The Earthquake Woke Up The Sea Monsters (6/10)

[Latimeria]

Last night was a memorable evening of shark fishing indeed which I'm still pinching myself.  The guy who caught the Great White off the beach a few years ago, Jeff, wanted to show me how to fish paddled out baits before he moved back east.  I'm not familiar with the SD/OC border, but he lives pretty much right there.

I met up with him armed with kayak and a bat ray as bait.  Needless to say that he didn't get a license for 2016 and since he's moving soon and just decided to play sand hand for me.  We set up some rods and I used bat ray as bait for the first time.  Bat Ray chunks are heavy as hell and I even put a chunk on for casted bait as well.  The bat ray wasn't getting bit, so I switched up to some big bonito I had. I cast out and got slammed on it, but missed the bite.  I re-baited and tried again, but made a poor cast.  I went to reel it in immediately and was snagged onto something.  For f@ck sake... big expensive rig already going to break off.  Jeff was going to put the kayak in to try and get my rig back when I told him not to bother and I was snagged up good.  As I was pulling, I finally felt the sinker slip from whatever it was stuck on and started reeling in fast just to have it "Get Stuck" again.  This time, the get stuck part started pulling back!

69.5" Soupie! 



Not bad for a new beach for me... We reeled in the bat ray that wasn't touched on the yakked rod as it was in the way and we just set up the long rods.  It's a lot of work putting a paddled bait out there.  A Lot more work than I'm willing to do unless if I lived on the Gulf Coast of course.

The bonito I brought was huge so I switched to mack and so glad I did.  Kelp started to become a problem, so a close eye on the gear was a must.

A little while later and I see a familiar bounce of the rod... Right away it looked like a Seven and sure enough got my first Seven of the evening on the beach! 

A very FAT 80"



Now I was 2 for 3 on the shark bites and a just at high tide, I had a big hit #4!  Problem was it didn't stick and things went quiet for a while.

The tide was on its way out and it was getting late.  I still had a drive ahead of me and felt pretty darn good about the evening.  Jeff got to see his first Sevengill and I got to learn all about yakkin baits, gulf coast style.  Just then my rod makes a huge bounce and I was all over it.  I felt the rod starting to load up and gave a hookset that stopped me in my tracks.... This girls was on the bigger side!

She made a circular flip out of the water and I saw that she had some size to her.  Heavy, Heavy Heavy!  One of the fattest ones I've caught.  I'm glad Jeff is a marine and in great shape as it got to the beach all agro and looking to take someone out.  Jeff brought his tail rope, but it didn't want him to rope her at all and he wound up in a tug of war with her tail to slide her up the beach just enough.  I took a pic of him during/after his epic battle!  lol

Here it almost knocked him over with a tail slap to the head!





99" of FAT victory! (I don't know if she was eating well or just pregnant, but she had some girth to her)



I cast another bait out just to have it picked clean with bait stealers and called it the night.  I learned a lot of new techniques tonight, new baits, new location, epic catches and met a really cool peep in Jeff.  I can hear that story of the Great White over and over... One day, I'll get on that short list, but in the meantime I'm super stoked how the night turned out.

Soupie - Bonito Incoming
Seven #1 - Mack Head - High Tide
Seven #2 - Mack Head - Outgoing Tide

3 for 5 on the shark bites...

[sasquatch]

When I heard my text sound at midnight I knew you did good. Didn't even read it.

See you tonight.

[Latimeria]

When I heard my text sound at midnight I knew you did good. Didn't even read it.

See you tonight.

I got a poker game tonight up in San Marcos and a party to go to on Sunday night.  I'll text you details.

[xjchad]

 
I'm green man, what an amazing night!
Sure you didn't have a bad batch of tuna for dinner and dream it all??

[sasquatch]

When I heard my text sound at midnight I knew you did good. Didn't even read it.

See you tonight.

I got a poker game tonight up in San Marcos and a party to go to on Sunday night.  I'll text you details.

Thanks for giving me a chance. I just gave away my kayak yesterday so I'm glad I won't need it.

[Eric H]

That's cool you met up with Jeff fangman.

Glad you put some sharks on the beach while he was there.

[LONGCAST JOE]

You sure she only went 99"? Looks alot bigger, must be the girth...Wow. Epic night with the Fangman, cool stuff.
JOE

[vdisney]

You are on fire Tom, congrats on a stellar night...........V

[Pinoyfisher]

What a night it was!! Those are some fat 7s!!

[1morecast]

Nice!

[HalibutJoel99]

Holy moly! That last picture is a beast! Congrats.

[Thefangman]

It was definitely a cool night. I honestly didn't have my hopes to high, even after the first shark. Bites kept coming and I got more and more exited as the night rolled on. It was great just to be on the sand helping out, I take as much pride helping as I do actually catching.

Some things to make note of.
- match your bait to the bait species of the area. We ended up fishing a location not know for its availability of rays. Hence no interest from the sharks.
- geese, keep an eye out on those 7gills, their range of motion is pretty wild.
- get out and give it your best effort, nothing half assed.

[SurffishingSean]

Great story and thats sweet you got together with Fangman. that awesome pictures. Keep it up!

[Sharkinthedark II]

That's a Bad fish! Camp P has been on my mind for a while...