cpn_aaron
06-13-2006, 08:33 AM
After taking a week off the beach for a close friend's wedding in New Mexico I was jonesing for some fishing bad. So when I read the tide reports for Merritt Island National Refuge I was stoked to see some early morning tides for Sat and Sun.
On Sat I was on the beach at lot 12/13 border and in the water by with all but my yak line out by 6 AM. We caught plenty of sailor's choice and croakers, but only a few whiting. I baited up my kayak line with a nive 10" croaker and took the poor soul past the sandbar. We continued to fish spoons and chunk baits and I only caught one bull whiting for the day. There were plenty of freshly pupped bonnetheads, corakers, and sailor's choice eating every bait offered (clam, shrimp, feas, chunked fish) but no whioting and pompano. The entire day only 2 other bull whiting were caught with the news that one guy caught 1 bluefish at lot 10. otherwise no pompano or blues were landed.
So ignoring my shallow lines I put my faith in my deep line and I wasn't disappointed.
http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j299/aaronanddelania/fish/psspinner06.jpg
This nice male 42" at the fork spinner gave me a great fight with some of the best acrobatics I've seen out of fish I've fought. After 30 min he came in and was tagged and tossed to fight another day.
I quickly yaked one of the other craokers from our bait well out and almost immediately got hit by a smaller spinner (~29" at the fork). I didn't get the chance to tag him, measure him, or anything because some pill popped out druggie grabbed him off my pole and attempted to take him offereing me $5 for the shark since i was just wasting it by throwing it back. Apparently my 15 min yaking, and long fighting is worth little and I was one step from sending him to the hospital until he saw the light and left me alone. Since he took my needlenosed pliers and drummed the poor shark over the head once (a grazing blow doing no apparent damage, or we would have had some "words") I quickly sent the shark home to avoid anymore due stress. And my father-in-law and I made sure the guy understood his prescence around our poles wasn't welcome anymore. We finished fishing around noon and called it a day since we all felt the fishing had tapered.
Sunday we were back at it again and fishing by 6:30 AM. We caught tons of croakers, sailor's choice, and bonnethead pups, but only a few small whiting. I managed to catch one blacktip, 32" at the fork
http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j299/aaronanddelania/fish/psblacktip06.jpg
I then had a mighty spooling fish that was huge. It was then greeted by a huge dolphin (flipper variety) jumping with my bait in her mouth with her calf close behind. So the dolphin's were having fun at my expense.
While leaving a croaker out for the next 3 hrs I was tossing fleas in the 2nd trough trying to catch some bait or maybe perchance a real table fish. After one spirited cast I was hit by some strong taps and I set the hook. What followed was the offical best aerial acrobatics I had ever seen. I had hooked a 2'5" wingspan little manta ray. I wrestled with her up and down the beach for ~30 min. Snapped a pic and sent her free. I have never seen a fish jump like those rays. They look cool doing that far out over the sandbar, but it is much cooler when its on the end of your line.
http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j299/aaronanddelania/fish/psmantaray06.jpg
I had one large fish rip my craoker free ~2 PM on a hellacious run and I called fishing quits and took up my new hobby (drinking brews) for the rest of the afternoon enjoying a good book with my wife. All in all it was a killer weekend that proves why I can never live anywhere but the coast (particularly a warm one).
On Sat I was on the beach at lot 12/13 border and in the water by with all but my yak line out by 6 AM. We caught plenty of sailor's choice and croakers, but only a few whiting. I baited up my kayak line with a nive 10" croaker and took the poor soul past the sandbar. We continued to fish spoons and chunk baits and I only caught one bull whiting for the day. There were plenty of freshly pupped bonnetheads, corakers, and sailor's choice eating every bait offered (clam, shrimp, feas, chunked fish) but no whioting and pompano. The entire day only 2 other bull whiting were caught with the news that one guy caught 1 bluefish at lot 10. otherwise no pompano or blues were landed.
So ignoring my shallow lines I put my faith in my deep line and I wasn't disappointed.
http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j299/aaronanddelania/fish/psspinner06.jpg
This nice male 42" at the fork spinner gave me a great fight with some of the best acrobatics I've seen out of fish I've fought. After 30 min he came in and was tagged and tossed to fight another day.
I quickly yaked one of the other craokers from our bait well out and almost immediately got hit by a smaller spinner (~29" at the fork). I didn't get the chance to tag him, measure him, or anything because some pill popped out druggie grabbed him off my pole and attempted to take him offereing me $5 for the shark since i was just wasting it by throwing it back. Apparently my 15 min yaking, and long fighting is worth little and I was one step from sending him to the hospital until he saw the light and left me alone. Since he took my needlenosed pliers and drummed the poor shark over the head once (a grazing blow doing no apparent damage, or we would have had some "words") I quickly sent the shark home to avoid anymore due stress. And my father-in-law and I made sure the guy understood his prescence around our poles wasn't welcome anymore. We finished fishing around noon and called it a day since we all felt the fishing had tapered.
Sunday we were back at it again and fishing by 6:30 AM. We caught tons of croakers, sailor's choice, and bonnethead pups, but only a few small whiting. I managed to catch one blacktip, 32" at the fork
http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j299/aaronanddelania/fish/psblacktip06.jpg
I then had a mighty spooling fish that was huge. It was then greeted by a huge dolphin (flipper variety) jumping with my bait in her mouth with her calf close behind. So the dolphin's were having fun at my expense.
While leaving a croaker out for the next 3 hrs I was tossing fleas in the 2nd trough trying to catch some bait or maybe perchance a real table fish. After one spirited cast I was hit by some strong taps and I set the hook. What followed was the offical best aerial acrobatics I had ever seen. I had hooked a 2'5" wingspan little manta ray. I wrestled with her up and down the beach for ~30 min. Snapped a pic and sent her free. I have never seen a fish jump like those rays. They look cool doing that far out over the sandbar, but it is much cooler when its on the end of your line.
http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j299/aaronanddelania/fish/psmantaray06.jpg
I had one large fish rip my craoker free ~2 PM on a hellacious run and I called fishing quits and took up my new hobby (drinking brews) for the rest of the afternoon enjoying a good book with my wife. All in all it was a killer weekend that proves why I can never live anywhere but the coast (particularly a warm one).