Eisboch wrote:
"Boater" wrote in message
...

Tom Francis - SWSports wrote:
Same over in Narragansett Bay by the bridges. With the right wind,
these dummies get tossed around and sometimes into the bridge pilings.

As you said, no thanks.


Woosies! :)

I admit that I am not much of a fishing nut. When I do go, I'd much rather
troll slowly around the shore or rocks for stripers if in the small boat.
To me, blues are nothing but a pain and a waste of time. I know people
enjoy catching them on light gear because of the fight they put up, but
after a few times it gets old to me. I don't eat them, so there is no point
in catching them.

I just don't get a thrill of sitting amoung half a dozen or more other
boats, bottom fishing while bouncing and rocking for hours near a bunch of
bridge pilings. Much rather be underway and trolling or, if in a bigger
boat, go well offshore and either drift fish for cod or troll for tuna.

32 miles straight out from Scituate in 260 feet of water is a verrry
productive cod fishing day. Two or three trips will supply several families
fresh and frozen fish for the summer and following winter.

Eisboch


I enjoyed trolling for fish along the Florida shorelines and along the
Connecticut shorelines, but around here trolling is done far enough off
the shoreline that you can't see much, and there is very little bottom
structure. I also like sight fishing and drift fishing.

Thirty two miles from here is just more of the Bay.

"Boater" wrote in message
...


Thirty two miles from here is just more of the Bay.


My condolences.

Move to where the real ocean is. :-)


Seriously, what I enjoyed the most of having the Egg Harbor and doing the
cod fishing runs was the whole ritual. It started at about 4:30 am. I
usually slept on the boat the night before and the crew (usually my brother
or son ... or both) and the fishing party would show up just before dawn.
Even in the summer, it would be chilly, so the party would stand around in
jackets or sweatshirts, downing one of those big box jugs of "Joe" from
Dunkin' Donuts. We used to invite different people for each trip, usually
guys from work or friends that wanted to go.

We'd fire up the diesels just as the sun was about to rise and head out. It
usually took about an hour and a half to get to my secret, GPS recorded
"spot". It was in about 260 feet of water, but had a bottom structure that
rose up about 30 or 35 feet. I'd position the boat relative to the wind so
it would drift over the structure. Usually it was dead calm, so the boat
didn't move very quickly, but if the wind was up a bit, we'd deploy a sea
anchor off the starboard or port beam cleat (depending on wind) to slow the
drift.

My brother and/or son would instruct the fishing party on how to "rotate" in
the cockpit while hauling in the cod. My job was simply to call "lines in"
when it was time for me to reposition the boat for another drift over the
structure, and watch the fish finder. I'd zoom in to the bottom 10 feet and
could actually see the lines from the rods and the red blobs of cod moving
towards the jigs.

After about 3 or 5 hours the fish wells in the boat would be pretty much
full of cod and a few haddock.
By then everyone's arms were getting tired (it's quite a bit of work
hauling a big cod or two up from that depth) and I could sense that everyone
on board was happy and satisfied. "Lines in" and we'd head back.
I remember one trip in particular ... we headed back to port with over 600
lbs of cod in the wells.

After docking, the cleaning started, both fish and the boat. We usually
drew quite an audience of "gawkers" .... people standing up on the sidewalk
watching the process of hauling cod after cod out of the well and over to
the cleaning table. The fishing party would celebrate the day with a few
brews and then take their respective coolers filled with cod fillets home to
the wife and kids.

The reality of it struck one day as one group was leaving. One of the guys
came over to thank us for the day and told me that I probably didn't even
realize that to him the fishing trip was the highlight of his summer.

It was pretty cool.

Eisboch

On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 11:14:52 -0600, Vic Smith
wrote:

Probably a macho ritual. I can't think of any reason for the couple
times I went ice fishing except to "check it out." It checked out
cold, and I didn't catch anything.
I think about ice fishing whenever I see the crowd at a Bears or
Packers game when the temp is -10F.
brrrrrrr

Central Iowa riders have BRR, Bike Ride to Rippey, from Perry Ia to
Rippey, fifteen miles or so. In the dead of Winter, some years it has
been below zero and windy. Other years, fifty and sunny.

Casady

On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 18:40:39 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:


"Boater" wrote in message
...

Tom Francis - SWSports wrote:

Same over in Narragansett Bay by the bridges. With the right wind,
these dummies get tossed around and sometimes into the bridge pilings.

