Author: Riley

The boring part of the story. Well today we had our buddy Scott from Tappahanock come up for the day. Scott, Scott, Mitch, and I left dock around 11 am. They waited for me to get back from church. We couldn’t get to our reliable spot because someone had put a tremendous fish net out. It seemed to go to the Md. waters but at least we knew we couldn’t fish our hot spot. The fleet was over the NNK reef and south just past R 62. We fished the northern edge of the reef and picked up a few nice ones but decided to head closer to 62. Caught a nice 23″ just on the ledge and slightly north of the 62 buoy. Kept hitting dinks so we moved to the Asphalt Pile, wow a bunch of fish but mostly smaller in size. Finally, we got a 20″ fish and I mean 20.0085 but a legal fish. Moved back to 62 and added two more 23″ers, they came at the same time. We did have another good one that got off right at the boat that was definitely a keeper.

Ok, now for the real story, I saw three things I thought I would never see today. First, Scott told me to throw back the 20″er that was in the boat. I could not believe my ears so I asked again and again to confirm. Second, he had his hands on the weight of the last keeper only to lose it at the boat. This was the most surprised I have been and if I could describe his face when he told us if got off I would win a Pulitzer for sure. If you know Scott you know the face. And finally, as we were coming back in we saw 250ish birds just tearing up the water and he did not stop. I mean we only needed one fish. I thought he had had a stroke so I got up to take a look at him. He was dedicated to getting home before dark but this is the same guy that got me to stop for birds when we were in 5 foot seas and thought we were not going to make it back home. Birds are working…we are fishing just that simple.

Could have limit but read the second paragraph. Two 23″ and one 24″. But, as normal we had another great day on the water, caught fish, had a bunch of laughs and came home with a good haul. Scott is taking them home to share with his bride and we will see him again at fish camp after Christmas.

Anyone else want to love the technical side of fishing? Well too late, here we go with analysising the moon transits and phases. In general, we you have an opposing lunar transit you will catch more fish as they are more active. People either love the full moon (as it brings out more activity or hate it because they are believed to eat all night therefore not in the mood of biting during the day). I tend to think it is more about being at the transit as opposed to a particular phase. How else would we explain these captain boats getting limit almost every day?

Moon Tranist is when the moon is either directly overhead. I think we get more fish when we are opposite the moon transient (moon at moon rise or at the horizon) and then about 2 hours after. Find the moon rise time and be on the fishing grounds then, hopefully you will have your limit in two hours.

There are a seemingly endless amount of varibles in fishing. How many of these varibles you get right as opposed to wrong decides how many fish you catch. I do think it is sometimes a numbers game, meaning there are so many little fish mixed in witht he bigger ones sometimes you just need to catch more fish to get more keepers. I guess that is the main difference between the pros and those of us that just have a good time fishing.

Without question it does matter, we have been very successful this year where others have not. Why is the question. Here are some of the factors that I pay attention to:

• How clear is the sky? Change you baits based on if they sparkle in sun light or need to dazzle the fish with zero sun.
• Kind of bait? This does seem to change every year but without question umbrella rigs are bigger producers year to year.
• How deep? For this years striper I think fairly close to bottom, may 5-8 feet above.
• Tatics? Again for this year, when I see a school of fish on the bottom I do a “crazy Ivan” (yep from the Tom Clancy novel “Hunt for Red October”. I think dropping the baits down with the turn then bringging them up quickly by straightening out makes a big difference.
• Weather? Well sometimes you can’t wish for better weather but fish do not like a pressure lowering quickly. So if you have to get up leaves because rain is coming you may as well go do it because fishing doesn’t seem to be as good anyway.

Well that’s just how good fishing is right now, Megan, Sara, and Bubba and I went with out this afternoon. We went to the NNK reef like we have for the last several trips and there were a ton of boats everywhere. The boats were thick from maybe just north of the reef to R 62. We found our spot in amongst all of the fleet and started setting out our gear. As we were started the purple striper eater went down. Sarah and Megan had to fight that one on their own because we both had rods in our hands trying to get set. Thankfully, it slowed down just long enough to get the other rods in the water. We were working all the time with really no slow down. We did not go more than about 5 min. between fish. Got mutliples a bunch of the time as well as some doubles that had two big fish on.

