Report from Dares Beach

[boque]

After a month of not being able to coordinate work schedules with days that didn’t have too much wind, I finally got out on Saturday. I launched from a friend’s house near Dares Beach MD. The water was flat and the sky was clear. I started by trolling a Yo-Zuri Crystal Minnow and a Rapala along the edge of the docks and rip-rap walls, through downed trees and along the cliffs and beaches. I didn’t get a bite or mark any fish, not even any bait fish. Then I went over a small sandbar and into Parker’s Creek. Again, I didn’t even mark bait fish. Still, I trolled a plug on my way out. I decided to move to about 10-15 feet of water where the crab pots were and zig-zaged through them. I marked a few fish but got no bites. Then I moved to the edge of the main channel (again, there was not boat traffic around) into 25+ feet of water. I marked a good number of fish, mostly right on the bottom with a few bait balls in 15-20 feet of water as well. I switched to a deep-dive Yo-Zuri and a 1.5 oz bucktail but didn’t get any hits. I was getting pretty from my starting point so I started to head back and decided to follow the channel edge on the way back. About ½ way back I got a strong hit on the bucktail and was excited until I saw it was just a ray. He towed me around a little bit and then I cut the line when I he was reasonably close to the kayak. I continued to tow just the deep-dive lure and switched to running along the outside edge of the line of crab pots. Eventually I caught a small striper. I kept it in the water to release but I’d guess it wasn’t much more than 12-14”.

A question: When I saw the fish near the bottom on the edge of the main channel, were those likely striped bass? I thought about stopping to jig for a bit but didn’t want to delay the return trip. Would that have been the thing to do? I didn’t really have any lures that would run that deep to troll


C.J.

Hobie Compass