My Final Trip of the year to the Bay Bridge and my final "catch"....

[dson05]

I bottom fished hoping that some of the action that I saw from stripers last week held through the cold front this past week. When I got there... nada. No perch, no stripers, nothing even on my fish finder that gave a hint of life. I moved over to the bay bridge to jig the pilings... no readings still and not even a nibble.

I did come away with a decent catch of sinkers though... =).

Sinkers.jpg

If only they were all bank sinkers to make up for what I lost togging. Still worth a decent price considering the cost of sinkers these days.

Thought I would add this in to add a bit of humor to the season. Looking forward to another great year next.

[whenican]

You caught the motherlode of sinkers... Nice find!

[Mark]

Just curious...how did you "catch" sinkers?

[daolai]

Nice catch on the sinkers.. that is worthy of the trip.. surprised how many boaters use the pyramids vs bank..

[chex]

Just curious...how did you "catch" sinkers?

I want to know too

[john from md]

Me too!

BTW, when I used to fish for tog in New Jersey, we used old spark plugs for sinkers and bought the cheapest hooks you could find. The best deal was a tin of 100 hooks for a buck! Tog are hell on tackle.

[J.A. Veil]

About 15 years ago (pre-kayak days), I visited Jonas Green on a winter afternoon. The wind had blown hard in the downriver direction for several days, making the water level extremely low. I saw a piece of fiberglass debris sitting near water's edge that was covered with hundreds of bottom rigs that had snagged over the years. I spent an hour harvesting as many sinkers as I could get before my hands got too cold. When I got home, I sorted the pile of sinkers by size and weight. I had found exactly 25 lbs of sinkers -- more than a lifetime supply. I donated about half to Wish a Fish and still have a large supply in my garage.

Have fun recycling your catch!

[HJS]

I want to know too

Me also. My guess is they were all found at one time hung-up on something, like a crab trap, that you winched up from the bottom.

[dson05]

Before I went to the bay bridge I was at another location where there typically are a lot of shore fisherman. Normally I wouldn't be that close too shore, but since there was no one out there in the cold weather I was near the shore and there is a Marker that tells boaters to slow down. I noticed a large amount of sinkers hung up on that. I think I would have noticed it before, but it must have been because of the large flow of fisherman last week to catch their final stripers of the year. I just simply picked them off the post like I was picking fruit. I was doing it by hand at first, but then realized if I yanked with my pliers the line either gave or the swivels pulled apart. It might not hurt to take time this winter to go to where there a lot of, "cough" novice fisherman, and scan posts trees channel markers to see what you can find.

I was kind of disturbed by the amount of line/garbage tangled up on that post, but I had no knife to cut it away and dispose of it. Couldn't help but to think of fish getting tangled in them or even ingesting it and dying.

[john from md]

I was kind of disturbed by the amount of line/garbage tangled up on that post, but I had no knife to cut it away and dispose of it.

Please do yourself a favor and get a couple of good knives. Mount one on your yak and another on your PFD. There are too many ways to get tangled up on the water and drown for lack of a sharp knife.

[Memory Maker]

Please do yourself a favor and get a couple of good knives. Mount one on your yak and another on your PFD. There are too many ways to get tangled up on the water and drown for lack of a sharp knife.

+1

[dson05]

Please do yourself a favor and get a couple of good knives. Mount one on your yak and another on your PFD. There are too many ways to get tangled up on the water and drown for lack of a sharp knife.

I had one, but it fell in the water. This knife had a wooden handle so it floats, BUT .... i didn't even know it fell overboard so I lost it. Thanks for the advice though.