DaParson's Fishing Adventures

With the schedule on Friday - Dewey and I could only get out for a couple of hours. We had the privilege of taking Wayne Hamilton - one of our friends from church out with us. The water had warmed up to about 67.2 and the wind was not too bad out of the SE. We tried fishing out towards the end of the jetty on the leeward side of the waves ... but really didn't do much good. There was one boat on the other side - much bigger than ours - the waves were such that he would disappear between the waves. Too much for Dewey's little 17.5 boat.

Here was the biggest Black Drum the Wayne caught. We fished a couple of hours - the tide was very slack but them picked up a little as the tide began to ease in. We fished for a while out towards the end of the jetty on the outside. But really didn't have much luck there. We went back towards the boat cut where we had our best fishing earlier in the week. 

Here is a nice drum that Dewey caught. This last year we have caught several like these that almost seem like a crossbreed between a Black Drum and a Bull Red. They are a bit more slender than most of the drum that we catch ... may be be a bit more juvinile that the others. 

Here is the only Red of the day. He was a beautiful clean fish - nice spot patterns. Wayne was very proud ... you can see it one his face ... we could hear it in the boat ... in the car ... at the house ... and probably at church ... every Sunday ... for a month! (laughing) 

No ... it isn't the doublemint twin ... here is two pics of the same fish. This drum bottomed out the boga grip scale of 50lb. He was vented and sent on his way. 

Here is the last drum that Wayne caught. One the day, he caught 4 Black Drum and 1 nice 38" Red. Not bad for a couple of hours fishing! 

What a Monster Black Drum! Ben Dedman caught this Huge Black Drum at the North Jetty Saturday, March 25th. His estimate was that is was well over 70lbs! Great Fish Ben .... now I have to get back to work - wishing I was fishing! (grin)

Here is another pic of the same fish. They guy holding the fish is 6'5" ... so you can scale the fish from the size of the picture. Ben had a scale that bottomed out at 50lbs easily!

There are days of fishing and then there are days like today were it was an incredible DAY OF CATCHING! The water had cooled down to 61.7 when we arrived - but was at 63.1 when we left. There was a strong outgoing tide and the water clarity was fine - nothing special either way. The wind was SE about 10-15. Dewey and I usually put out 6 lines when it is just he and I fishing. There are times our boat looks like a upside down dead spider. The fishing was sooooo good today - that we started only putting out 4 lines. There was a time that were fighting 4 fish at once! Many times we had 1 or 2 in the boat and before we could get them out - we were fighting more fish! It got so bad that we literally pulled all of our lines out of the water for about 15 minutes just to drink coffee and get a bite to eat! As best as we could count - we caught about 26-28 Black Drum and 2 Bull Reds. It was a crazy day. We fished for a little over 4 hours. Dropped the anchor about 8 and pulled it up...

I noticed a trend - Dewey catches the fish ... and I took the picture. But every time I caught a fish - - Dewey was busy fighting fish and couldn't take my picture! (grin) At one point - Dewey and I looked at each other and felt that it was just too good to be enjoyed by just us. We really wished there could have been some folks in the boat with us. It would have been great!

This picture is kinda twisted with the rolling of the boat and exposure. Still was a nice fish.

Here is Dewey and another Drum. You can see the boat behind us - There were several boats around the boat cut and a few others past us. The boats that we could see were hooked up fairly often. We did see several "floaters" - Big Drum that weren't either vented or treated properly to give them the best chance of survival. When we left - there was one drum that was floating by the rocks - we went over and netted him - vented him and sent him on his way. For those who have followed this blog - you know my story about venting. Last year I caught the biggest Black Drum I had ever caught up to that point. We were out at the end of the Jetty - I got him off the hook - worked him back and forth several minutes - then released him. He went under - then floated to the top - we pulled anchor - netted him again - worked him - let him go only to see him floating again. I spent close to an hour working on this fish - trying to get him to submerge. We finally just left him - wat...