As you said, no thanks.

Woosies! :)

I admit that I am not much of a fishing nut. When I do go, I'd much rather
troll slowly around the shore or rocks for stripers if in the small boat.
To me, blues are nothing but a pain and a waste of time. I know people
enjoy catching them on light gear because of the fight they put up, but
after a few times it gets old to me. I don't eat them, so there is no point
in catching them.

I just don't get a thrill of sitting amoung half a dozen or more other
boats, bottom fishing while bouncing and rocking for hours near a bunch of
bridge pilings. Much rather be underway and trolling or, if in a bigger
boat, go well offshore and either drift fish for cod or troll for tuna.

32 miles straight out from Scituate in 260 feet of water is a verrry
productive cod fishing day. Two or three trips will supply several families
fresh and frozen fish for the summer and following winter.

Fishing, in general, is a kind of odd sport. There are divisions
within divisions and sub-sets of divisions and sub-sets of sub-sets
and endless techniques for all types and classes of fish.

For example, drifting open water is not my thing. Nor is sitting on a
rock pile or open beach area. I much prefer moving in and around
structure, anticipating school movement and hunting, if that's an
applicable word, for bigger fish rather than schoolies. When I did
some tuna fishing, I was bored silly. I mean catching tuna seemed
like a brute strength sport and frankly boring. Give me a big blue
fish on a light rod - now that's my idea of fun. Or a three pound
smallmouth on an ultra-light rig.

My gear is pretty universal - I range from medium heavy to ultra-light
spinning rigs (both fresh and salt) and have a few bait casters in the
same categories. I believe in big baits for big fish and tend to
stick with that even to the point of using large and very light lures
for the ultra-light gear. Fly fishing, I tend to the medium to heavy
forward weighted sinking lines 7 foot rods with heavy sinking lines
with large flies and streamers on light weight tippets. For trout
fishing, it's small rods 5 1/2 foot, extremely light weight lines and
large imitations. I have a color preference too - I tend to like
green, blue and/or brown lures for all circumstances. I like to use
yellow. blue or the new camouflage color lines.

A typical trip for me is fairly well pre-rigged. I set up what rods I
think I'll use, select a line color or colors and pre-rig all the rods
with a different selection of lures so that I'm set and ready to go
when I get to where I'm going. I will take along a set of
pre-selected lures for change outs, but that's not typical - I
generally go with what I brung and pre-rigged.

Other guides I know do the complete opposite - they will work with one
type of rig, sit for hours on one type of structure and tend to work
with one type or category of lure. It works for them. I know other
guides who come to a trip with a complete tackle shop in their boats
or cars and are constantly mixing and matching rods, reels, lines and
lures.

When you multiply all the different types of fishermen against all the
different techniques against all the different specialties (trout,
fluke, blue, tuna, yada, yada, yada), it's fairly well endless.

On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 19:20:45 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:

The reality of it struck one day as one group was leaving. One of the guys
came over to thank us for the day and told me that I probably didn't even
realize that to him the fishing trip was the highlight of his summer.

It was pretty cool.

That's the best part of fishing - being out, having fun and generally
satisfying some weird psychological need to feed oneself.

When I was still active chartering, you'd get those "best trip EVAH"
one year and "BEST TRIP EVAH" the next year from the regular clients.

It's was kind of funny actually. :)

On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 18:40:39 -0500, Eisboch wrote:


32 miles straight out from Scituate in 260 feet of water is a verrry
productive cod fishing day. Two or three trips will supply several
families fresh and frozen fish for the summer and following winter.

Is that still the case? I thought cod stocks were about done in. Are
they coming back?

On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 21:42:08 -0500, gfretwell wrote:


Occasionally I will throw a real spoon at them but as soon as they hit
it I would just as soon turn him loose. I am going to release him next
to the boat anyway.

You could take the hooks of that spoon. I used to carry a hookless
topwater plug for the occasional blues blitz. Watching that plug being
smashed by an angry bluefish was a lot of fun.

On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 18:39:47 -0600, Eddie
wrote:

That's my kind of fishing.

What, no suffering ?

You have missed the essential essence of the sport !

"Tom Francis - SWSports" wrote in
message ...
On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 18:40:39 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:


"Boater" wrote in message
...

Tom Francis - SWSports wrote:

Same over in Narragansett Bay by the bridges. With the right wind,
these dummies get tossed around and sometimes into the bridge pilings.

