Malcolm & Russ wanted in on some groceries.
Nice ride out to 175’.
Squid, previously cleaned fish belly strips, cigars & Wx buoy live bait. Ran slow on 1 motor. The strips worked best, 2"x4" and circle hook thru once part way in from the end.
Spent a bit longer targeting the African Pompanos - they are very good pan fried and grilled. Coffin box maxed out.
Small ship dragging a few miles outside us all day. Their run was no more than several miles long each time. (can be seen in a few pics)
Sad to imaging the by-catch mortality rate. One drag probably killed more brown & red fish that the SC recreational fishermen landed in the past 7 years.
That is awesome Dave. Glad Malcom will be able to enjoy some of that delicious AP. Man, keep that honey hole number locked up. Interesting seeing some smaller APs and how their head shape changes as they get bigger. Probably a little easier to clean. Enjoy!
“Apathy is the Glove into Which Evil Slips It’s Hand”, but really, who cares?
Nice catch but if you keep that many pompanos every time, that won’t be a pompano spot for much longer. They are fairly limited in abundance here so the stewardship is really on you.
DF: smaller fish had the ‘threads’ top & bottom over a foot long.
‘Cudas got over 6# of lead – egg sinkers and a bunch of swivels & hooks.
Didn’t apply any repellant, shame on me.
Certainly not a secret spot.
It’s marked on the Maps Unique & Top Spot charts.
The day you came out, recall the other rec. boat without the T-top?
They were on their mark before we got there and remained close by thru our departure. Something good under them for sure.
Second trip out there was a small commercial boat moving along the ledge, progressively getting closer to us. Can only surmise he/she picked up to move only when the bite dropped off. That boat no doubt moved on to eventually cover the piece of real estate we fished which was close aligned ½ mile tracks. We could have spoken to them, they were that close.
Oh, had a few charter folks trolling around, one got close enough to speak to, must not have been brought up like most, couldn’t afford to wave back to us.
Skinneej: Highly respect all you’ve contributed.
Will we go back there? Darn skippy we will!
All my friends & I work for a living and the cost of buying food is substantial.
I’ll be the first to apologize to the locals for harvesting 20 fish in 2 days.
My time in the area is 2x a year for several weeks – getting out to fish when weather allows.
Post & PM here on CF now & then. Lots of readers invested in the sport may be interested in the occasional rec. crew hitting the jackpot. Folks doing it for a living, understandably are less apt to share. Hats off to the few commercial & charter guys (retired or not yet) here that offer advice to others.
Mdaddy: Didn’t observe the operations of the ship other than it’s movements.
Doubt they were tossing sabiki rigs though.
Skinneej: Highly respect all you’ve contributed.
Will we go back there? Darn skippy we will!
All my friends & I work for a living and the cost of buying food is substantial.
I’ll be the first to apologize to the locals for harvesting 20 fish in 2 days.
I think you are misreading my statements. Personally, I don't care if you keep 100 fish in 1 day. I'm just saying that you have a special resource there that many people don't. Admittedly, I've only seen pompano in the water a few times, and when I have seen them, the largest school size that I have seen is about 8 fish. Obviously you were on a larger school, but don't assume that because you caught 20 of them, that there are 800 million down there. My understanding is that they weren't even around here until after Hurricane Hugo. We don't know much about them. All, I am saying is that if you want to catch them year after year on your spot, you might want to only consider keeping a handful of them when you go. It's not about how much you fish, it's about how much your spot can sustain. It is certainly possible that these fish are here one day and gone the next. Again, I don't know much about them, but I do know that there are certain places where they can be targetted which suggests some sort of site fidelity. Anyway, do as you wish and what you feel comfortable with. Just don't be surprised if they disappear.
My post is not judgment. It’s just “food for thought”. I have more than 3500 fishing spots in my log book from the NC\SC border to the SC\FL border, and I treat each and everyone of them as if I plan on coming back. I don’t care who has fished them before me, or who will fish them after me.
