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After debating on where to fish yesterday, Foursteps24 and I decided to leave the kayaks behind and get on a boat to catch fish. We opted to take a sea bass trip with Capt. Monty on the MorningStar. Once all anglers arrived, we were headed out to the ocean. We left the dock about 20 minutes ahead of schedule.
The ride out to Capt Monty's secret fishing grounds was long as expected. We motored out for about 2.5hrs. I always hate this part, but I know of the rewards to come. We set up on the first reef, and the action went from 0-60 instantly. We all were catching sea bass. There were a lot of undersized fish caught, but there were enough keepers in the mix for us to stay here for a while.
We fished the whole day with a steady pick of sea bass. Also at one location I caught a ton of blues. I gave them all away to the couple fishing next to me. They were decent size...15" range, but not what I wanted to bring home.
We began to head back at around 2:15pm. Mind you, we were 2.5hrs out...scheduled to be back at 3pm. Yep, he extended the trip for us to catch a few more fish. On the way back, we were at the stern chit chatting. We noticed the boat making a 180 degree turn. "Wtf, are we lost?" we kinda joked. Turns out that Monty passed over a huge school of fish on the way back. He suspected it to be a school of croaker, so he wanted to give it a shot. He had the mates get everyone set up with squid as he positioned the boat over the fish. We were all kinda surprised, as we assumed the day was over. We dropped down and began catching croaker! Unfortunately they were all small. Every croaker that I saw caught had to be measured for 9". If you need to measure a croaker, its too small IMO. Since it was a huge school of babies, we finally headed back to the dock.
I ended the day with 17 black sea bass. Fine table fare. I have 30 fillets vacuum sealed for later consumption. I have two whole fish that I am gonna enjoy tomorrow while watching football. I'm glad we decided to ditch the kayaks yesterday and get on the boat. Weather back locally wasn't good. Luckily we only had to fish thru one brief but heavy shower while offshore. This was my second great trip on the MorningStar. Good times.
The ride out to Capt Monty's secret fishing grounds was long as expected. We motored out for about 2.5hrs. I always hate this part, but I know of the rewards to come. We set up on the first reef, and the action went from 0-60 instantly. We all were catching sea bass. There were a lot of undersized fish caught, but there were enough keepers in the mix for us to stay here for a while.
We fished the whole day with a steady pick of sea bass. Also at one location I caught a ton of blues. I gave them all away to the couple fishing next to me. They were decent size...15" range, but not what I wanted to bring home.
We began to head back at around 2:15pm. Mind you, we were 2.5hrs out...scheduled to be back at 3pm. Yep, he extended the trip for us to catch a few more fish. On the way back, we were at the stern chit chatting. We noticed the boat making a 180 degree turn. "Wtf, are we lost?" we kinda joked. Turns out that Monty passed over a huge school of fish on the way back. He suspected it to be a school of croaker, so he wanted to give it a shot. He had the mates get everyone set up with squid as he positioned the boat over the fish. We were all kinda surprised, as we assumed the day was over. We dropped down and began catching croaker! Unfortunately they were all small. Every croaker that I saw caught had to be measured for 9". If you need to measure a croaker, its too small IMO. Since it was a huge school of babies, we finally headed back to the dock.
I ended the day with 17 black sea bass. Fine table fare. I have 30 fillets vacuum sealed for later consumption. I have two whole fish that I am gonna enjoy tomorrow while watching football. I'm glad we decided to ditch the kayaks yesterday and get on the boat. Weather back locally wasn't good. Luckily we only had to fish thru one brief but heavy shower while offshore. This was my second great trip on the MorningStar. Good times.
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