Had Tom and Kevin aboard the Jettywolf today. Left out later around 8am. I knew going in the tide would be weak, and it sure was. Water movement for this Float-rig fisherman was near to none at the jetties. But we stuck with it, because and incoming tide most of the morning made for not a lot of choices.
In a nut shell, it was a Mangrove Snapper kinda day overall. Interrupted by moments of WOW.
The WOW first came as Kevin got his butt handed to him by a really big fish (probably a Redbass). It seems to be a trend, when people first get slam dunked, no one really realizes how strong these fish are on light tackle. The fish broke him off and the whole leader was gone.
Then, I had the same thing happen to me. And I couldn't even stop what ever I had hooked up.
The rod was horse shoed, my thumb was on the spool, the drag was peeling and that was it. My 15# leader gave.
Next up was Tom. His float goes down, he reels and hauls back, and a Tarpon in the 20-40 pound class flies from the jetty toward the boat and almost came in the boat!! The fish hit the water directly at my boats transom.......splashing all three of us. I know the water was running down my sunglasses afterwards. That was a close call. TARPON TERROR, Oh no!!
The Mangroves were almost chewin' and stealing alot of bait. As a few were caught here and there. Then Kevin hooks and get the only Red that made it to the boat. a 19 incher.
You can see the darkness in the sky in these photos, so guess what was the next WOW of the day??
If guessed rain, you were right. But this wasn't just rain, this was a Forest Gump Big rain.
We could see it coming from the SW. And we had plenty of prep time. So I re-anchored and put out lots of scope just in case 60 mph winds were with it. We got our rain gear on. I packed away the wallet cellphone and turned off the big Raymarine sounder and put the cover on it. We were ready, now. And it was sort of cool, because as we prepped, every one else around took off....they still got wet I'm sure.
Here we are and Kevin and Tom were still fishing! The rain came so hard and visibility went from 2-3 miles to 20-30 feet!
It went by us quickly, and headed offshore to the N.E. Then the sun came out and all was good again......time to make a move.
But still just a few Mangroves. So we changed up locales and ran up river to try something else.
But the tide was so damn weak, where we were. Heavy duty bottom fishing just wasn't working.
So we pitched out with lighter rods and tight-lined with 1oz. sinkers and long leaders, and live shrimp. And not long after Kevin turned into the Snappa' Stroka'.
He found them, and real good sized one too. Slam dunking one after another after another.
Then, a few Trout. No Black Drum, or Reds, which I thought we might have got tight lining the bottom and working the structure the way we did. Kevin was the big Hooker that's for sure.
Can you believe he caught a "nail"....yeah a 6 penny nail! A blue button up shirt, and then an ole coffee filter. No one ever, has caught such a weird "SLAM" before. This dang river has so much crap on the bottom, I'm not all that surprised sometimes at what gets drug up from the depths.
We ran out of shrimp and headed back to the boat ramp to clean 13 Mangrove Snappers to 16", a Redbass, 2 Trout and a Lookdown. Everyone says to me how great the Lookdowns meat is. But this will be my first and last one we ever keep. It really wasn't worth the work of filleting it.
It was a day full of all kinds of wackiness and lots of fun, that's for sure.