I once asked an old timer commercial bottom fisherman a
Roger SJ.
Been at it long enough to undetstand the concern.
Good on you having the added benefit of seeing things up close. Once they come out with affordable underwater optics many more folks will be able to target a specific species.
ed. for spelling mistake before getting flamed for that!
Once they come out with affordable underwater optics many more folks will be able to target a spefic species.
Ha! I hope that never happens!!!
I quite enjoy the way things are now! My time down in South Florida has shown me what a “bad” fishery can really look like when the “Tragedy of the Commons” is unrestricted. High accessibility to fishing grounds is a nuclear bomb to a fishery. We are blessed that are fishing grounds are further out and “secret” for the most part.
He’s right. We rarely take more than 3-4 AP’s off any particular structure in a year. The funny thing is that you’ll see juveniles like this all schooled together and not an adult in sight. Most of the juveniles will school on or around ledges, but the adults tend to school on or around wrecks, even the smallest of wreck structure will hold plenty of adults. They don’t ever seem to mingle. Cut open their stomachs and report back with contents please. Most of the AP’s that we kill are full of baby octopus this time of year.
quote:Originally posted by skinneej
quote:Originally posted by DG34YF
Skinneej: Highly respect all you’ve contributed.
Will we go back there? Darn skippy we will!
All my friends & I work for a living and the cost of buying food is substantial.
I’ll be the first to apologize to the locals for harvesting 20 fish in 2 days.
I think you are misreading my statements. Personally, I don't care if you keep 100 fish in 1 day. I'm just saying that you have a special resource there that many people don't. Admittedly, I've only seen pompano in the water a few times, and when I have seen them, the largest school size that I have seen is about 8 fish. Obviously you were on a larger school, but don't assume that because you caught 20 of them, that there are 800 million down there. My understanding is that they weren't even around here until after Hurricane Hugo. We don't know much about them. All, I am saying is that if you want to catch them year after year on your spot, you might want to only consider keeping a handful of them when you go. It's not about how much you fish, it's about how much your
Roger SJ.
Been at it long enough to undetstand the concern.
Good on you having the added benefit of seeing things up close. Once they come out with affordable underwater optics many more folks will be able to target a specific species.
ed. for spelling mistake before getting flamed for that!
YB: The ones I cleaned had nothing identifiable in their stomachs
May have purged early on during the ascent.
Using 6/0 circle hooks, all but a few were hooked very deep - 8" de-hooking pliers barely reached.
Had we been anchored it would have been a chinese fire drill. these AP’s got legs and like to run all over. Often multiple hook-ups resulted in having to move the boat and each guy walking about to keep things sorted. 'Cudas followed them up but mad no contact with the AP’s. That wasn’t the case on many pinkies, B-liners and the blue.
Good haul of fish. But I’m confused about the vessel you called a dragger that probably killed a gazillion fish, then you say you didn’t observe its operations. That’s quite a stretch of ones imagination. Looks like a research boat to me, probably running a side scan sonar or pulling a plankton net or similar.
Small ship dragging a few miles outside us all day. Their run was no more than several miles long each time. (can be seen in a few pics)
Sad to imaging the by-catch mortality rate. One drag probably killed more brown & red fish that the SC recreational fishermen landed in the past 7 years.
Mdaddy: Didn’t observe the operations of the ship other than it’s movements.
Doubt they were tossing sabiki rigs though.
Never fails on this site. Man goes out, smokes the fish puts up a post for us guys stuck on shore to enjoy and dream about getting out and doing the same thing. Then all of a sudden BAM, gotta get hated on. Not just hated on but any negative response is so not needed.
Thanks for the report buddy and wtg on the APs. Hope you guys get em again soon and I would like to see another report.
No problem with his fish as I would have kept everyone of them as well. I was simply questioning the sighting of a bottom dragger of of I presume Charleston.
Was it a trawler or a ship?
