Healthy Grin Sport Fishing

A team of anglers representing the PSWSFA participated in the 7th Annual Catchin’ For Kids Rockfish Tournament from December 10 – 12, 2010. The purpose of the tournament was to collect new, unwrapped toys, as well as monetary donations to support underprivileged children in the local community. Over the last seven years, donations raised during Catchin’ For Kids events have contributed greatly to the Marine Corps TOYS FOR TOTS program in Hampton Roads.

The tournament headquarters were at Oceans East 2 in Norfolk, Va. Lines in 8pm Friday, lines out Sunday at 3:30pm. Out of the 48 registered boats, only 11 fish were weighed in ranging from 4 – 48lbs. Team “Grizzwalds”, captained by PSWSFA member Scott Elford (Seaford, Va.), was fortunate enough to catch two fish weighing 24.72lb and 32.62lb, winning the Angler’s Club Challenge for the PSWSFA. PSWSFA member Spencer Elford (8 years old) caught the 4th largest rockfish in the tournament (32.62lbs) and was also the top Youth Angler. Spencer let the line out and had the rod in hand when the fish bit. In typical “Grizzwald” fashion, the other anglers were trying to untangle a potential catastrophe when Spencer calmly explained that he was hooked up and for someone to get the net! In addition, the “Grizzwalds” were the only team to catch two fish and won the Two Fish Calcutta with a combined weight of 57.34lbs.

The “Grizzwalds” anglers included Scott and Spencer Elford, Phil Greasely, Rob Dearnley, and Barclay Shepard; Cousin Eddie was unavailable due to legal problems in California. The team of anglers from PSWSFA needed a redemption tournament and got one! In case you were wondering, the fish was caught in the Chesapeake Bay at the intersection of Effort, Opportunity, Skill, and Blind Luck! For us, that intersection happened to be off Kiptopeake State Park.

-Barclay Shepard

Capt. Jerry Thrash

Queens Creek Outfitters

Patriot Charters

804-725-3889

www.queenscreek.com

Jerry@queenscreek.com

Fishing Report 12.13.10

With the winter storms underway in the northeast we saw a continued arrival of fish this week. Thursday was slow with only a scattered fish caught here and there. We managed only two fish on my Thursday charter and their stomachs were empty despite sea lice being present on both. On Friday, fishing improved greatly with LESS STRESS returning to the dock with 10 keepers and other boats seeing their best bay action of the year in the Buoy 42 and lower Cut Channel areas.

Bill Skelley of Richmond recently caught this pretty 38″, 21 lbs, 4 oz striper on a white bucktail in the Piankatank River. PICTURE

Kristy Tucker of West Point managed this pretty 43″, 30.5 lbs fish Friday at Buoy 41 on a Stretch 15. PICTURE

CITATIONS:
We registered 4 citation fish on Saturday, two of which were caught in the Mathews Rotary Club Tournament.

RELEASE, 45.5″ caught 12/11 by Michael Hanhart of Winter Harbor and Huddleston at the Cell on a gold spoon.

47.5″, 40 lbs 10 oz caught 12/11 by Robert D. Kirks of Petersburg at Buoy 42 on a Stretch 25 PICTURE

47″, 42 lbs, 4 oz caught on an eel at Cape Charles 12/11 by Christopher L. Williams of Mathews, placed first in the Rotary Tournament.

47.5″ 41 lbs, 4 oz caught on an eel at Cape Charles 12/11 by David L. Nova of Whitestone,
placed second in the Rotary Tournament.

Tight Lines,
Jerry

Capt. Jerry Thrash

Queens Creek Outfitters

Patriot Charters

804-725-3889

www.queenscreek.com

Jerry@queenscreek.com

Fishing Report 12.6.10

We finally saw in influx of fish in the 30 inch range on last Wed and Thurs. Most were caught vicinity 1R and 2R. Winds pretty much wiped out Friday’s Chesterfield Fire Dept tournament fishing and almost all other fishing efforts. The weekend was a total blowout and it continues into this week. The Deltaville CCA Tournament went with the wind also. With the winter storm underway in the northeast we may see a continued arrival of fish this week so, if the weather gods allow, we may be able to look for fish this weekend.

Tight Lines,
Jerry

Last night, it was windy, cold and snowing. We decided that it was a good time to go fishing. The wind and tide were going in the same direction and the water was flying out at the high rise area of the CBBT. It was slow in the snow for us. Charles Southall caught one nice fish. We pulled the hook on one and broke another off when it got into the pilings. We missed a couple of other bites but we never got into them good. About 2 AM, Charles and Gabe Sava decided that they had enough fun. We did not ask Wes Blow his opinion or we would still be out there.

Dr. Ken Neill, III
IGFA Representative
www.igfa.org
www.pswsfa.com
www.vbsf-hookedup.net/healthygrin/

I have had materials from the IGFA for the upcoming Million Dollar Rockfish Challenge: www.milliondollarrockfishchallenge.com . I needed to get them to Marina Shores so I ran them over there today. I figured if I was driving to Virginia Beach I might as well take a few eels and try for a rockfish. After delivering the stuff for the captains’ bags, I hopped in the Healthy Grin and ran over to the Concrete Ships. I got in one drift before sunset and had one bite. It was a 47-inch fish that I released after a quick photo. It was a nice, short and calm trip after the marathon, offshore trip we ran the day before.

The radio chatter indicated that the bite at the CBBT was good.

