Fished yesterday in the ICW with fellow guide and long time friend Capt Addison Rupert. Dispite the nasty wind and a NE wind at that we still went. Sight fishing wasnt in our cards so we chilled out and chunked some bait. Blue crabs and mullet came thru again. Caught 12-15 nice reds only one small pup and the rest 6-12 pounds. After playing with those for awhile we pushed on scouting new areas for untouched fish. Found some great areas that look extremely fishy and a few fish to go with it. Lots of fun on the water with a good friend.
There are lots of bait chunkers out there, and there is no problem doing it either. You gotta do what the weather lets you. As for myself Id rather throw plastics or flies. The main thing is keeping up with where the fish are…Cant catch 'em on the couch!
Some people may know that I work at Haddrells POint MTP, but when I fish I have everything known to man on the boat. Its like a floating tackle shop. You never know what you’ll need or what they will be biting that day!
We were fishing the last 2 hrs of the falling tide and the first bit of the incoming tide. This time of year I have better luck with lower water fishing…when the fish are out of the grass and in the shallow waters.
Very nice Justin. Thanks for the info in the report and the help in the shop recent
I feel much better knowing I’m not the only “bait chunker”
Pardon my ignorance, but please explain why “chunking bait” seems to carry a negative connotation. What’s the difference (in theory) between using cut versus live bait? Please clarify. Thanks in advance.
The term “chunkin bait” means using live or cut bait and “chunkin” it out there instead of using lures/soft plastics. I dont see any problem with using bait at all. Any given day that I go out on the water I always have some kind of live or dead bait. Some say there is more sport in catching fish with artificials but when you are charter fishing you gotta catch fish no matter what it takes. I dont mean to sound superior to anyone out there and dont want to give the wrong impression but I sometimes incorperate the term into my jibber jabber lingo.
I am bait chunker and don’t care what people say about it. Not that anyone on this thread said anything, but have had people say it in the past, that it’s not real fishing, but usually and almost every trip my bait produced at least a catch or two. Ive thrown plactics all day before without a bite, so why not throw one or two rods out with bait? Its fun to hear the drag scream. I love using bait, and I think it’s also fun to catch fish on topwater or plastics.
Some fly fisherman are ‘taught’ to look down their noses at bait fisherman (River Runs Through it). There certainly is a feeling of exhileration when you land your first fish on flies you tied yourself. So the skill is in replicating what they eat. Even though I tie some freshwater flies, I have no interest in trying to tie a shrimp or mm, at least intially. Maybe when I get bored of catching too many :), I’ll switch over to my own creations.
Many go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after.