Serving Up the Soup (4/9)

[Latimeria]

Hopefully I capture the entire night in a nutshell, but Steve and Ray might be able to fill in the gaps with whatever I missed.  So it all started on Monday when Ray got his first soupie.  He also lost his flip flops that day and with a high incoming tide, just considered them gone. 

Tuesday we went out and Steve has been having a tough streak from the surf.  He was determined to get something big and toothy, but as described in my last post, I was the fortunate angler to catch a beautiful soupfin shark, while Ray missed a nice one.  Steve's streak continued.

I wasn't planning on going out on Thursday as I had to watch my daughter, but I got a text from Steve that he was going to try again and I should get my older daughter to watch Hannah and get my butt out fishing.  Surprisingly it worked and I got freed up at dinner to drive up to the beach and meet Steve.  I arrived to see Ray and Steve fishing along with a ton of kelp and grass in the water.  I was not feeling overly confident, but it was a long ride and I wasn't going to turn around now.

I get to the beach to see that someone placed Ray's flip flops on the upper beach and they survived 4 days on the beach without anyone taking them or the tide washing them away.  Pretty amazing considering... 
Then Ray says he wants to see an eel.  I laugh and said I haven't seen one in a year.  Literally 2 minutes later, I reel in my rig and you guessed it... I got Ray's eel.



I brought some huge macks and a big bonito, so I was planning on seeing a bigger grinner.  Not long after, I see what I thought was a bass hit, just to find Ray cursed me again with another eel!  Great!   



We were getting lots and lots of weeds with the incoming tide, but it was magic hour and things were hopefully going to pick up.  I look up with my head lamp after a cast and see a green pair of flip flops moving past me in the surf and went to grab them.  Ray was a good 20 yards away and apparently lost his flip flops once again without him noticing.  That's twice those suckers were saved.

30 minutes later, I see a flannel shirt in my headlamd doing the same thing Rays' flip flops were doing and went... That's Squatches Flannel!  I saved his flannel and it wound up being his favorite flannel, so that was two huge saves in a row.

Some time and a lot of kelp later, when I saw my rod make a few funny bounces.  I put the rod in my hands when BAM!  It went screaming out like a banshee!  I was about 10 minutes into the fight when I felt the soupie stop dead in it's tracks..  I instantly thought it got snagged up when I felt a few giant pulls and shakes and POW!  60 lb mono!  (I increased from 40lb line to 60lb line in an experiment and it wound up performing better than anticipated)
Instantly Ray was like... I'm on!  He fought it the last 20 yards to the beach and Steve slid it up onto the beach.  We were trying to get all of the grass and kelp off the line when Ray goes... "What the f@ck?"



Ray got a nice Shark Burn on his leg as you can see here.



Right where the legs were popped out on the sinker, was Ray's broken line all tangled in the legs of my weight, leader and hook in the sharks mouth!  You got to be kidding me.  His line broke and snagged my sinker (or broke after it snagged my sinker?) and wedged into the lead enough to make a seal to battle the shark in!  What a save for sure and by far in the top five weirdest ways to catch a fish that I've experienced.



Steve then gets a bite or tangled with kelp and goes running off to save his rod.  Just then I look down at the sharks tail and see this!



The mouth marks were a about a foot wide and lots of teeth scrapes on both sides.  One side had all big and wide teeth patterns and the other side had small hole patterns on it.  This is the bite of an extremely large Sevengill shark!  This Soupfin was was 6 feet long and I realized that the quick stop in my line and two big thumps before my line snapped were from a big shark who grabbed it while I was reeling it in!  This meant I was not leaving anytime soon and I had some GIANT baits on me so the odds were good that we might have a shot at an estimated 9-10 foot Sevengill!

My Part of the shark Picture...



Rays awesome assist!  We all saved something from peril tonight, but Ray's lucky snag of my line will go down in my history books.
Here is his shots with the opposite side.  It was hard to see in these pics, but there were teeth scrapes on the tail on this side, but more like small puncture wounds from the sharks smaller upper dentition.





After a bunch of pics, she was revived and released.  There wasn't much swell tonight, so she recovered quickly and swam off without a hitch.

Then we hear a yell in the distance.  It wasn't a big shark, but Steve broke his streak with a 13" calico.  When you have Sasquatch arms though, you can make that sucker look 13 pounds!  LOL



I then burned through all of my baits and hour later and had to call it quits as it was already 11:30 and all of us were looking for that big seven that took a bite of the soupie.  This would have been a true giant and we tried hard to find her!
I split and had a tough time at work today since I only had 4 hours of sleep.  Squatch amazed me by staying later than I have ever seen him out there and I left before him! 

I was hoping to hear about some good news this morning, but the kelp and grass allowed the big shark to slip away unnoticed.  I could only imagine the kelp got worse as the evening went on, but it was not a bad night at all.  3 soupies in 3 trips and a BEAST that is lurking in the shallow part of the surf as this happened only 20 yards out which is not very far at all!

We will get our revenge, but in the meantime... not a bad evening!

[sasquatch]

Got home at 1 in the morning. Skipped out on work. There was just no way.

Happy hour tonight, but I'll be out again soon. Got to come around to my turn again.

Pretty amazing night.

[WheresMyBeer]

Wow ... crazy!! 

[raychavez91]

Truly an amazing night that I will remember for awhile.
Really cool seeing those eels, I cant wait to see you guys get more soon.
I also feel at home now that my sandals have survived so much. I really got my $11 or so dollars worth out of em.
And much like Steve, I took the day off and came back to LA early lol
But still, I can only imagine what attacked that soup. I'm gonna definitely reprep my gear just in case I tangle with it next week...or hey, maybe it'll be Steve's turn

[Pinoyfisher]

Wow!!! Like I said on FB, you're lucky as hell!! Time for bigger baits!!

I've been giving it a lot and was wondering what you guys do when solo fishing, how do you get that shark in? I've been looking at roping the tail. Thoughts?

[raychavez91]

I've bin thinking about tailing em....but so far I just man up and tail grab it with my surf rod in my left hand, and right hand on its tail and drag!

[Pinoyfisher]

I've bin thinking about tailing em....but so far I just man up and tail grab it with my surf rod in my left hand, and right hand on its tail and drag!

Can it really be that easy?

[Latimeria]

I've bin thinking about tailing em....but so far I just man up and tail grab it with my surf rod in my left hand, and right hand on its tail and drag!

Can it really be that easy?

I solo tail grabbed and beached my 8.5' 7~gill with one arm. Adrenaline is awesome.

[WheresMyBeer]

Can it really be that easy?

Only one way to find out mike ...

[Pinoyfisher]

Can it really be that easy?

Only one way to find out mike ...



Working on that!

[Pinoyfisher]

I've bin thinking about tailing em....but so far I just man up and tail grab it with my surf rod in my left hand, and right hand on its tail and drag!

Can it really be that easy?

I solo tail grabbed and beached my 8.5' 7~gill with one arm. Adrenaline is awesome.

So is having all my fingers!

[raychavez91]

Just time the waves and try to be light on your feet, and once you get em...be quick!

[Eric H]

Great post.

The soupie flapping around and appearing to be a wounded " baitfish" looked to be an easy meal for that bruiser 7. This same thing happened before on a great white on great white, I'll pull up the photos...

Tailing a shark solo isnt much different. Just tuck the rod into you armpit and grab the tail with both hands...  No need for rope..

[Eric H]

Crazy how soups go from non existent to thick.

The info online is limited.

Wish I understood....

[raychavez91]

I'm guessing the drop in weather briefly sparked a good inshore run?