22 Jul Flounder and Mahi
Its HOT summertime, a great time to be offshore and not sweltering in the heat on land. Fish get hot too, the flounder that come spawn inshore during the spring are now rolling to the deep water in the ocean. Below the thermocline (about 20-40ft down) the water stays a cool 50ish degrees or so year round. Just like us in the summer, they want to escape the heat! The past two weeks we have done a mix of trips. Offshore trolling with a bit of flounder fishing, then flounder fishing with a bit of offshore trolling! Also slipped to the Chesapeake bay side to Cobia fish, the cobes are at their northernmost range right now (in our backyard 🙂
We tried to jump on the end of an almost non existent bluefin tuna run this year. Went out and trolled the 20 line dragging a WWB (way way back) line in search of the bluefins that are normally around this time of year. an hour intro trolling we get our bite! Line dumps off our 80 class reel and we strap a guy in for a fight. An hour later, we have the fish almost boatside when it starts to look funny in the water…. Wait, that is not a tuna….. Somehow, a giant ocean sunfish decided to actually EAT our bait.
Hooked a sunfish, it actually ATE!
We have heard of them getting snagged, but never heard of them eating a trolled bait! So we snap a pic and let him go. We did have a steady pic of nice size gaffer dolphin throughout the day which was nice to see inshore. Ran back in to finish the day with a few flounder. O yea, it rained all day, quite the gloomy day, but fish were still hitting the deck!
Pretty dolphin
A pretty bull dolphin from July 11th
Over to the Chesapeake we took a quick evening trip to go catch a Cobia. The water is a little dirtier up here vs the Chesapeake bay bridge tunnel where the guys sight cast. So we go old school and set up a chum slick. Dropped anchor in about 14ft of water, put out our chum bucket and 4 lines with cut bunker. Nothing fancy about this, its lazy bait fishing at its finest. OK, we know what we are in for, RAYS. You have to just deal with them, so we battled a good dozen bruiser rays, good way to test your tackle for sure.
Fully focused during the battle
Then, something bites a little different. Its heavy and runs right to the top (they do that almost every time) There he is! The Cobe we were after, good size one too. In the fish box he goes, man, they are good to eat…
A nice 40lb Cobe
Wrap it up and head on back, not a bad trip for not thinking about going until 3pm that afternoon.
Back to the ocean the next trip, this time we were focused on flounder. They are back stacked on the wrecks, not only the reef, but any structure out to 30 miles it seems.
Who you lookin’ at
Dont worry, our fisheries management are already going to F’ this up for us. Last week they announced a 43% cut on flounder next year, today they said, well maybe 23% instead. All this coming from the poorest data that would make any real scientist turn over in their grave. Anyhow, let’s catchem’ while they let us, so off to the reef we go. Started at 6:30 and had our 16 fish limit by 8:15.
That is how good the fishing is right now. So with the whole day ahead of us we ran offshore and trolled up a couple nice Mahi.
Now this is how you hold a fish
Jeff with a nice bull
Then finished the day popping some nice sea bass. Kept the guys busy all day and had great weather. Whats next? More flounder….. Catchem’ while we still can.
Limit of flounder by 8am then trolled up some mahi
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