The title of this post was created by Megan. We had caught 3 of our 4 fish for limit so we started throwing anything back that was not bigger than 23″. Megan could tell before the fish got over the gunnel that it was not going to be bigger than we were looking for so we got a laugh each time she said the now famous slogan.

We fished our same umbrella rigs. This afternoon was very clear, warm, the water was basically flat so I think the purple with clear silver speckled rig did the best but it was a close call with our white and chartreuse combo contrasting rigs. The water temp was 53 degrees and crystal clear.

The Crew, Megan had not fished very many times but jumped right in and did a great job. Sara is a typical trooper and expert by this time. Bubba as always is completely dependable to keep everything working wonderfully and is great at setting the lines out as well as ensuring we get all the fish in. We ended the day with 4 all 23 – 25″.

Look at this guy Megan is holding, he had been caught so many times his mouth was just destroyed. I’m glad we were the ones that were capable of putting the fish overboard as a keeper. I am not sure how he would survive with no mouth! Give him credit he kept biting the hook (we just had the kind of crew that could actually catch him).

Todd and Jacob came over today at about 8:15. Good timing as High Tide was around 10:08 so we hit that pretty much on the money. We went to just north of 1 GW because we saw some birds working a bit. Set everything out but all told there was not hardly any bait and didn’t hit a single fish. I called Vince because he was about an hour ahead of me, he was at the NNK reef or just north of it. He had not caught a fish but had lots of action around him so we headed there. Certainly no more than got the lines wet we started pounding them in. We caught so many it was difficult to count. We caught a bunch that were keepers, maybe 20+ but if they were well hooked we just let them out because we knew some bigger ones were mixed in with them. We easily caught our limit in an hour and they were 23, 25, and 25. Waited for a cargo ship to cross and we headed to dock.

While we were out there we called Mitch and Scott (son) to see how they were doing. They got into some nice striper just south of the NNK Reef. Overall, the bay is just loaded with very quality fish. Mitch and Scott got these two (nice ones).

Went on a charter on the Mystic Lady II with Capt. Jack and for today Mark as the first mate. As you would expect we just had a great day. We set off on the docks at first light, maybe 6:45 or so. The trip out was perfect, the sun coming up was just beautiful. We had Scott, Bubba (in pic), Trey, Charlie, Charlie Jr., Lucky (yes and that is his M.O. as well), and Myself.

We head out towards the Va/Md border. Started seeing a bunch of birds but as a very good Capt, Jack somehow knows the difference between birds over a group of small fish and those of the bigger fish. So we moved around, set out our Rods and caught a one keeper but more unders than Jack was comfortable with so we moved a 1/8 to 1/4 mile or so north.

This is what we mean when Birds Go Wild or we affectionately call it a Birdnado (a tornado of birds). We caught our limit by 9:30 or so and were back at dock by 10:30 or so.

Just another great day on the water. As you can see the water is very calm, the sun up, the wind down, and the air temps were about upper fifties but certainly felt warmer.

You can contact Captain Jack Frazier at (540) 809-3282 to setup a charter. You will not find a finer captain and crew on the bay.

Here is my setup. I only go back behind the boat with about 40 – 100 feet of line. That is closer than I have in the past but it sure seems to be working. All things considered this runs about 10 – 15 feet below the surface depending on if I add a 6 oz or 32 oz weight, this is depending on how deep of water, current, etc. I clip directly onto the umbrella rig. This also helps when finishing up for the day as you can move the clip to the rod and easily roll up the setup, then I put the umbrella away. Quick in and out.

Update: Obviously adding different weights gets this to the depth you like. For a lot of the late season I would add from 24 – 50 oz to get it closer to the bottom.