This was another one of the Drum we caught. This was the "typical" size of many of the fish. We did have proabably a half-dozen or so that would have been right at or over the 50lb range.

Here is another Black Drum that Dewey Caught. As best as we could figure - we caught 26 -28 Black Drum and 2 Bull Reds. The largest Black Drum was probably in the 50lb range. The Reds were in the 38-42" Range. We were whupped.

There were times that we had fish in the boat and before we could get them out another line would go off. Here is one of the times I had two fish in the boat and while this picture was being taken - I had a fish that was dragging another line!

Here was one of the two Bull Reds that we caught on the day. We fished both with cracked crab and cut shad. We caught both Reds on shad - but caught Black Drum on both the crab and shad.

Here was another one of the Black Drum.

Here is Dewey with another Black Drum.

Here is another double. I was unable to hold them up - because Dewey wouldn't wait for me to finish fighting the one that I had on the line! It really was a day that both of us caught all we wanted ... plus some.

We stopped taking pictures after this one. It was an incredible day of fishing!

You don't see this everyday! Here is two different generations of crusie ships! I think it is the Elisa - not for sure about the Cruse Ship coming in - but it was cool to see.

We had a great day on the water! Micah Richardson - the bass player for our church - was in the boat with us today. It was non-stop action from the time we got there to when we left. As best as we could count, we caught 18 Black Drum - no Bull Reds. We guessed weights - but figured that we caught about 500-600 lbs of fish! It was great fun and Micah had a great time! Click Here to view the movie of the trip. (Explorer Only) or Click Here to view the movie of the trip. (Other Browsers)

Here was the second Black Drum that Micah caught. Little did we know that it would be non-stop action the entire time we fished!

Micah was treated to a great day of fishing. We made sure that he was put on some Big Uglies. We fished on outgoing tide - water was 70.3 degrees - clarity was good - and wind was nominal until the front started blowing through. We fished in about 28 foot of water and all fish were caught on cracked crab. They wouldn't touch anything else.

Here is Micah with another Black Drum he caught ... yada yada yada ... (laughing)

Here is Micah holding another Black Drum. It actually looks like Micah caught 1 Drum and had his picture taken 5 different times ... but truth is ... he really did catch all 5! Dewey and I tried to grab a rod - but Micah kept shoving us out of the way! (grin)

Micah and I hooked up - the story behind this photo was that while Dewey was getting ready to take the picture - I was slapping Micah with the tail of the Black Drum I was holding! I hit him in the chest - the face and on the belly with it! I apologized to the fish for putting him through so much trauma! (grin)

This was one beat up Black Drum!

Dewey finally got into the action. Here is one of the Black Drum that he caught. The only way he got this one was that Micah was busy with another fish! (laughing)

Here is another Black Drum that I caught. It was hard to beat Micah to the rod - but I finally did it! (laughing)

It was almost impossible to take this pic. Micah had caught and brought in a Gaftop - while Dewey was fighting his Drum - then the another Rod took off and Micah grabbed it - and while I was taking the Gaftop off of the hook for him - another Rod took off. All three of us were hooked up at the same time! Here are the fish the Dewey and Micah caught.

This was the last fish we caught on the day. If you look over Micah's shoulder - you can see the Norther beginning to blow in. It was a wet ride back to the end of the dike.

It happens very very rarely. But it happened today. I, Mark Redd, was outfished by Dewey. There ... Dewey said I wouldn't own up to it ... but there it is in black and white. (laughing) Due to a funeral I preformed early Friday Morning, we didn't get out on the water until almost 1:00. It was fairly windy - 15mph out of the SE. The water was 66.8 degress and we fished the moon rock. On the day, we caught this one drum - and had 2 other runs. We fished with crab, shrimp and cut mullet. Also trying various depths of water - it was just one of those days.

Brad Brice was out with us - he picked up a big ugly black drum - we were a good ways away - but was able to snap this pick while bouncing with the wind and waves.