Pecan Island Report

[Finfeatherfur]

Well, we made it out Saturday as planned, but didn't plan for the 3' seas we encountered! Weather man called for 1's, and they were until about 20 miles out, and we crossed a thin line of clouds that were dark and the wind/seas kicked up a bit. I assumed it would lay down once I cleared that thin line of clouds on our way to 50 miles out. Does everyone know what happens when you "assume" something?!

On board was my wife and her sister, along with Hayden, Connor, and Goldenrod's son. We have a spot that produces sow snapper on a regular basis, so I figured we would fight through it, get our snapper and head in to calmer water. I arrived to find a ripping current, and it would cause me great headaches most of the day. The current was so strong, it was a nightmare trying to direct the wife to control the boat while I attempted to tie up. The current also affected the fishing as the fish were unable to stage in their normal pattern due to the rip, and were forced to seek refuge on the other side of the structure. This made it impossible to present bait to them, so I played the hand dealt to me. Went up in weight and scratched a few snapper in the 17-18" range which I threw back waiting on the bigger snapper. In hindsight, I should have filled the limit and ran in, but it is what it is!

After boating a few snapper, my sis-n-law is at the back of the boat and calmly says "what's that big thing", and I turn to see a huge Ling swimming away from the boat. I immediately grab a rod rigged for that, pitch a bait about 5' from him and he is hungry. Luckily, I had a bouy handy and was ready to dump the rope at a moments notice. The fish followed the bait all the way to the boat and ate it only feet away from us. As soon as he did, line came off the big Calcutta like it was a Zebco 33 and I handed the rod to our young guest. I immediately put the float on the rig rope and dump it, which ended up being the "hero" moment of the day. This fish was big, and on semi light tackle for that species along with the current, it took us quite awhile to play out. Several times he came alongside the boat only to rip off another 100' of line. Once he played out, I buried the gaff in him and got him on board. Only problem was he was about 6" longer than the inside of our 150qt Coleman fish box.

We picked away at the snapper, having to move the boat and stay off the rope on the upcurrent side to find the fish, and it took alot longer than recent trips. Not sure what was up with the current this weekend, haven't seen it like this in our area in some time. The grass line was in the same area as last week, but with the wind and seas it was broken up. So we finished the day with a box of smaller than usual snapper and a big ole' Cobia and called it a day. On the way in, we found calm seas and green water at the close in rigs and almost stopped to fish, but again the current was so strong I figured we would be waisting our time.