Report submitted by 'Moose'
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Port Aransas Offshore Report
Port Aransas, TX
September 2nd, 2005
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Mako called us up and said that he got his boat back from the
shop and he had the urge. We met up before the sunrise to fuel up and get
ready for a day on the big pond in search of anything with fins. With the
boat loaded up, we cruised out of the pass into the deep blue. Thunderstorms
surrounded the area and lit up the skies with spectacular lightning. Luckily
we had a window of opportunity to thread the needle between some large storm
cells. 10 miles out we tied up to the first rig and we started to chop up
some bait and chum.
Immediateley, Mako drops down and gets hooked up and taken into
the rig by a mystery fish that would eventually break him off while Oz is
busy hauling up a pair of snapper. We couldn't cut the frozen bait fast enough
to send down and retrieve with snapper. Mako sends a big bait down. Two seconds
later the rod was doubled over. Mako put the muscle to it and got this sow
snapper before the predators did...
notice
the bite on the back.
We proceed to catch snapper after snapper and they were all
8 to 10 pounds with several around the 15 pound mark. We were throwing back
good keeper snaps because we knew that the next one was going to be bigger.
Oz dropped a bait that would start taking line away from the rig at good
speed. A couple of minutes later he got this very unhappy Blacknose in the
boat and set him free. Oz would catch and release a Blacknose later.
Mako rigged up a live bait to send to the bottom and set the
rod in the holder. He grabbed the light tackle and went to work on the the
mangrove snapper.
While he was messing with the light tackle the TLD50 goes off
in the back peeling off about 25 yards of line. He told me to grab it, but
I was too busy reeling up my own snapper. He got back to the rod and set
the hook on a brute. This good sized snapper would be the best of the day.
So before 10:00am we had our limit of big sow snapper and the
weather had cooperated until now. We had been watching a big squall line
that luckily moved just to the east of us. Oz would pull up one of many custom
rigs full of snapper, notice the skies starting to get bad.
It seemed that the storms would miss but they had a different
fate in store for us. Just as we thought we were in the clear, the skies
just surrounded us with black clouds and white walls of rain. We quickly
came to the conclusion that we should stay and weather it out instead of
run home. Who cares about wind, rain, and lightning when the fish are biting?
We had noticed a rig further out to sea earlier and the bite was turning
off where we were at. So after discussing what Tred Barta would do, we decided
to run the 10 more miles out in the rain and lightning.
We decided to stop en route and take cover from the electricity
underneath the lightning rod of a shrimp boat. On the first cast, Mako missed
the first and second strikes, but the third would find the flesh and he landed
a King. No more action so we continued to the rig. We got there and found
the same conditions... snapper after snapper. We caught and released
approximately 40 snapper at the second rig while it steadily rained. We caught
some small Strawberry Grouper, but they were not big enough. Like drowned
rats we started the journey back and stopped by the previous rig to spear
up some spade fish. The worst of the storm was over and some birds working
made us leave in pursuit. We got a couple of Bonita and finally headed back
around 5:30pm. We got back to the docks and cleaned the boat, washed the
gear and started cleaning fish at the mansion.
Another awesome, but interesting trip on the big pond.
Thanks to Mako for offering to go out in the storms.
-Moose
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