New Year's Eve striper trip results in 42lb fish

beautiful striper

--
www.wermieerniebaits.com
Making fish regret their decision on a daily basis
"SimRacer" wrote in message
nk.net...
With the continuing "relatively nice for the time" weather we've had here
in NC, me and a fishing buddy linked up and went out to the OBX to get in
on some of this winter Striped Bass fishing we've been hearing so much of
the past few years. We went out this past Saturday (Dec 31) off Hatteras
Island (NC) out of Oregon Inlet and managed to catch a few really nice
stripers. There were a ton of folks on the water, I was even surprised at
the amount of charter boats we saw out there chasing these winter bass.
The "3 mile line" kept us all clumped up along the various stretches of
shore from Kitty Hawk/Duck NC past Oregon Inlet and the Bodie Island
Lighthouse all the way South to Hatteras Village and the lighthouse
itself. So we just jumped into the trolling line that was more like a
fleet by mid morning, and all "followed the birds" looking for schools of
bait fish.

We caught this particular striper about 10 miles North of the Hatteras
Lighthouse, about 2 miles off the beach:
(this is my buddy in the photos, he reeled her in, so we gave him the
glory)

http://home.earthlink.net/~simracer5...b_striper5.jpg

http://home.earthlink.net/~simracer5...b_striper1.jpg

We had her certified for a state citation when we got back in, which is
35lbs here in NC. Weighed 42 lbs on the dot according to the
"official/certified" scales at the tackle shop. Our best rough
measurements were 45" long, 28" girth. Nowhere near the *rumored* new
record set this past week during a tournament of over 60 lbs, which was
the record from 1971 until this past week if said rumor is true. (We heard
several weights through the rumor mill; 62, 63 and 65 pounds, so
apparentlly a large one above 60 lbs was caught)

Hope everyone here at rofb had enjoyable holidays.

"alwaysfishking" wrote in message
...
beautiful striper

Thanks. She took a while to drag up from 44 ft. And our rigs were
triple-home-made types that had 32oz, 24, oz and 16 oz baits on it all at
once. This fish was on the bottom, 32oz "jig head" (our pseudo-guide called
them "mojos" with swimming soft bait bodies that went from about 6" in
length, to about a foot long on the 24 and 32 oz heads). It didn't take long
to see why we were using such heavy line (50lb line, 100lb shock leader) and
heavy ocean trolling rods and reels...our rigs weighed 4.5 lbs without a
fish on them, lol!

We caught 7 striped bass (from 18lbs to this monstor) before the blues
turned on. We boated about 25 of those, and didn't keep a single one. Good
fighters, but apparently not that good to eat, so we let 'em live. We only
kept 2 of the bass, this big'un and another that went about 22lbs, just to
split up among us Sunday before we came home.


--
www.wermieerniebaits.com
Making fish regret their decision on a daily basis
"SimRacer" wrote in message
nk.net...
With the continuing "relatively nice for the time" weather we've had
here
in NC, me and a fishing buddy linked up and went out to the OBX to get
in
on some of this winter Striped Bass fishing we've been hearing so much
of
the past few years. We went out this past Saturday (Dec 31) off Hatteras
Island (NC) out of Oregon Inlet and managed to catch a few really nice
stripers. There were a ton of folks on the water, I was even surprised
at
the amount of charter boats we saw out there chasing these winter bass.
The "3 mile line" kept us all clumped up along the various stretches of
shore from Kitty Hawk/Duck NC past Oregon Inlet and the Bodie Island
Lighthouse all the way South to Hatteras Village and the lighthouse
itself. So we just jumped into the trolling line that was more like a
fleet by mid morning, and all "followed the birds" looking for schools
of
bait fish.

We caught this particular striper about 10 miles North of the Hatteras
Lighthouse, about 2 miles off the beach:
(this is my buddy in the photos, he reeled her in, so we gave him the
glory)

http://home.earthlink.net/~simracer5...b_striper5.jpg

http://home.earthlink.net/~simracer5...b_striper1.jpg

We had her certified for a state citation when we got back in, which is
35lbs here in NC. Weighed 42 lbs on the dot according to the
"official/certified" scales at the tackle shop. Our best rough
measurements were 45" long, 28" girth. Nowhere near the *rumored* new
record set this past week during a tournament of over 60 lbs, which was
the record from 1971 until this past week if said rumor is true. (We
heard
several weights through the rumor mill; 62, 63 and 65 pounds, so
apparentlly a large one above 60 lbs was caught)

Hope everyone here at rofb had enjoyable holidays.

