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Saturday morning, I left DC around 4am. I was on the water in Kiptopeke before 9am.
The surf was rather high. Several other yakers were standing on shore looking out, wondering whether to go out. They saw me gearing up and asked if I was going. I said "hell yeah, I didn't drive 4 hours to watch the waves..." They eventually went out too. It wasn't bad at all on the shore side of the ships, but the other side... well let's just say you wouldn't want to have been there. As the winds died throughout the day, it got much better on both sides.
I got to a hole on the calm side and put in my first line... 10 seconds it was in before I had a tog on... 15.75 incher.
I caught 11 in all, including 4 keepers (2 @ 16" and 2@ 18") I only kept 2. I used up a dozen blue crabs and maybe 20 shrimp. Only caught 1 on the shrimp. The rest of the shrimp got stolen, probably by sea bass and tog. The blue crab is great because it lasts a long time if you hook it right. It has to be difficult to get on the hook, otherwise, it will be easy for the tog to steal it. I only lost 1 rig.
Tog are now officially my favorite fish to catch so far. My arm is sore today from fighting them, but probably mostly from setting the hook a million times (and missing). On one hook set towards the end of the day, I was tired, and the tog almost ripped the rod out of my hands... instead of going up to set the hook, the rod went down! I missed him that time, but I think it may have been an 18 incher I caught a few minutes later. My drag was tightened all the way and he still pulled out some line.
I found that it was much harder to catch them during high current times. Slack is best... they don't seem to like it if the bait is moving too much, and even with a 4oz sinker, I couldn't keep it down. The current really flows fast along the bottom of the ships.
After Kipto, I launched from the Willoughby Boat Ramp to hit the southern HRBT at night. There is a sandy launch there for yaks. It was dead calm out there. There were at least a dozen yakers fishing the bridge. I only caught a few small flounder and weakfish.
I got back home at 3am and slept for almost 12 hours.
The surf was rather high. Several other yakers were standing on shore looking out, wondering whether to go out. They saw me gearing up and asked if I was going. I said "hell yeah, I didn't drive 4 hours to watch the waves..." They eventually went out too. It wasn't bad at all on the shore side of the ships, but the other side... well let's just say you wouldn't want to have been there. As the winds died throughout the day, it got much better on both sides.
I got to a hole on the calm side and put in my first line... 10 seconds it was in before I had a tog on... 15.75 incher.
I caught 11 in all, including 4 keepers (2 @ 16" and 2@ 18") I only kept 2. I used up a dozen blue crabs and maybe 20 shrimp. Only caught 1 on the shrimp. The rest of the shrimp got stolen, probably by sea bass and tog. The blue crab is great because it lasts a long time if you hook it right. It has to be difficult to get on the hook, otherwise, it will be easy for the tog to steal it. I only lost 1 rig.
Tog are now officially my favorite fish to catch so far. My arm is sore today from fighting them, but probably mostly from setting the hook a million times (and missing). On one hook set towards the end of the day, I was tired, and the tog almost ripped the rod out of my hands... instead of going up to set the hook, the rod went down! I missed him that time, but I think it may have been an 18 incher I caught a few minutes later. My drag was tightened all the way and he still pulled out some line.
I found that it was much harder to catch them during high current times. Slack is best... they don't seem to like it if the bait is moving too much, and even with a 4oz sinker, I couldn't keep it down. The current really flows fast along the bottom of the ships.
After Kipto, I launched from the Willoughby Boat Ramp to hit the southern HRBT at night. There is a sandy launch there for yaks. It was dead calm out there. There were at least a dozen yakers fishing the bridge. I only caught a few small flounder and weakfish.
I got back home at 3am and slept for almost 12 hours.
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