Reel Return bottom fishing 9-12-09 New River Inlet

[reelreturn]

Finally got a day when the weatherman called for calm seas and light winds so I planned a fishing trip with Doug Kennedy and John Boyette. When John arrived at the house he noted that I only had bottom fishing gear loaded on the boat so he knew we were headed out more than a few miles. Even more surprising was that the weatherman was actually correct in the forecast and the run to some ledges in the 35 mile range proved to be comfortable, fast and with the radio playing some classic rock the ride passed quickly. As I approached my planned destination I pulled back on the throttles and was checking out my waypoint list when Doug shouted- “we’ve hit something”. I knocked the boat out of gear and we saw that the transducer was floating on its cable right behind the transom. After a few attempts to put the transducer back in the mount from inside the boat, I took off my shirt and shoes and into the water I went. Finally I got the transducer back into the mount (no easy task when the boat is bobbing up and down with the waves) and when the GPS was turned back on everything appeared to be working fine.

Our first ledge only produced some grunts, bait stealers and other trash fish, so we tried another ledge with the same result. The pressure on me was mounting to get some edible fish in the box, so we moved inshore about 5 miles to a spot where I had caught some nice beeliners and trigger fish. I finally started snagging some beeliners and John pulled up a couple to add to the box also. Doug is the grunt catching champion and today was no exception. Drop after drop only produced citation sized grunts for him and I sensed his mounting frustration as John and I were pulling in some nice fish. Doug then hooked into something which bent the rod more than his normal grunts. Commenting that he thought he had a shark on, I put my rod in the rod holder to help him out. As the fish neared the surface we saw that it was a nice sized Cobia. John readied the gaff and I grabbed the fish bat since I knew this fish was really green. John sunk the gaff and I calmed the fish down with more than a few swings of the bat. John turned back to his rod which was bent almost double with another fish on. Doug grabbed the gaff; I took my batting stance as we saw another cobia come to the surface. After calming the fish down with a few more swings of the bat, the rod with a live bait and egg sinker on the bottom starts bending with a substantial fish on. Cobia number three soon comes to the surface with John doing the honors with the gaff and swinging the bat. The cobia weighed in at 32.4 lbs, 29.2 lbs and 22.5 lbs, a nice catch while jigging for bottom critters. Here’s the happy crew with the cobia:





the days catch:

[Nauti Natured]

Great report Captain! Way to get 'em!

[thoffman]

nice catch, way to turn into a great day.

[merry marlin]

Pretty work on those cobias and those are some fat Beeliners... Wouldn't it be nice if we had more flat days on the ocean?
MM

[Sea Draggin]

Awesome job. How deep were the cobias?

Thanks,
Jim

[reelreturn]

Awesome job. How deep were the cobias?
Thanks,
Jim

We were jigging at the time- I guess the first one hit at about 40 feet, the second one 50-60 and the last one hit the live bait on the bottom

[WAHOONBOX]

NOW THAT IS STEPPING UP TO DA PLATE WITH A LOUISVLLE SLUGGER ALRIGHT! 3 COBES....I'LL TAKE THAT FOR DINNER ANYDAY ANYTIME


PRETTY WORK!

[Ponce]

Nice report and nice Cobia.

[SeaBiscuit]

Good looking catch Taylor!
I have just one word of advice regarding that transducer situation: 5200
SeaBiscuit

[gottaflylee]

Congrats guys, thats getting it done...