On board Saturday, I had repeat client, Matt Cataldo, along with his son, nephew, and father for LT striped bass. The two boys, ages 12 and 11, had games later that day, so Matt wanted them to sleep in and we departed the dock around 6:30am, instead of 5:00am.

The day started out with an 0 for 13 on topwater hits on the Heddon Super Spooks and a Gagg’s Grabber popper. We did hook into a decent keeper in the low 30″ inches, that threw the hook! (3rd keeper to throw the hook in two days on Baymen Charters!). All hooks are brand new and tack sharp, so we just took it in stride.

Then, the boys hooked into two more fish, both snapping the line at the boat! I went over every rod and reel and spool and found two reels with slight abraisions on the braided line. I stripped off the chaffed part on this brand new line I had just loaded the day before, re-rigged, and we never had another fish break off. Very strange… It had to be a manufacture defect somewhere in that giant bulk spool of braid that I had just paid $300 bucks for!

Well, we had landed just three fish. I decided to put everyone on rubber crank baits, and we began to run the bay. I used sonar but marked no bait and no bass anywhere. We decided to run to a quiet little spot that everybody passes over (“can’t be any fish in there…”) and guess what? It was stacked on the last two hours of the dropping tide! When we entered, we had boated just three fish. When we left that spot, we had boated a total of 16 fish for the morning! All fish were in the 18-20″ inch range and we never saw another keeper after that first one that threw the hook. But the boys had fun, and they got the cast and count technique and the Baymen Bounce retrieve down pat. Future pro anglers in the making!

On the way home, we skimmed over 6″+ inches of water on the nearly low-tide flats. Love the Carolina flat bottomed skiffs!

Total catch and release today: 16 striped bass. A good way to end a gorgeous morning on the bay.

Hope everyone had a great weekend of fishing!

Sincerely,

Capt. Dave
BAYMEN
www.baymenlife.com