....chopper blues steaked out and beer marinated are wonderfull on the
grill....said Huck

"Huck Palmatier" wrote in message
news:Y56vf.4243$CV.1466@dukeread03...
...chopper blues steaked out and beer marinated are wonderfull on the
grill....said Huck



Hmmm....Now I know and love "fish steaks", so blues work on the grill huh?
Thanks for that advice, I will keep it in mind when we go out and hit them
again soon.

Actually, one of the gawkers on the ramp that evening said something to the
same affect when we told them that we caught more blues than stripers, that
they'd make good "grillin' steaks" had we kept some of them. I'll say one
thing for blues, they are absolute hell on soft baits. Whether you catch
them or they just snipe at the baits, they can tear up a lot of plastic in
short order with them teeth...

Hmmm....Now I know and love "fish steaks", so blues work on the grill huh?
Thanks for that advice, I will keep it in mind when we go out and hit them
again soon.

Actually, one of the gawkers on the ramp that evening said something to
the
same affect when we told them that we caught more blues than stripers,
that
they'd make good "grillin' steaks" had we kept some of them. I'll say one
thing for blues, they are absolute hell on soft baits. Whether you catch
them or they just snipe at the baits, they can tear up a lot of plastic in
short order with them teeth...

.....yessir up here in "the bay" you have to get the bait down past the blues
to get to the rocks....the grill helps drain the oil while they
cook.....next time you run into a school of blues, try a big zara
spook.....it's a blast.

"Huck Palmatier" wrote in message
news:BZqvf.5427$CV.3024@dukeread03...

Hmmm....Now I know and love "fish steaks", so blues work on the grill
huh?
Thanks for that advice, I will keep it in mind when we go out and hit
them
again soon.

Actually, one of the gawkers on the ramp that evening said something to
the
same affect when we told them that we caught more blues than stripers,
that
they'd make good "grillin' steaks" had we kept some of them. I'll say
one
thing for blues, they are absolute hell on soft baits. Whether you catch
them or they just snipe at the baits, they can tear up a lot of plastic
in
short order with them teeth...

....yessir up here in "the bay" you have to get the bait down past the
blues
to get to the rocks....the grill helps drain the oil while they
cook.....next time you run into a school of blues, try a big zara
spook.....it's a blast.



Ya know, it's funny you mention that. As we weere making our way back South
to Oregon Inlet to get back to the ramp, from Duck (NC), we came upon some
baitfish, literally being chased to the surface by "something". Of course we
saw it was Bluefish once we eased up on them, and I can just about promise
you we could have thrown a Spook, or even a Devil's Horse stick bait at them
and would have loaded up. As it is, we dropped some bucktails, jigs with
"long" white grubs, and even a Crippl'd Herring jig/spoon, and loaded up
anyway...That was the most "frenzied" feeding frenzy of fish I think I have
ever seen in my lifetime. For about 20 minutes, we could have had a Blue
every single time we dipped a hook in the water...and they weren't little
bitties either. The smallest one we caught in that school had to be at least
10lbs. They were quite fat.

After about 20 minutes, our arms were so tired, we just forced ourselves to
crank on up and continue toward the inlet...I know our limit here on them is
15 per day, but only 5 can have a TL of 24" or greater. Most of these we
were catching were (or appeared to be) 24"+. We didn't keep a single one,
but still. Knowing now that we can grill them and cook out some of that
strong oil, I'll keep one or two next time. I already grill King steaks, so
I imagine these wouldn't be too different to do.

Earlier in the day, when the stripers had been turned on (after-action
reports tell us the only stripers caught that day were between
10:30AM-12PM), we actually got into the Blues then/there too, and had a
double and a triple on the mojo rigs we were pulling. I reeled in the
double, each appeared to be in that 10-12lb range, and it was a chore
lugging those 2 to the surface all at once, along with 3-4 lbs of mojos too
anyway. lol

And FYI for anyone else following this thread, they've posted a photo of the
new NC State Record Marine Striped Bass that was caught down there last
Friday at http://stripers247.com on their message board. The thread is in
their "Striper Room" (or lounge?) and is titled "North Carolina Record
Breakers" or similar. 62 lbs!! That's a whopper.