We had a new Captain in charge of the boat today. Bryan had a cut hand and we (Sara and I) decided he needed to drive so not to get fish gunk in the cut. Well we camped out in the same general location as I have in the last few weeks and had another great day. Bryan did keep us out of the gil nets and crab pots so I was really glad to have him behind the controls. Sara as you would expect did a great job with her side of the boat. We caught a bunch of fish, it was not as hectic as yesterday but the ratio of keepers to unders was way better. My guess is we caught 30 total and caught limit of 3 nice keepers (it’s the new 40%). Brain gets his sense of direction from his dad but with Sara’s help we actually got him to go RIGHT once in a while.

I was glad to have them on board and got treated to breakfast as well. Could hardly have been a better day on the water. The air was crisp but the sun and the seas were just as perfect as you could get. The water has gotten under 60 for a change and is now about 59.

Went out early this morning to change out my stereo in the boat, the old one just gave up the ghost. Worked on that for a few hours and just couldn’t take it anymore. I headed out to my old place that I had had such great success. I saw Vince there, called him up, he had a few small ones but nothing of any size. It was right at high tide so we discussed it would probably turn on after the tide change. Boy did it, went berserk and stayed that way all afternoon. I called Buddy, Mitch, and Todd, everyone got in the action. Ron, Joe, and Jack went hunting so they missed that but got a bear so I guess that is enough.

Anyway, they were again hitting the umbrella rigs of really any color. The rest of the guys were mainly using tandems. Those worked but I think the umbrellas were grabbing a few more. Well the more you land the more chances you have a grabbing one of size. I landed a bunch, 100+ and was completely tired of catching. There was no fishing, this was a catching day.

Finally got two 24″ at the same time on one umbrella, the whole time it was coming in I was praying it was only one fish. It would have been huge but two 24s is fine with me. Buddy got a keeper as did the rest of the gang.

Today was Patsy’s first treatment, I really did not want to call Buddy but I figured just let him know and he would know what to do. After he got back in he and his daughter Sharon went out and caught one 23. Patsy we are all praying for your speedy recovery. Love yah.

Today was overcast and going to rain in the afternoon so I set out a 7:30 this morning. I went to the same place near Cockerell’s creek. I had the same rigs on two primarily yellow and one all white. Last posting they would have only hit the yellow rigs today it was only white. I finally moved to two white rigs and one clear speckle. Overall a really good day, I lost count but I think it was 25 or so with three total keeper size. I kept the 23″ the others were slightly smaller but many of the throwbacks were 19+.

The umbrella’s were the old white bucktails (yep the same ones as you have fished your whole life) with either a white or yellow swim tail.

The water is still warm, about 62 deg. There was a little more surf than the other days but really nothing to speak of maybe 1 foot from the east.

Well I’ve been out a couple of times this year on the Great Wicomico down by the 200 bridge and we picked up a couple here or there but today the bite finally turned on. There is a neighborhood chili cookoff that I would normally go with a bunch of my friends but this year we were not able to attend. Alyssa has an upcoming medical procedure and we had to quarantine ourselves. So I took advantage of the great weather day and set out by myself this morning after the fog cleared.

As a general rule I never leave the river if I am by myself and I always wear my life jacket. I didn’t expect to catch much if anything but just getting out is enough for me. Fish is just a side benefit if they come. Well I went about where Green Number 9 but on the north side of the channel and dropped in two umbrella rigs with two hooked trailers. Both were chartreuse in color with white head but chartreuse 4 inch swim shads.

And here we go, I no more than got the bait wet and one rods went down. I really thought they were bigger but it turns out I had 2 on at one time. Neither of them were a keeper so I set them back out. About 5 min later they both went down with two on each. One keeper to the bunch.

I called Scott because I know he was dying to go but he had set up duty for the cookoff. Well he, Bryan, and Sara came over because they had about 2 hours to spare. We were dumping one rod after the next. Panderlerium was the tale of the day, we either lit them all up or nothing. Sara finally pulled in a nice one.

We had to come back so they could get back to work and have the cookoff but I ate lunch and Chuck and I went out. We caught even more than the other two times. In total for the after we had 16 for a grand total of 28 for the day.

The weather was absolutely perfect, the water was 59 degrees and little wind.