Great Day on Crab Aller Bay 9/22/19

[belairfishing]

***Edit Crab Alley Bay***

Epic would be a stretch, so I'll go with amazing. I had a few milestones today...caught a speck trolling a white paddle tail with a chartreuse tip; had the opportunity to chase birds for about 45 minutes and caught plenty of fish, nothing big though; caught my first seagull (didnt hook it, just got some braid wrapped around the wing, easy release)

I figured it was going to be a good day when I hooked up on the first paddle tail I dropped in the water trolling out of the creek. Then I hooked up on my second topwater cast by some rip rap. Then more topwater by the duck blinds, and when the topwater died, I tied in a spinner bait with a big mister twister white trailer. I hooked the biggest white perch I have ever seen in person, but it came undone at the boat. With the spinner bait, my thought was bigger lure, bigger fish...that's when it hit. (I'll post the pictures later.) Quality fish, but I forgot my bump board, but I would estimate it at just shy of keeper, maybe 18+/-. A few casts later, in the same lure, I hooked up with the biggest fish of the day after I saw some bait getting crushed 15 feet from the boat. I cast the spinner bait just beyond the commotion, when I saw the shoulders on what was chasing the bait...that one was probably close to 20.

I was staying busy until I saw birds working around the first channel marker, so I high-tailed it over there. Caught 3 or 4 shorts, and the seagull. I worked the edges and below with a jig, and even ripped a jerk bait through, but couldn't pull out anything big.

Went back to the duck blinds and the topwater bit picked up again...a few more shorts and something BIG that got into the rocks and got me snagged...it released itself, and I never saw it, but based on the initial run, it would have been the fish of the day.

All in all, a perfect day. Winds never got over 7, and for the last hour, dead calm. I worked the rip rap once more before I left and didnt get a bump.

As some have said, things are looking up for a quality fall fishing season.

Wife is out of town this weekend, so I am definitely heading east again on Saturday if anyone wants to join me.

Speck.jpg

Rockfish.jpg

Steve

[Yakmac]

Steve,

That’s awesome! Glad you found fish, next Saturday is a possibility for me I’ll let you know.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[mike o]

Sounds like a great day

[J.A. Veil]

Congratulations on a very successful day. I am glad to hear that portions of Eastern Bay are heating up.

If you ever have a wing wrap on a gull again, the easiest way to deal with it is to wind the bird next to your boat. Then cover its head with a cloth. This immediately calms the bird down plus it takes the beak out of play. You can usually unwrap the line, or if necessary, cut the line and pull out the two ends. On a recent trip in my center console, we found numerous working birds and ended up with two wrapped gulls. Both were released without harm to the birds or the anglers.

[mjkeith13]

Steve - are you still planning on heading east again this saturday? If so, would like to join in, weather permitting.

Thanks,
mike

[belairfishing]

Steve - are you still planning on heading east again this saturday? If so, would like to join in, weather permitting.

Thanks,
mike

I want to, but the wind forecast gets kind of gnarly after 10:00 or so. Good news is wind forecasts change two days out, bad news is that makes it difficult to plan. I'll monitor the forecast and post on SL where I will be. Looks like its going to have to be an early start.

[belairfishing]

Wind forecast is still not looking too good tomorrow for eastern bay area. I might end up staying close to home and hit the Susky for smallmouth, catfish and the potential striper.