Birding, Hiking, and Fishing, Oh my, Part 3, Fishing

I got back to the ferry dock at 5:45 pm Thursday night and I had a four and a half hour ride home. I got home roughly 10:15. I brought in what I needed to and packed my fishing gear for the morning. I was in bed before 11 pm, but didn't fall asleep until midnight. Four fifteen (4:15 am) came very quickly. I met Eric at his house after picking up some ice at 4:45 and we made the ride to Wareham where we put in. We headed out into Buzzard's Bay






It didn't take us long to find sea bass. We were surprised to find that most of the fish ranged between 16-18 inches. Even the females were large. I know I caught some females that were around eighteen inches.  We let most of our fish go that we caught. We did keep a couple of the bigger males each. Neither of us kept any fish under nineteen inches except my last fish. We didn't get into any huge schools but one of us was on almost all of the time.

All of my fish were caughto n this set up. The bucktail looked a
lot better at the beginning of the day. Doesn't that little grub
look appetizing? That big jig outfished it all day. 

I used the same lures all day. For the first time I did a high/low set up. On the bottom I used a two ounce bucktail jig. I tipped it with a four inch white curly tail grub. On top I looped a snelled hook to my barrel swivel. I put a small grub on it in either white or pink. I thought for sure the little grub would catch the majority of the fish. I mean a 2 inch pink curly tail looks an awful lot like a fluttering shrimp. I was completely wrong. When I only hooked one fish, a five to one ratio, it was caught on the big gaudy jig. Notice I said, when I caught only one fish- I had at least ten doubles today. Sometimes I would be fighting a fish, and I could actually feel a hit on the other lure.

Eric experimented with multiple lures and bait. We used some huge (6 inch?) paddle tail grubs on a four ounce jug. He also used soft plastic squid imitations and other soft plastics. He also tipped most of his jigs with squid the second half of the day. As with all types of fishing, Sometimes I'd catch three or four while he watched. Then the opposite was true and I'd watch him. There were too many fish out there to count, but I suspect we got about the same amount of fish.

Two things worthy of mentioning were the wind and tide.

The tide was really moving. Last year when I fished with Eric, it was flat calm with little water movement in the morning. I was catching a ton of fish on half ounce and 3/4 ounce homemade bucktails. Once the tide picked up I couldn't get to the bottom with my light stuff. Lesson learned. So over the winter I made heavier bucktails in 1, 1 1/2, and 2 ounces. It is a good thing I did. I needed all of the two ounces today.

The wind was pretty strong out of the southwest today. During the morning the waves were running at roughly a foot. By the end of the day, I'm sure were were going up and over some four footers. We were never in any danger, but I did get nervous seeing some of those big choppy rollers coming at us. We got off the water in the early afternoon because of the building waves.

All in all, we had a great day. It was the perfect way to end an epic three day vaca.