Over the past 4 days I've been fishing one of my favorite local haunts, a tiny dead end cove. Over these days I noticed that I always caught a fish in the pre-dawn gloom at one particular spot, and after that 1st drift, fishing just died until around 07:00 when the fish would start feeding for a brief moment and it was important to anticipate where that blitz would occur.
After 2 days with a fish using a popper on the first drift, I decided to go a little earlier and drag out my Dark Money Plug and relive my Sleepless Striper Skills. Got to the spot just after 05:00 and on the second cast, it was fish on. Boy did I feel smart, figuring I would be catching a few before things slowed down, yeah right. Next drift, one tail slap and that was it until the fish popped up when I got a second fish.
Today, more of the same, except the first drift only yielded a few follows and one tail slap, but no fish. Second drift, one follow and no hits, I was afraid I was smalling skunk. Drifted out past the point I was working and kept casting with no results. Once I was convinced there was nothing around, I decided to break out the secret weapon when fishing in shallow, protected coves, starting the engine. As soon as I turned the key, I noticed 5 swirls close to the boat. Immediately killed the switch and tossed out the popper, for an immediate hit and hookup. Soon I had exorcised the skunk from the morning by boating a 23" fish.
Everything seem to be dead, so I figured I'd be taking a few more casts and then move somewhere else. My thoughts were interrupted with a massive surface strike from an extremely pissed off 29" fish discovering that she had a hook in her mouth and only 4' of water under her. After thrashing around on the surface for enough time to get my heart pounding, she took off on a long run, and even a bit of a Nantucket Sleighride for me. After a bit of a tug of war, I slipped a net under a beautiful fish, perfect for the Suzuki Sashimi that The Admiral has been asking for.
Stuck things out for the anticipated surface feeding Whack-A-Mole event and scored twice out of 5, 10 second blitzes with a 27 & 25" fish, completing my 23-29" odd number run for the morning.
After 2 days with a fish using a popper on the first drift, I decided to go a little earlier and drag out my Dark Money Plug and relive my Sleepless Striper Skills. Got to the spot just after 05:00 and on the second cast, it was fish on. Boy did I feel smart, figuring I would be catching a few before things slowed down, yeah right. Next drift, one tail slap and that was it until the fish popped up when I got a second fish.
Today, more of the same, except the first drift only yielded a few follows and one tail slap, but no fish. Second drift, one follow and no hits, I was afraid I was smalling skunk. Drifted out past the point I was working and kept casting with no results. Once I was convinced there was nothing around, I decided to break out the secret weapon when fishing in shallow, protected coves, starting the engine. As soon as I turned the key, I noticed 5 swirls close to the boat. Immediately killed the switch and tossed out the popper, for an immediate hit and hookup. Soon I had exorcised the skunk from the morning by boating a 23" fish.
Everything seem to be dead, so I figured I'd be taking a few more casts and then move somewhere else. My thoughts were interrupted with a massive surface strike from an extremely pissed off 29" fish discovering that she had a hook in her mouth and only 4' of water under her. After thrashing around on the surface for enough time to get my heart pounding, she took off on a long run, and even a bit of a Nantucket Sleighride for me. After a bit of a tug of war, I slipped a net under a beautiful fish, perfect for the Suzuki Sashimi that The Admiral has been asking for.
Stuck things out for the anticipated surface feeding Whack-A-Mole event and scored twice out of 5, 10 second blitzes with a 27 & 25" fish, completing my 23-29" odd number run for the morning.
