Saturday on Platts

[maineraptor]

Haddock fishing was awesome. Only a few cod, only one cusk, and a huge wolffish which I released. Hooked what I thought was a haddock on a butterfly jig which work great on haddock by the way, then it pulled a little drag and I said "this is a better one", then it ran off about 200 yards of 30 pound PowerPro across the surface smoking the water. By the time the lines were cleared and the chum bucket was in the Regulator, my Avet MXL 6/4 was just about spooled.

After running it down to get about half the line back on the spool, I fought that BFT for exactly 3 timed hours. The Avet and the St. Croix SWC70MHF worked perfectly. I even worked it close enough that I think I saw color once but bottom line is that the rig was overmatched. It's 38 miles back to Georgetown and I was done and didn't know if I could ratchet down more or not so I handed over the rod and we decided that it was make or break time. Five minutes to the broken line. We have no idea how big it was but I've caught a lot of very big Yellowfin down south on 20 and 30 pound gear so we think it was probably a giant.

From now on that rig will only be used to sight cast to known smaller BFT. Avet HX 2 speeds only for butterfly jigging from this day forward. One of the crew marked that fish on bottom on the machine just when I hooked it.

We ran home happy!!

[Dads Dream]

what a day.....and good memories.....especially if you saw color......bet it was a 70+ incher! Way to stay on the fish......

~Rich