Capt. Jorj Head, (757) 262-9004, sent me a report from Saturday. They fished in the Gloucester Point Marina Rockfish Tournament. They started out eeling at the high rise where the seas were very ugly. The crew was just miserable so they went to Cape Charles and drifted eels there. Their largest fish was about 30 pounds and was good enough to take first place in the tournament. Their winnings were a bit over $3,800.

Dr. Ken Neill, III
IGFA Representative
www.igfa.org
www.pswsfa.com
www.vbsf-hookedup.net/healthygrin/

We headed out to do some bottom fishing dark and early. The ride was not pleasant. We just kept going because the forecast was for it to calm down as the day went on. It finally did, but it was not a pretty morning. The fish did not care. We started catching some nice blueline tiles right away. No photos then, I was just hanging on to the wheel. There were some nice sea bass mixed in with the tiles and we also caught some bluefish. We moved over to the canyon wall and were going to make just one quick drop in the deeper waters. If the grouper were there, fine, but we were not going hunting. These short days do not give us a lot of fishing time. Our short drop turned into a longer one when Wes Blow hooked up to something big down there. While he was fighting that thing, other guys brought up big congor eels and Roger Burnley brought up a double of big bluefish. Wes’ fish finally broke him off. We made one more drop and caught a couple more eels. We left there to hit some wrecks for sea bass. At the tip of the canyon, there was thick bait, working birds, and the occasional explosion on the surface. The bait was small when we could get a look at it, probably sand eels and a lot of them. We did cruise around and tried casting to the areas of working birds with no hits. We had offshore stuff and ballyhoo on board. I asked the guys do we try for a bluefin or do go onto a wreck? They wanted to hit a wreck before we ran out of day. We went on into the Ocean Venture and caught sea bass, more bluefish and a nice flounder. When the sun went down, the sea bass slowed up and the conger eels got active so we ran on in to clean a box load of fish. Wes Blow caught the largest tilefish at 19 pounds even. Hunter Southall caught the largest sea bass at a bit over 6 pounds (should be the new state leader). We caught a few smooth dogs but no spiny dogs.

When we got in, Roger called his brother Ric. Ric was fishing the CBBT. They had caught a limit of tautog during the day and were then clobbering big rockfish at the high rise. Ric said that they had quit counting and had no idea how many big rockfish they had caught an released. Everyone had their citation fish. They were fishing with live eels. www.fishcrazy.info

Dr. Ken Neill, III
IGFA Representative
www.igfa.org
www.pswsfa.com
www.vbsf-hookedup.net/healthygrin/

Sunday, we went out to the deeper wrecks and caught more sea bass. Last weekend we had hit wrecks to the south and caught a nice limit of fish but never found a loaded wreck. This time we went east and hit wrecks like the Ocean Venture, 44-Fathom, and Grain Barge. Again we found fish on all of them but no great numbers except for the Ostfriesland. There, we only caught a single, small sea bass. Wes Blow caught our largest sea bass at 5-9. I don’t think we had the number of jumbo-sized bass as we did last week to the south. Steve Martin caught a small snowy grouper while fishing for sea bass at the 44-Fathom wreck. We tried for tilefish along 50 fathoms and caught some nice fish including a number of citations to 17-10. There were no spiny dogs out there yet. We caught a couple of smooth dogs.

Saturday we went to the Triangle Reef area. We were after bluefish. It was rough as a cob. We ran into some fish between the navy buoy and the Triangles. We caught one and had a couple of bite offs as the guys cast Storms to them. Went on out to the Triangles where we never really got into the bluefish well. We dropped down on the wrecks and they were loaded with sea bass. A lot of fish, not very large, but plenty of keepers. Our largest was probably about 3 pounds. Periodically, we would bring up parts of sea bass and then would break out the jigs and catch a bluefish or two and then go back to catching sea bass. The bluefish we caught were in the 12 to 14 pound range. We did not see any bluefin tuna but it was very rough. Boats encountered them in the area on Sunday. We did catch a few spiny dogfish but they were not too bad.

Capt. Jerry Thrash

Queens Creek Outfitters

Patriot Charters

804-725-3889

www.queenscreek.com

Jerry@queenscreek.com

Fishing and Hunting Report 11.22.10

Water temps are still in the mid-50s at the CBBT and mid-bay surface temps are in the low 50s. Waters are still too warm to prompt feeding frenzies. Stripers continue biting for only short periods each day. Very few larger fish in the 30″ range were caught this weekend and the morning bite died by 9:00 am. Afternoon bites didn’t materialize, likely due to the fish feeding at night under a full moon. School-sized fish were caught in Fleets Bay and north to the Tangier area. There is still no big influx of fish as waters remain warm enough to hold bait to the north along the coast.

Kyle Diggs of Mathews registered this pretty 9 point buck killed in Mathews County on November 16th.

Tight Lines,
Jerry

We ran out to catch some sea bass Sunday. We left a bit later than usual because we wanted to be able to see the big seas that were predicted. There actually were some very impressive waves but they were a smooth, long-period swell making for a gorgeous day out on the ocean. We hit a handful of wrecks. Catching a limit of nice fish is not a problem but none of the wrecks we tried were really loaded up. Lots of birds out there and bluefish were everywhere we fished. We did not fish for them but we still caught a good number which was good for Ric Burnley. He is doing a bluefish article so he got some photos for it. Ric did really well on the sea bass with is little rod and bug jigs. Roger Burnley, Wes Blow, and myself stuck with bait. Ric caught the largest fish. We kept a lookout but did not see any bluefin tuna on the surface.