Cutlass Hunting

[J. Rentch]

I did a down & back to Solomons today with John Veil in an attempt to catch some Atlantic Cutlass fish. We did this trip last August and was a blast. It took a steep learning curve before I landed my first in 2023. Today’s trip was disappointing. We spent 4+ hours in our area with John finally landing one at the end of the day. My best moment was I took a detour to a shallow area looking for White Perch. I was throwing a Big Nose Spinner. Instead of a perch I landed a fat Redfish to my big surprise. I thought it was a Striper at first due to the couple of head shakes, but when I saw the color-I knew it was a Redfish. I had to retire the spinner due to the bend shape after the fish fish fight.

We are going to make another try for Cutlass in August. Think that we were a little ahead to the big migration to that area.

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[bignose]

John, I'm looking at the photo and the lure doesn't look too bad at all.

Bend the arm towards the head a little bit past 90 degrees, and gently bend the hook so the point is level. (And maybe polish the blade up a little with some #0000 steel wool or metal polish!).

Should be good a lot more fish!

Stu

[dsaavedra]

That slot red is a nice consolation prize for the lack of cutlassfish

[ski357]

Thanks for the report. Cutlass is a species I haven't had much luck with. Besides one or two back in 2021 or so, haven't been able to dial them in.

[J.A. Veil]

I stayed out an hour after John Rentch called it quits. I finally got my one and only cutlassfish of the day during the fifth hour of the trip. It bit a 4" Gulp swimming mullet on a 1/2-oz jighead. I cast it out, let it sink, and retrieved it slowly along the bottom. I had a bunch of taps on previous casts, but this was the only fish that got hooked up.

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[DanMarino]

Cool report. Bummer about the lack of fish. Those cutlassfish are super strange looking. haha.