After a slow start we finally had a good night of drum fishing tonight on the shoals near buoy 8. Fished with Davie and Wally and we got 12 Red Drum from 47″ to 52.5″ and 5 Black Drum from 36″ to 46″ before the thunderstorms ran us off. We left them biting. Wally caught the last red when we were pulling lines in. Did not see any other boats out around us. Had 3 on one time and four on another (3 reds and 1 black drum). Needed a bigger boat and more anglers. This week should be awesome when we can get out.

Fished with Jody and Wally inside the breakers near Fisherman’s Island. Jody got a nice 50″ red drum and Wally caught a 34″ black drum. Not as good as I had hoped but it should get better as we approach the full moon in May.

Fished with Mike, Lanie, Wes, Jeremy and Jody on Seaduction for togs.

Mike’s post on TidalFish: http://www.tidalfish.com/forums/showthread.php/329852-Triangle-Toggin-Sunday

Triangle Toggin Sunday
Fished the triangle wrecks on Sunday with Lanie, Rick, Jodie, Wes, and his son Jeremy. My son didn’t want to get out of bed that early. Planned to fish on Saturday but winds were too much so shifted to Sunday. Perfect sunny, calm, warm day for toggin. Tog bite was good in the morning but slowed as the day went on. BSB bite was good but all they did was rob us of bait as they had to be released. We went through 4 dozen blue crab before the fishing day was over because of the BSB. Did not light the world on fire but managed 18 togs keeping 12 of the bigger ones. Water temp in the morning was 51 and was 55 went we left.

Mike
Hydrasport 2900VX
Seaduction MMSI 338-018-823

Trailered the boat down to OI yesterday and fished for bluefin tuna w/ Davie, Jody, David and Joey. We had our under at 58″ in the boat by 9am. Landed our giant for the year at 1pm (87″ – 400lbs). Both fish were caught around the 530 @ 1000 fathoms. We had two others that pulled the hook. Alot of tuna were caught yesterday, but there were also a lot of tuna that were lost. Both fish were caught trolling. Stopped on marks several times to jig, but no luck.

Video of Getting the fish in the boat:

Ran out to the Norfolk Canyon with Davie, Wally and Jody for some blueline tile. Brought some tuna gear just in case. About 13mi NE of the CLT we marked a ton of bait and rockfish. Birds diving everywhere on bait with 30 to 40lb class rochfish mixed in. We caught and released a few on jigs hoping some tuna were mixed in and then moved on. Water spray was frozen on the boat. Only fished one spot on the SE wall of the canyon and got our limit of 8 to 11lb tiles. Everyone had atleast one blueline over 10lbs, with the largest at 11lbs 4oz. Ran to an offshore wreck on the way in and caught over 30 black seabass. Everyone got atleast one seabass over 5lbs. Jody got the largest one at 5lbs 13oz. Had atleast 8 citation bluelines and 6 citation black seabass. A little bumpy heading out and back in.

80W frozen with saltwater…….it was cold

Tried for bluefin tuna again last Saturday. Worked down to the 4A Dry Dock and on out to the Chesapeake Light Tower without any encounters. No luck. Couple shots from the day……..

Ran out of Messick at 5:30am and headed to the tip of Cape Henry and beyond trolling for bluefin tuna. A lot of bait  at the cape and  5mi NE of the CLT. Tried to stay away from the crowds and rockfish. Caught and released seven rockfish in the mid 30′s, but no tuna. Heard of one tuna caught today.

Headed to the triangles for opening day on the Black Sea Bass. Those who did not go, didn’t miss much. Plenty of fish, but they were not the huge ones that we were catching and releasing back in early December while jigging for bluefish. We had 25+ BSB with the largest at 18.5″ caught by Jody. We could have easily caught our four man limit but we were using single hooks / mostly jigs, looking for the big boys and checking various locations. Headed to Cape Henry in the late afternoon and trolled for rockfish with a few other boats from 3pm to 4pm. Lots of bait, lots of birds and a few fish caught, but not by us.

Fished Plantation Light area today. Spent most of the day trolling. Very few fish or bait marks. Switched over to eeling around 2pm with 1 – 31″ rockfish caught before heading in around 3pm.

Eeled the highrise area for rockfish from 5pm to 1am.  David Jenkins caught and released a nice 49.5″ Rockfish.  That was it for us the entire night.  We fished the outgoing tide, plus the first part of the incoming tide. Slow for us other than that one nice fish that was landed around 6:30pm.  Thinking the problem may be that I am going when the bay conditions are nice, so I might try Friday night (W 30kt, 5-6ft). I’ll put some extra chain on my anchor line and we should be good to go.

Short video, because David accidentally dropped the fish overboard before I could snap a photo of him and his release citation rockfish.

Rockfishing / 49.5″ Rockfish 12/20/12