Fingers report 7/9/06

[Persistence2]

Boat: Persistence2
Crew: Keith, Lee, Steve and myself
Area(s) fished: 21f Finger and east of the 65/65 finger
Water: 75-76 degree, blended
Seas: 2-4ft swell in am, some wind chop in afternoon but overall, nice.

We cleared LC Jetties a little after 4am headed for the Fingers. Plan was to try the 21f Finger for a bluefin. Set lines in around 6:10am. 10-15 minutes into it the Bird/GM line is smoking. Steve wrestles the fish up to the boat but unfortunately, some boatside antics by the fish caused the hook to pull so we are 0 for 1. (40 or so pound BFT). We make a couple more passes then work the deep hole with no more bites. I can hear Capt. Joe to our north banging on some YFT so we troll that way (Thanks again Joe). He is about 4 miles north of us I figured... Along the way, we see some nice grass lines and bait/porpoises. The short rigger comes down hard and peels drag but main-line breaks (I'm blaming it on the bluefish from last week:) ). The long rigger also comes down and is hooked. We fight this fish for like 5-10 minutes and hook pulls (0 for 3). Continue along and the long rigger comes down and Lee fights the fish and Keith sticks him...Nice YFT. 1 for 4. As soon as we put the boat in gear, the short spreader and the wfb are hammered. Steve fights the spreader bite and Lee sticks him. 2 for 5. Keith fights the WFB fish for a good 10 minutes...hook pulls. 2 for 6. We continue our troll and get another bite or 2 that both do not stay tight so now it's like 2 for 8 (Below the Mendoza line). Find the mini fleet and the bite has cooled. Joe says he's getting some planer bites so down goes the meat stick with a drone spoon (thanks Joe). Not 10 minutes later after trolling over some Skipjacks we get a YFT on the planer. 15 mintes later another nice YFT on the planer. OK, 4 for 10. Not long after this the long rigger comes down and I drop back and jig...miss the fish 3 times. Also the WFB comes down but no one home. Mahi is my guess but now it's 4 for 12. 2 hour lull with no bites but some nice marks, skippies on surface and YFT airing out. OK, FINALLY we get a smoking bite on the flat line...100 yards of line peels off then you guessed it, gone. A little while later I'm clearing some grass of the spreaded (cranking it in) and a dumb-a$$ tuna crashes it but misses the hook. UNCLE!!! 4 for 14. Just not our day to keep em' tight but we had a lot of bites. (yes, I do sharpen my hooks religiously)

I also left 400 dollars worth of spreader bars laying on the dock. Remembered this after I pull into my driveway but God had mercy on me...Lee drove back over to the boat (after I woke him up) and they were still there [grin]

Boat ran very well and the crew was a lot of fun and worked hard all day. Thanks guys. Next time the average will be better and we'll have to head in early due to a FULL box.

Gelnn

[Paul]

NIce Job!! We were a little south of there and had 3 yellowfins and 1 Bluefin and many bluefish releases. Missed a few too!! Thought the radio was quiet and figured out later the channel got changed. Oh well. Was a pretty day out there to relax. Tight lines. Paul

[ocnslr]

Thanks for the report, Glenn. Sorry to hear about the misses, but all that activity couldn't have been all bad... [smile]

Brian

[HIT N RUN]

Man, I wish I had been there. Sounds like a lot of fun. I guess the cooler water up your way is the place to be.

Bill.

[Persistence2]

Thanks guys and for sure, I'm glad to see the bites. Some of the charters I was near did VERY well and really put on a clinic. Yes, the 20-30 fathom area up and down the line seemed to be holding fish. I marked some very thick areas of what I guess were sand eels (mark bleeds from the bottom up about 20ft off the bottom) and lots of life for sure. In hindsight, I probably should have stopped and put up camp where I had some bites all by myself but that's a tough call when you hear Joe and some others really waxing em'.

Good luck out there everyone. The next week or so should be dynamite.

Glenn

[tyler sprenkle]

Hey Glenn,
How have you been? Sorry to hear your hook up ratio wasn't good but it did sound like you guys got a lot of action. We were also out there but didn't hear you. We started out @ 2:30am out of Owls Creek thinking we would get an early bite. No early bite but we did get two 45lbers at the top of the 22f finger. Actually, I didn't get anything because I was on the floor but I did manage to drive, leader and gaff while sick(not recomended and not fun). Never been sea sick before and I hope I never repeat it. I did recover later in the afternoon to fight a throwback but that was it for us. Nice day big rollers early in the dark but did flatten out.

[Persistence2]

Tyler,

Been doing well, thanks!

...sorry to hear about the sickness. That sucks... I was on 79 all day since I was fishing near a couple charters who were nice enough to give me some info...and I tried to let them know where I was hooking up in case the bite they were on slowed (which it did not...for them[wink])

Nice work on the tunas.

Glenn

[Ben S]

Glenn,

Way to go man...wish I could have been with you guys instead of dark and 78.

Glad to here the old girl ran good!

Ben

[Here We Go]

Thanks again for the invite always fun fishing with you. Boat ran greattttt.

Need to cut down on our release ratio[grin]

[Mike Avery]

Glenn, great report. We were having problems with the hookup too. Lost 4 nice ones, one right at the boat. One of my lessons learned is don't make a wire leader too long. As I was leadering a big YFT on a wire leader, he kept circling trying to get back down. Think he circled a kink in the wire then he was gone about a second before the gaff sunk into him.

Great talking to you on the water. We saw the mini fleet but found some YFT a couple of miles SE of the fleet so did not have to get anywhere near them.