Took my 12 year old son and 3 of his friends out yesterday. Best ride out in years. Lines in at 6 at about 350 feet, first mahi by 6:30. A good start to a great day but it was not to be, worked hard for 4 keepers. Lots of schoolies short striking so frequent re baiting. Cast on the peanuts for a while. Went deep looking for better and fished a great rip with nothing to show for it. Went back in to 600 feet and had a bill come up and slash a bait that popped the rigger clip. Dropped it back and it hit hard almost spooling me before it threw the hook. Guessing it was a sailfish.
Anybody know the “playing hooky”, maybe out of savannah? Lots of coast guard chatter it was taking on water near Edisto banks and lost power. battery plus pumps were keeping her afloat. Last I heard it was stabilized and help was on site.
“Mary Catherine”
Grady White 330 Express
Beaufort
I am not trying to be a smart bottom…but how would a possible sail almost spool you?
Well…He was guessing it was a sail…Perhaps it was a white.
I’ll be the first to admit I have next to no experience identifying billfish as this is only the 2nd I have hooked up, the first being a sail that was landed. Your comment implies a sail can’t spool a TLD25 so must have been something bigger? You could be right and I don’t have the experience to say otherwise. I gave up about half the line on the reel dropping it back and my crew of 4 kids was slow to react to my “throttle back” (repeated 3 times) so when it hooked up we were still at trolling speed and gave up even more line. I set max drag to keep some line on the reel and shortly thereafter it threw (or I pulled) the hook.
“Mary Catherine”
Grady White 330 Express
Beaufort
There are lots of billfish out there that can spool a TLD 25.