With the wind howling the past few days the urge to go out even in the new Contender was really not there. I'm sure the fish were around but chasing mid 30-inch fish around in a gale just wasn't on the menu. So after a few days off the water I started getting the shakes and knew it was time to get fishing fast. I had hoped to get out this morning, but I was tired after work and the wind was still screaming and shaking my house, so I took a nap and planed for the evening.

Ruge came by the house around 1700 hours sans gear. I outfitted him with a spare 7-foot St Croix and a few big pogie/herring looking plugs. We piled into the F350 with our waders and we headed for several local estuarys.

The first place we hit looked promising and had a TON of pogies durring the middle of the night, but when we arrived it was deader than Elvis. After about an hour of flogging dead water we opted to do a little recon and foud several nice spots but none were looking particularly fishing at the time.

We packed it up and ran about 8-10 miles to another estuary thats been producing. We arrived to several guys fishing and a few with rods bent over. Ruge and I took up our spots at the end of the line and on the first cast I was tight. Soon Ruge and I were rasing fish every few casts.

I had a few early season braided line issues and I was dumb enough to leave all my cutting tools at home. It's always fun to cut away 50-pound braid knots with your teeth. So after sawing away at the braid and wearing away 10 years of enamel from my teeth I was back in the game for a short time. A braided loop that caught a guide sent a new Salty Danny to the far shore unattached.

While I was fighting new braid Ruge was tossing a new Ocean Lures SP that I was given to try. It was INSANE! He was throwing the lure a mile and it was raising fish on every cast. Not all the fish were big enough to eat, but they all wanted to smash the SP. I was able to get my line issues under control and I tied on another SP and began to make my comeback. Ruge got slowed down by a bluefish that swallowed the SP and like the cutting tools we left the pliers home too. The hook removal on the 10-pound bluefish in chest deep water nearly cost Ruge a finger or two, but it gave me enough time to catch a few fish and catch up to him. After surgery Dr. Ruge showed that he was not going to be beaten today and hung a nice bass at the end of a 70 yard cast. After a few runs and a few close calls on the rocks Ruge landed the mid 30-inch bass.

After a few pics the fish was released and as he let the fish go the tide slacked off and the bite was done. We made a few more casts but it was obvious that the fish were not going to eat until the water began to move. We however couldn't wait that long so we packed it up and headed for home.

Final tally a between a dozen and two dozen fish. The largest being a 10-pound bluefish and a mid 30-inch bass. Several other guys landed fish around us that size and we saw one that was an easy 40 inches. I got a few fish on a Yellow Salty Danny before I threw it into the next county without line attached. From there on it was the Ocean Lures Show! The new SP that Paul has created is a floating surface darter that casts like a rocket hence the name (SP stands for Surf Plug) It darts around with a walk the dog action that the fish just couldn't stand. The huge casts were a big help reaching the channel where the fish were hanging. Ruge was throwing Yellow and I was tossing Pearl White.

Overall a nice way to spend a few hours. I don't don the waders often and its always fun. Except when I go in too deep like tonight (the curse of being short) We will be back at the same spot at around 0400 to catch the new round of the tide and see if we cant get one of those 40" fish we saw.
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Good Luck,

Capt. Terry Nugent
Riptide Charters
www.riptidecharters.com