Friday - BIRDS GONE WILD

[RRabiner]

West Side of Prudence

Report after dinner

[RRabiner]

With apologies to Dickens - today would be filed under " of it was the worst of times/ it was the best of times"

Left the marina early this AM - fricking cold out- to a rapidly building NW breeze-

Nothing like getting dressed full foul weather gear - just for warmth in the boat yard - before I got on board - to the sound of the wind ripping through the rigging on the boats on land ( and quietly left the fly rod in the car as an offering to the wind gods that it would lay down - it didn't )

As I have been heading south all the time recently- and have been pretty much skunked ( as well as others ) I decided to play the contrarian - and head North. As I haven’t seen bait - I figured that it may still be up the bay, and that I might be the one finding it on the way down

At least i would cover alot of water - and stay out of some of the breeze

Ran up the east side of Prudence - with a few birds here or there - but nothing boding real fish underneath -

Up towards Potter's - there were a bunch of birds on a lee shore - took a few casts to them - but the breeze made the drift less than pleasant - and getting blown up on a beach was not on my top ten - so I pushed on further north.

Crossed over the top of Patience -/ actually thinking about heading further north when i saw a cluster of birds down the western side of Patience.

Slid down on a flock of working birds - ( congratulating myself that I had found the mother load - and with images of acres of bass working underneath - I started working the water )

Approximately two hours later- yes two HOURS - later I landed my first bass. Talk about stupid persistence - but with so many birds working - there had to be a bass in there for me.

I have never seen the bass so picky - I threw everything in the boat at them - with only one taker - top water spooks - poppers - shads - spoons – swimmers - deadly dicks - buck tails -

Finally - I caught the obvious " shallow end of the gene pool bass “ - when I really wasn’t even watching – I was in that automatic mode when you have been throwing for too long with nothing going on – and I really didn’t deserve that fish - but after that amount of time – I wasn’t going to stand on ceremony - a fat just sub legal - that I quickly sent back into the fray

Figuring that this pod of fish were just sitting and laughing at me the entire time - I pushed further down the western side of Prudence -

Towards the bottom of Prudence - I was rewarded by seeing possibly every bird in the 401-area code - and possibly a few from 508 – I am not prone to exaggeration – but I mean it was absolutely insane - there was every type of gull and every cormorant in the area - all in full work mode.

There were so many cormorants – that when they were not working – and in float mode – the orange of their beaks made it look like a small island – truly hundreds of them

Having been steeled to disillusionment with my prior efforts - and with little thought towards success here- I rigged up one of my " Jersey" plugs - Loud / flashy and with alot of attitude - and launched it into the melee.

With the breeze - I was forced to use a heavier than normal rod - and it throws these big plugs a long way - looks like you are bombing the area - and it makes a whistling noise as they go - so if nothing else - it was taking care of my childish attributes

The plug gets a few looks - a bump - and then a take - and we are off the to the races - and for the next two hours - I was into solid fish - brief interludes here and there - but fish.

I use the fish finder as a guide – and more a sense of the bottom –than a fish finder- but in this mix – the screen was going absolutely black with bait and fish. You could literally watch the fish swarming up like locusts from the bottom and shredding the bait balls -

The birds were oblivious to me encroaching on their feeding – and many times I was simply surrounded with birds. Lost one plug to a bird the got tangled in the line – as it seems it ran into the line / and either bit it off / or it thankfully just snapped - as I was attempting to pull it in and free it – Giving the prospect of attempting to free a gull – or a lost plug – I think that I came out on the better end of the equation

I then switched off to a Tattoo White Swimmer – as I had found that smaller plugs like the standard go to jumping minnow – even with a dressed rear hook was not getting the looks For the first hour it was solid bass – all 28 - 30 inches - and all really fat – healthy fish. Bunches of singles – loads of doubles on the teaser - and then the shift started.

Hooked up onto what seemed to be a nice pair of bass – and as I am going for the release – trying to figure out which one to hand release first – I vaguely recognized that the second fish had a forked tail – with a quick pliers release – I had just entered the “ Blue Fish Zone”

Like someone had thrown a switch –the bass were gone – and I was into huge – and I mean huge bluefish.

These were not your normal – take your kids/ friends fishing, nice fighting blue fish – these were mean – nasty – attitudinal blue fish. These were the yellow eyed -wicked witch of the west “ and your little dog too” blue fish – 10 lb – plus – that wanted to eat the plug – and then come on board and kick your ass, blue fish.

They were just mauling the Tattoo – and had no respect for 40 lb leader that had the teasers. One of these monsters toke a run under the boat – and somehow was able to get leverage on the snap hook – and open it for a release of the fish and the plug.-the clip was totally deformed – and I know it was closed.( These were all long pliers – with a boga grip -type releases – as I wanted no part of my hands near these fish

Switched of to another swimmer – and fought fish for god knows how long – until I was starting to get both tired and cold – but every time I started to get ready to leave – another eruption of fish took place – and like in the Godfather – “ I tried to leave – but they sucked me back in”. Finally – as the sun was starting to get low in the horizon – I completed the transit of Prudence and headed for the barn.

Probably spent the entire time on the lower end of Prudence within a 1/2 mile circle – with the fish just racetracking around – negating the need to do a lot of movement to stay in them. If you weren’t in them – all you had to do was to wait a few minutes – and they were back.

Sorry for the long post – but it was REALLY a fun day – a bit cold and lumpy in the AM –a quiet start – but a very busy finish

My November bass secure – I can relax a bit until December – where I will be hunting my Christmas Bass

[ron-fish]

Glad to hear you got into them RRabiner, there were some fish out off south beach Friday as well mostly mixed bass and blues around 24-26 inches but healthy, at least the ones that came within range of us shore guys. Heard there had been some big blues earlier in the day, but not in the evening.
By the wat it looks like that beach was overwashed during the storm and the second pond is finally open with a deep cut basically stopping anyone from reaching the very east end of the beach. Ron

[nofish]

Awesome report, thanks

[basswipe]

I did pretty good wading off the beach yesterday after work.All schoolies but fun anyways.One big blue also.

[merch]

This was the same story down of ocean drive on friday afternoon. We took the boat out to go after some of the HUGE totaug that have been out there. The wind and seas made it a little difficult to get a good hookset from the anchor on the ledge. While messing around with this we noticed that apparently every bird that wasn't hanging out with RRabiner up by prudence was working from price neck all the way east of seal rock. All small bass with some big blues mixed in. On the way back we saw the same type of thing RRabiner saw off prudence in the morning. There were tons of birds working the rip south of castle hill all the way down past the first bell but no fish under them just bait. Couldn't even id the bait they were hitting.

[Kevin J]

Excellent post! Being "landlocked" it's nice to know fish are still coming out of the bay.