Cold Muskie

I made another trip with Blue Ridge Musky in some rather brisk conditions. “Only” landed two muskie. Started fishing with them last year, hoping to catch a muskie. Now I expect to catch muskies every time. I’ve been spoiled. Shouldn’t say it but so far, I have landed muskie every trip with Capt. Sam Scott. Best day, landed 8. It can’t continue, muskie fishing, 10,000 casts, and all of that. I guess I’ll find out how long the streak can go.

I still don’t catch way more than I land. Casting this over-sized rubber frog (a lure I was laughing at) and I snagged a log. Still think I snagged a log but somehow it turned into a big muskie with a bad attitude. I was on the bow; it took off and wrapped around the stern. I did not control my fish. That was the most impressive lost fish of the day, but I managed to not catch others.

A cool catch was one that followed the lure to the boat and stayed with the figure eight thing but never ate, just hung out looking at it. Sam handed me light rod with a tube jig on it and had me just toss it out in front of it. That fish looked at that jig bouncing on the bottom, for over a minute before finally eating it. That was a fun catch on tackle I’d use for speckled trout. (I managed to not catch other fish on that jig but got this one).

www.blueridgemusky.com

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Calm Before the Storm

I got up this morning and it was beautiful outside. Hard to believe Armageddon is coming. Too calm not to fish. I still had a few eels left that I decided to drag around for a bit before letting them go. I ran up the bay to the Range Tower area. I passed a duck that didn’t fly away. I stopped and went back to see what was wrong with the stupid duck. I rescued the poor thing and ran on up the bay. Slick calm and no other boats in sight. The rockfish were still there. I got 4 bites. Two pulled off pretty quickly, lost a big girl at the boat, and caught one.  

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Bluefin

The plan was to fish with Blue Ridge Musky on Tuesday and drive from there to Wanchese to fish on the Special Kate the next morning. Captain Sam Scott said that we might want to reschedule the muskie trip as it was going to be too cold to keep the reels from freezing while casting. We could just drag baits around. Sam, I’m retired, I can fish anytime you say. So, muskie trip rescheduled, headed to Wanchese. Gorgeous down there and we didn’t run anywhere. Just get out of the inlet and fish right off of the beach. Hooked 5 bluefin. One was small enough to keep. Released two that were too big. Broke two off and broke two rods. Actually, broke the same rod twice. Bishop Fishing Supply, the Southalls need a new planer rod and probably some other stuff. Those bluefin are mean.

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Gizzard Master

Stan Simmerman took me out after speckled trout. It was a last-minute thing: I’m going, want to go? We tagged and released 11 speckled trout. I caught fish of 22 and 24 inches long and I lost a couple more about that size. All of the other trout were under 20 inches. Stan may have let me catch all of the big trout but was gizzard shad master. Both of his were bigger than the one I caught and one was a true trophy. He wouldn’t pose for a photo with it though. Those shad masters are a secretive bunch.

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Bluefin

I got to fish on the Special Kate this morning with Charles Southall and Hunter Southall. It was a short trip. We ran about 10 miles from Oregon Inet, 3 miles off of the beach. Hunter put 3 baits out and very quickly; the planer bait was screaming drag. I cranked on it for 3 hours (more like 40 minutes maybe, but I’m old and it felt like 3 hours).

We boated our “trophy” limit for the year and looked at other fish rolling around us. We briefly considered putting baits back out to release others but I wasn’t going to crank another and nobody else was very keen. We were back to the dock by breakfast time.

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Pretty trout on a pretty day

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rock last week

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Beautiful Day

Stan Simmerman took me out after speckled trout today. We did not catch a lot, but we caught some nice ones. We tagged and released four over 20 inches long, including two citation-sized fish at 25 and 25.5 inches long. (Mine was the 25.5, the extra half-inch is very important!). We lost another four or so 20 plus-inch fish. Beautiful January day on the water.

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George Poveromo’s World of Saltwater Fishing

George Poveromo came to Virginia (again) to film an episode of his television show, World of Saltwater Fishing. He fished on the Top Notch, out of Rudee Inlet, with Russ and Bobby Kostinas. I was brought along for comic relief. I actually served some use as multiple hookups were the norm, so he needed another angler. The targeted species was white marlin but yellowfin tuna and dolphin also gave us plenty of action.
The episode will first air on the Discovery Channel: Sunday, February 22, 8:00 am.
It will re-air on ESPN 2: Saturday, May 23, 6:30 am.
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Big Rock and Apple Pie

Good day yesterday

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