As you said, no thanks.

Woosies! :)

I admit that I am not much of a fishing nut. When I do go, I'd much
rather
troll slowly around the shore or rocks for stripers if in the small boat.
To me, blues are nothing but a pain and a waste of time. I know people
enjoy catching them on light gear because of the fight they put up, but
after a few times it gets old to me. I don't eat them, so there is no
point
in catching them.

I just don't get a thrill of sitting amoung half a dozen or more other
boats, bottom fishing while bouncing and rocking for hours near a bunch of
bridge pilings. Much rather be underway and trolling or, if in a bigger
boat, go well offshore and either drift fish for cod or troll for tuna.

32 miles straight out from Scituate in 260 feet of water is a verrry
productive cod fishing day. Two or three trips will supply several
families
fresh and frozen fish for the summer and following winter.

Fishing, in general, is a kind of odd sport. There are divisions
within divisions and sub-sets of divisions and sub-sets of sub-sets
and endless techniques for all types and classes of fish.

For example, drifting open water is not my thing. Nor is sitting on a
rock pile or open beach area. I much prefer moving in and around
structure, anticipating school movement and hunting, if that's an
applicable word, for bigger fish rather than schoolies. When I did
some tuna fishing, I was bored silly. I mean catching tuna seemed
like a brute strength sport and frankly boring. Give me a big blue
fish on a light rod - now that's my idea of fun. Or a three pound
smallmouth on an ultra-light rig.

My gear is pretty universal - I range from medium heavy to ultra-light
spinning rigs (both fresh and salt) and have a few bait casters in the
same categories. I believe in big baits for big fish and tend to
stick with that even to the point of using large and very light lures
for the ultra-light gear. Fly fishing, I tend to the medium to heavy
forward weighted sinking lines 7 foot rods with heavy sinking lines
with large flies and streamers on light weight tippets. For trout
fishing, it's small rods 5 1/2 foot, extremely light weight lines and
large imitations. I have a color preference too - I tend to like
green, blue and/or brown lures for all circumstances. I like to use
yellow. blue or the new camouflage color lines.

A typical trip for me is fairly well pre-rigged. I set up what rods I
think I'll use, select a line color or colors and pre-rig all the rods
with a different selection of lures so that I'm set and ready to go
when I get to where I'm going. I will take along a set of
pre-selected lures for change outs, but that's not typical - I
generally go with what I brung and pre-rigged.

Other guides I know do the complete opposite - they will work with one
type of rig, sit for hours on one type of structure and tend to work
with one type or category of lure. It works for them. I know other
guides who come to a trip with a complete tackle shop in their boats
or cars and are constantly mixing and matching rods, reels, lines and
lures.

When you multiply all the different types of fishermen against all the
different techniques against all the different specialties (trout,
fluke, blue, tuna, yada, yada, yada), it's fairly well endless.

I am learning to go with less gear these days. I think the few times I have
kayak fished has educated me a little. A small Plano tray about 6x8" is
all I take. A few swim baits and some jigs. I only fish live bait on
salmon and tuna / yellowtail. And tuna fishing in Calif seems to be
different than on your coast. We do a lot of hunting looking for Kelp
Paddies (can be a piece of plywood, etc) or breezers. Tuna that are
crashing a bait school at the surface. I still throw surface Irons (Tady's)
for them, but some days in a live bait fishery.

wrote in message
...
On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 18:40:39 -0500, Eisboch wrote:


32 miles straight out from Scituate in 260 feet of water is a verrry
productive cod fishing day. Two or three trips will supply several
families fresh and frozen fish for the summer and following winter.

Is that still the case? I thought cod stocks were about done in. Are
they coming back?


I haven't done it for a few years now, but I heard from the regular charter
boys that the cod has dropped off quite a bit over the last couple of years.
It apparently goes in cycles.

What is strange though is the number of tuna being landed. When we had the
Egg (2003-2005 seasons) it was a rare occasion for anyone, including the
charter boats, to return to the dock with a tuna. The tuna would arrive
around mid-August, but the hits and landings were infrequent. We got a
reputation of being the "lucky" fishing boat because we always came back
with a full well of cod and, in our first tuna outing, hooked up and landed
one by 8 am. However, by 2007 and this past season, tuna began showing up
in Cape Cod Bay in early June and charter boats were returning to the dock
early with their limit. Again, from talking to the "experts", all of this
goes in cycles.

Eisboch