The predicted weather was much better for this past weekend so I gave Ken a call and told him we were going to hit the offshore wrecks. In addition to helping a writer out, I have been given a bunch of jigs by a new lure company, "Jerk That Jig" http://www.jerkthatjig.com . They want me to try out their jigs and get them some photos. They sure are some pretty things and I was anxious to give them a try.
We were joined by Wes Blow, Chris Boyce, and another outdoor writer, Ric Burnley. Seas were calm and fishing was good. A pleasant surprise was the lack of spiny dogfish out there. We did catch a few dogfish but they were smooth dogs. I guess all the spiny dogs are inshore eating all those eels that the striped bass anglers are feeding them. We hit 3 wrecks and then did some dropping along the 50 fathom curve after we had a box full of bass. We registered a total of 9 citation fish (5 sea bass and 4 tilefish). We had some others which may have gone if we had weighed them. The dogfish were not around but the bluefish sure were, 30-34 inches long. We would be fishing fine, I would see them show on the bottom machine and then everyone would be hooked up. Those things tore up some sea bass and plenty of our bottom rigs. We also caught a handful of triggerfish up to 3.5 pounds.
Wes Blow was the hot angler with 4 citation fish. It was Chris Boyce's birthday. He celebrated his 25th by catching his first ever citation sea bass. Everyone on board registered at least one citation (except me). I'm not sure where Ken's article is going. I think Virginia Wildlife but he writes for a number of publications.
