Finest Kind

My son and his family have come to visit from CA along with my daughter and her family from Pittsburgh, PA (yes they are rabid Steelers fans but we still let them in the house ;-)).

I took a leave from work for the day and our plan was to fill the kids’ freezer with cod for the winter.  The prices they pay for fish where they live are incredible so our mission was to help the food budgets with a great catch.

We departed Gloucester Harbor at 0530 (kids like to sleep in) and I headed for the cod grounds I have been fishing recently.  Along the way I decided to stop in an area I have been passing by but have wanted to fish.  Since it was just a slight ways off my original course I made the adjustment to the Lady Diane’s autopilot and we steamed across glassy seas at 25 knots.

Upon arriving at my waypoint we sent jigs to the bottom after seeing the finder’s screen light up.  Immediately great market cod inhaled our iron clams and found their way into the box. 

During the action George shouted “Big Shark”…I turned to see the wake of something that was only 10 feet off the stern.  George, having seen many sharks of the CA coast, insisted it was a huge Mako and since we were not bothered during the next 10 minutes while reeling in cod I assumed her was right and it was not a blue dog.  But then came the bite!

George hooked a good cod and was reeling it up when I happened to look at his line.  At that instant the line took a hard outbound turn and the rod tip, on the 80 class rod bent hard into the water.  Damn…shark on and is it a Mako?  My son in law Bruce and I reeled in our rods as fast as humanly possible while the 113H was being dumped.  I have rigged these reels with 130 Jerry Brown line and 80lb leaders but the drag and line capacity cannot match the speed of a Mako..If indeed that is what my son had hooked. 

Underway, and George is in the bow reeling hard as I maneuvered the boat to put line back on the reel.  The fish was pulling very hard and acting like a shark but no jumps as makos often do…blue dog now comes to mind.  I decided to get George into the Black Magic Harness so Bruce took the rod as George geared up.

Just as the Steelers are surprised at how hard the PATS hit,  Bruce couldn’t believe how hard this fish pulled but he fought the fish like a pro and to my surprise within a couple minutes I saw leader.  Less than 10 minutes into the fight now I am concerned about a green shark coming boat side.  Since I was not able to see the fish, I told Bruce to pull this sucker up so I could get a look at what we what we were dealing with.  To my amazement, when color showed I was looking a tuna hooked in the tail!  GET THE GAFF!  I reached for the leader and pulled the fish closer and realize this was a mid 60” fish and would have to be released.  I thought I could hold him by the tail while someone unhooked the jig and took photos….wrong again.  Somehow the fish pulled from my hands and when I grabbed the 130 bite leader the dropper loop popped.  Obviously this fish had plenty of fight left in him and will live to give another angler a great experience.  Another great battle but this time I call a Draw!

We returned to cod fishing and found the fish were on a great bite.  Market to steaker sized cod began coming over the sides at a frantic pace.  Both George and Bruce were putting the hurt on them big time. I had all I could do to keep up with fish maintenance ( ripping and icing the catch) while the guys hauled them aboard.

I got a call from a Capt. Curt of the charter boat Relentless who runs from Green Harbor, looking for some help.  Capt Curt runs an A#1 operation and is always willing to share information with other captains.  I gave him the numbers of where I was and within a half hour we were fishing side by side sticking the best cod of the season..  Capt Curt has helped me in the past so I was glad I was able to return the favor.

As the tide ran out the bite seemed to slack so I decided to move off the bank into deeper water to see if that’s where the fish had moved.  Running out another mile into water 40 feet deeper was the key as we found the fish big time and they were HUNGRY.  I called Curt and we both enjoyed a tremendous bite on cod.

We limited out on cod and still had 3 hours to go so it was time to play catch and release.  We also took some nice pollack in the 15lb class and a couple bull haddock.  The cod were on such a frantic bite that it was nearly impossible to get bait to any other fish.  I decided to experiment and use virtually every style of jig I had in my arsenal.  I figured if it didn’t work today it was going to be tossed.  Bottom line ended up with all jigs returning to the bag as every one of them caught fish!  I even had the guys drop bait (yes Paul I did use bait) down, hoping for haddock, but the cod ate that too…what a problem to have.

With both fish boxes filled to the brim with gutted fish we decided to troll toward home on the slack tide looking for a tuna on the 50s.  Thankfully we didn’t hook a tuna as the boat was full of fish and our ice supply (150 qts) was running low.

We arrived back in port around 1530 after pulling my lobster traps and loaded 220+ lbs (195 of which was cod) into the truck.  The best trip of the season so far and I got to spend it with my favorite “sons”. At home the guys package and froze fish for over 4 hours as my faithful lab Coco mooched cod shashimi by their side.  This Captain was sound asleep  by this time reliving dreams of a great trip.

Update!!!!

Good News…Earl has petered out an should have a minimal impact on us.  I will lose Saturday’s and possibly Sunday’s but I am looking forward to a trip on Monday.  Stay tuned for a report come Tuesday!

I have October wide open for weekends and holidays...this is the time to put some of these in your freezer for the long winter ahead!

Tight Lines,

Capt. George

Capt George