Finally

[ictalurus]

Nice work, and sorry to hear about the one that got away. At least you got a good look at it. The ones that break off before I see them haunt me.

Bluefish works well as fishcakes, too.

[Shield]

Thanks guys and I am definitely not going to give up on the blues yet. I had taken the Blue fillets and dipped in egg and then breaded them in Italian bread crumbs w/ Old Bay then fried them. I will try some of the posted recipes. There are too many swimming around to not try different recipes.

[surfdog]

damn that sucks Don but congrats on the keeper! i try and control the leader while most of the fish is in the water then finger lip it or put the lip gripper in its mouth if using something with trebles. keeping most of the fish in the water usually keeps it from going physco

try marinading blues in italian dressing for an hour then grilling, the main thing is to remove the dark blood line from the fillet tastes much better with out it.

[jffoley]

WTG Don! Congrats on the keeper. Sorry about the big one getting away but we've all had that happen. +1 what Surf says about keeping them in the water and getting control by lip gripping. As for blues, I'm not much of a fan so back they go to get bigger.

[susqeyaker]

hey fellas aint that place awsome? me and my cousin topwater love that place. its waters are clear and there aint allot of boat traffic there. ive used that x rap there and caught speeks and stripers on them. gona be away this weekend but planning on hitting it next weekend.

[DOGFISH]

Sorry for you loss. However, isn't it amazing how a fish can hit a crank or even after being hooked by a crankbait, it can be missed or get off. With all of those needle sharp trebles, even the fisherman get hooked by those things. Thats alway been amazing to me. There are just some lucky fish. However, I do mostly C&R anyway.

[Shield]

isn't it amazing how a fish can hit a crank or even after being hooked by a crankbait, it can be missed or get off. With all of those needle sharp trebles, even the fisherman get hooked by those things. Thats alway been amazing to me. There are just some lucky fish.

Funny that you say that, because after that I cast my line a couple more times and over threw into the grasses. I pulled the rod hard to free plug and felt the tension fade and smack. The plug hit me in the side of the leg and two of the hooks said hello to my skin. Seems like it took longer for me to pull it out then it took the fish to get it out.

[Shield]

hey fellas aint that place awsome?

I agree. I’m going to try and go Saturday or Sunday afternoon this weekend. I’m hoping the weather cooperates for Saturday, but looks like Sunday will be better. I'm gonna look for a keeper speck.

[ronaultmtd]

The X-Raps really are great striper baits. Try the Glass Shad Rap, in Glass Ghost. I think the model number is GSR7. This is a deep diver and is great for trolling. What I do, is to swap out the tail hook for one size larger and the belly hook for a red hook in the same size. I also use 3x or 4x hooks, because sometimes the stripers bend out the factory hooks. Recently, I posted photos of the cranks that I troll with http://www.snaggedline.com/showthrea...9571#post19571. I use these with alot of success.

Thanks for the report.

That is about all I use for trolling crank baits now- had great luck with SXR10 XRap in Silver/Blue and the SXR12 in Blue Mackerel. The Larger 4 3/4 inch lure seems to catch a lot more Blues- the 4 inch lure is a striper/trout killer.
I use two rods trolling- one with a XRap, the other with a tandem rig of a one ounce Sea Striker jig head with a six inch Got-Cha ivory plastic shad (I dip the tail in garlic flavor scent that turns the ivory to bright chartreuse color)- tied 10-15 inches above the six inch shad is a 1/2 ounce bucktail with a four inch Mr. Twister tail dipped in the same garlic flavored scent to turn the end of the tail from white to Chartreuse color- I use 40 pound test mono for the rigging of this setup-

The dual shad/bucktail rig catches fish on both lures. When I see breaking fish I troll near the edge of the breakers and usually have instant hookups- always hits on the XRap, most time on both rigs- The stripers that hit the duo rig seem to like the bucktail, although my biggest striper was caught on the shad- Everything loves the XRaps- I even caught a great big channel cat trolling the 4 3/4 inch Blue/Mackerel XRap-