Reginald P. Smithers III wrote:
HK wrote:
HK wrote:
There were a few questions a couple of weeks ago about umbrella rigs.

Here's a commercial webpage that shows a variety of umbrella rigs,
their components, variations, et cetera.

http://www.cnksal****ertackle.com/home.html



I don't like to troll for stripers very much, but if I get talked into
it, I like to drag a tandem rig. This consists of a deep-diving hard
lure, a Rapala usually, tied to a three way swivel. I tie a soft
plastic bait on a jig hook to the other swivel eye, and the third
swivel eye, of course, is tied to the fishing line.

The deep-diving lure pulls the soft plastic lure down, too, and if
you've put the jig hook into that lure straight and true, it won't
twist as it is dragged.

The tandem setup was shown to me years ago by a really good north
Florida fishermen. I've seen it written up a few times in different
places, so it must be a fairly well known method. It does work, and to
me it is a lot more fun than dragging and then reeling in some
ungainly umbrella rig.


I heard the larger ones can give one hell of a fight. While I have
caught and eaten large mouth, with my limited fishing experience I have
never caught a striper. Do you ever bring them home for a dinner?


Well, in the Bay, they're "one hell of a fighter," because they tend to
be the largest fish most people encounter in the Bay, and their weight
alone makes them "tuggers." But I think they fight better when they are
in the ocean, not the Bay. I'm not impressed with their "fighting fish"
reputation. There are lots of predatory ocean fish that pound for pound
are much better fighters, even substantially smaller ocean fish. A
stinky sal****er catfish, for example, is a hell of a fighter.

Interestingly, many of the Bay fishermen I see targeting stripers do so
with tackle heavy enough to go shark fishing in the ocean. It's overkill
by a huge factor.

Neither my wife nor I like the taste of stripers that much, so if I
catch one, I usually release it. I have a neighbor who likes them,
though, so if he goes with me or if I know he is around, I'll keep a
fish for him. If we do cook one, I like to poach them. They're kind of
heavy tasting fried, at least to me.

While out west, we ate two dinners at a nice restaurant where the
speciality was "monkfish." I'd never had West Coast monkfish and I
thought it was delicious. Very light taste.

I don't much like "heavy" or oily tasting fish, though I do like
kingfish mackeral steaks broiled with lemon and some sauce.