woo-hoo!! AFter we boated that fish, we tried for some albies and trolled for kings for a few minures – getting several knockdowns and landing a 25lb class fish.
What a day guys! It doesn’t get better than this!
11/7 – This morning I had the pleasure of fishing with Don – reds and trouts were the game and we put a part of the day asside to look for some tailin’ fish on the high tide. We started off looking for a big trout – and Don quickly found one, a nice 2.5lb fish. After landing a small flounder and pulling the hooks on a few other fish, we went after some reds. It didn’t take long – a 18″ red smashed a spinnerbait and Don brought his slam to the boat! As the tide rose looked for some tailers – we saw several (no takers) but the water didn’t rise as it should have and we had to leave earlier than expected. A beautiful morning and good fishing – doesnt get better than that.
Don – congrats on the
11/6 – Again I had the pleasure of fishing with Gregg Duke and co. This is Gregg’s third WaterDog Charter and each time he comes (regardless of the forcast), the weather is SLICK CALM. Even with the “weathermen” calling for SW 10-15, it was slick-gorgeous calm. We started off the day looking for some trouts -and it was on. Fish on every single cast – they were small (11-13″) but we weeded our way through the small ones looking for some keepers. As the morning bite started to slow, I got a call that the Albacore bite was read hot. So we motored out that way and soon found big bait balls with albies gorging on “large micros” and bay anchovies. It didn’t take but a few casts and we had two hookups.
Over the next couple of hours we played with the albies, landing close to 10 before deciding to head back to the inlet and look for some more trout on the falling tide. Again, everywhere I went – fish on every cast. But again, it was tough finding a big trout bite – we found countless schools of “popcorn trout” and we caught them on nearly every cast for hours and hours. We got a decent number of keepers and several 2lb fish – but not nearly the numbers I was hoping for. In the end, on a conservative note, we “only” landed upwards of
Great day guys!
11/5 – The workaholic that I am, I decided to fish the morning of the fantastic NCW exhibition. Of course, the weather was gorgeous – but the waterways were extremely crowded and the south wind slowed the big trout bite. Regardless, we found several good schools of fish and landed upwards of 50 trout with a nice 2.5lb trout. We would have caught more if the bugbears would not have anchored right on the fish!!
I had a great time with Herbert and Marc – they’re two funny guys and we shared some good laughs.
I also want to take the time to thank NCW for organizing such a fantastic event – I spoke with many great folks and my only dissapointment was not meeting more folks from the forum!
11/4 – This morning I had the absolute pleasure of fishing with Cathy and Robert – rbeddard on NCW – and it was operation “teach cathy to trout fish.” Lucky for us, the bite was almost as hot as it was in the days prior and we layed it on the trout. While Robert and I BSed the entire time, Cathy perfected her cast and landed countless trout on nearly every cast. We didn’t find any bigguns today, but most fish were a solid 13-15 inches and few fish were below the legal mark. That’s how I like my spikeheads – small but legal!
Great day guys!!
Tally: 100 trout in 4 hours.
11/3 – After having tangled with the mahi and killin’ the kings, Phil and Drew came down to play with the trout and reds on a perfect November morning. And did we slam them or what.
We had the first trout in teh boat on the first cast – and htey came in waves, first it was spikeheads on every cast, then 2 pounders on every cast, then a school of drum would come by – it was automatic. Everywhere we went – big, beautiful trout and plentiful reds. Seriously, all day long, we never went mroe than 5 minutes or two casts without a bite. It does not get any better than this!
Days like this have been so common lately, I don’t even know how to describe it – it seems like every day is chalk full of countless trout and reds and flounder -so many that all my days run into one!!
We fished several holes and everywhere I Went – zero boats and tons of fish. To quote Phil: “we’re the guys who never got tired of catching trout…on every cast!” They ended up keeping 15 or so 1.5-3.5lb trout for some tasty dinners.
We accomplished all goals -both Phil and Drew got their slams (and me as well – yippee!!!). Great job guys!! I can’t wait to see y’all next year!!
11/2 – This morning it was blowin’ hard so I cancelled my charter…sorry guys. As the wind let up in the afternoon, I went out for a boat ride and brief fishing trip with my best fishin’ buddy. We rode around for an hour or so, barking at birds and mullet, before I decided to scout out a hole. I fished for 30 minutes, landing 1 keeper flounder (lost two more at the boat), 7 trout and a slot red…and got my inshore slam! Zane really likes trout – he stole the one fish that I kept out of my cooler (yes – he can open coolers, rubbermaid bins, trash cans…) and walked around my boat, holding it by the tail.
10/31 – Yet again, I was lucky enough to enjoy the company of my friend Dave – Davedowneast of NCW. Dave and I have had a great time fishing this summer – both for baby sharks (haha!) and some big kings and gorgeous mahi this past August.
Dave had never tangled with the trout and reds before – and today was his day. From the first minute on, the trouts came over the gunnel. Mixed among big spike heads (12-15″) we found a good number of 2-3.5lb trout (where are the citation fish?!?!). As the reds came in waves among the trout, Dave had his inshore slam within 30 minutes of wetting his line.
The action went on like this for hours, on almost every cast. While we were working a good school of reds, our fun was spoiled by a careless netter (explained below). After we left this fiasco, we headed to another hole where the trout bit on every cast and we found many beautiful drum – it was here that Dave found his fish of the day – a 26″ slot red that took him over 5 minutes to land on a trout rod. We released the beautiful fish to fight another day. Dave kept 8 big trout for dinner, releasing over over 80 trout!
I wish everyday could be like this!
The only time we didn’t catch fish, and the only blight of the day, was the roughly thirty minutes ruined by an idiot mullet netter. I know many of the netters, crabbers and other commercials whom frequent the same waters I fish – and I’m friendly with almost all of them. This guy, whom I’ve never seen before, came into the creek I was fishing (and despite me politely asking him to avoid running over the school of drum we were working), cussed at me (unprovoked) and ran over all the fish. After scouting out the creek for twenty or so minutes, while my client dave was fighting a fish (the drum came back), he deployed his net withn 5 feet of my boat, ran over Dave’s line with his prop in the process and completely netted the entire area we were fishing. As I rose my arms up in the air, he threw a sling of curse words at me, etc. He forgets that I’m out there on the water making a living as well. If that was the only place that there were mullet – he is obviously not doing his job. I saw hundreds of schools of big hardheads that morning.
