Gill-T

Day two was eventful again. I feel sorry for non-sportsman for things they miss. First light always brings the ocean to life. Today I had a bait pod come in and got to witness 30 dolphin get fired up and tear into them. Osprey and seabirds diving into the fray. Ended up catching a mackerel on a topwater plug but that was it. Water was too churned up from heavy surf to use jigs today. Back at it this evening if wind and waves cooperate.

Arrived yesterday to begin a week with my wife’s family vacationing on the jersey shore. First timer here. Brought my casting outfit so any tips anyone has for fishing the area, I am open to suggestions. My first attempt at fishing this morning was successful but got a little bit more than I bargained for. This morning saw me faced with big waves and outgoing tide. I had seen some YouTube vids on a double jig fluke rig so I rigged a bucktail jig on the bottom of a three way swivel and a lighter jig with a gulp curly tail on the longer lead. After a little casting I was able to catch an undersized striped bass ( my first ever). Saw a pod of dolphins come close so I figured they were herding bait. On one of my casts I hook into something SOLID and the drag starts to peel towards England. A couple times I looked at my spool of braid to see if I was getting close to seeing metal. After a while of back and forth, I was making some gains using the wave timings to reel fast during surges. I had no idea what I had on but soon the beast was near. I caught little glimpses of color...bluefish? No maybe a Cobia???, false albacore?? I had the frying pan already turned on in my mind......and then I saw it, a friekin’ stingray!! Now what? I was able to glide the ray in with in coming waves over to the side of the rock jetty nearby. Placing the butt of my rod up on the rocks above, I placed the tip of the rod onto the ray’s tail while removing the jig from its mouth. When I shook him loose, the goofy thing flipped over on its back and couldn’t right itself. By now the ruckus has attracted a small crowd that was concerned for the ray’s well being. The well intended human representatives advocated many suggestions while keeping their distance. I was able to use the butt of my rod to turn the ray over then gently push him out to deeper water. You never know what you are going to catch on the ocean.

Nocturnal soybean deer. Stud.

I have seen those nose-to-tail lines of salmon before. Usually during a roll over, almost always at 50’ of depth and almost always year 1 or 2 kings.

You can’t predict marine forecasts this far out.

Bad at the knots and for downrigger braid

I can’t buy a meat fish.

BAC - butts against cancer. Well done.

Did anyone snap a shot of the results from the pro/am?

It was a later bite on Saturday. We left the dock at around 1:00 and fished the afternoon. Fish were very aggressive wanting flasher/flies and mostly ignored spoons. People I spoke to at the launch had a slow morning. Kings especially feel those subtle changes to weather. There were some small storm cells nearby that would kick up the wind briefly. If you were over fish when those changes happened, you would get bit.

Hands are back to normal, thanks for asking!

Time to rename the boat “firecracker”

Cool. Looks like everything in the lake has stayed stable and consistent

The kings have come back. We did well west of port in 95-160’ in the afternoon. Mostly a flasher bite.

I will keep to these.

Kansas tag secured

Thin spoons or spoons with a heavy bend work at slower speeds. The picture below is a R&R 5 1/8” Kodiak Wobbler mag. Note the heavy bend in the spoon allowing it to dance at very slow speeds

I was doing a lot of swimming that week but every night I put antibiotic ointment on with a band-aid. It seems to me it was something in the water (runoff from farms or sewage dump that occurred in Seneca Falls earlier in week). It very strange to have five different puss pockets on two different hands.

Agreed. Small ones are shaken off with pliers off swim platform. I have Boca Grips but you have to be careful you don’t have the jaws open and drop fish from above ( that fish would go in cooler).

Some of you may have seen my post on fishing Cayuga lake during July 4th week. I incurred numerous cuts on my fingers while attempting to get a quick photo of the fish before releasing. Whether teeth cuts or gillrakers or whatever, my fingers went thru hell. Not sure if anyone else on this forum has experienced anything similar but my cuts calloused over but became increasingly painful. Things culminated early Sunday morning at 1:30 am when the pain in my fingers woke me up. I sensed something was wrong. Taking a pair of nail clippers I cut open the healing calluses and found a plethora of pus underneath. Upon draining and scraping each area I felt immediate relief and things are healing normally. I don’t know what was at play. Embedded tooth shards? A pathogen? Flesh-eating bacteria? If I was diabetic I would have been in real trouble. I included a picture today of some of the healing wounds. Last fish touched was July 5th (12 days ago). Hope this helps someone NOT put their hands in a dirty greaser’s mouth. I am going back to kings! Perhaps finger lakes has a different meaning?