Went out on Monday from Ripley. 47’ Viking, twin 800 hp diesels. Cruising speed was 30ish.
Ran to the ledge then out to 600’. Fairly smooth conditions, plenty of weed lines. Boated a Bonita and Mahi, lost a small Mahi, at the ledge then nothing. Eased out deep, boated another Mahi, lost something large, mostly likely a Wahoo, to the sharks. Not much happening. Went back to the ledge and picked up another Mahi, a tuna and a Wahoo.
Left the dock at 0500, got back after fueling on Shem Creek at 1900. Burned 316 gallons.
No one was catching much. General consensus was that large numbers of Mahi aren’t here yet. Last year was good by this time. One group of knuckleheads boated a way small Marlin and got nailed by DNR. Yeah. They made a mess at the cleaning station and left.
There were a couple boats bottom fishing at the ledge. Never saw what they caught but they were bending rods.