Light Tackle Spanish Mackerel (WARNING - blood & gore)
Sunday, August 17, 2008
I left Shipping Creek at 2:30 this afternoon with my buddy Dave. He told me he wanted some fish for his family and friends and was nice enough to hand over the wheel of his 21' Twin Vee. I headed us down E-Bay toward Poplar Island. We tied on full-size Lonely Angler Holos along the way and popped right in on a nice school of breakers right where they were supposed to be. We put our limit of 20+ inch rockfish fish in his cooler in the first 15 minutes. We changed up our gear and started casting s
poons landing a half-dozen 15 inch blues along with some under-size rock.
The tide waned and the fish went down. I wanted to look for bigger rock so moved over to a steep ledge. Since there were no breakers, I took the risk of using a blue-tipped Mann’s Hardnose. It lasted long enough to catch an undersized flounder, and a 17 inch rock, but the blues moved back in on us and that was the end of that. I asked Dave if he would mind a run south to look for Spanish mackerel. He agreed so we rounded the southern tip of Poplar and set a course southwest toward the channel.
West of Sharp’s Island in 80 feet of water, we noticed some splashes so slowed to an idle. It wasn’t much, at first I thought just little blues, but after watching a few minutes there was no mistaking the occasional arch of a feeding Spaniard. It wasn’t long before five or six more fish leapt like dolphins all at once into a school of bay anchovies. I still had on a kastmaster spoon with a single hook, so I started casting. After about 20 casts it was obvious I needed to try something different. I’ve heard stories of fishermen who target spanish by casting, but I’ve never talked to anyone who has actually done it. Everyone I know who fishes for them trolls clark spoons or similar. I was determined to figure them out.
I switched from my casting reel to my 7:1 retrieve top-water spinning outfit which is spooled with 10 pound mono. I recently ordered a 7:1 Revo baitcaster, but it still hasn’t arrived. I switched lures to a white crippled herring with a single dressed hook. There was plenty of fish around, we were marking them on the fish finder and seeing them in the clear water. After another 30 casts or more, I finally hooked up. Dave grabbed a net and I landed my first ever Spaniard. After lots more casting with only blues to show, I was still frustrated. I’d get an occasional follow, they'd come chasing my lure like Michael Phelps after a gold medal, but they just wouldn’t consistently take my lure. It was driving me nuts and I knew I had to do something different. I wondered if I needed to get deeper, and was about to change over to a 2 ounce stingsilver when I noticed the black barrel swivel on my lure. I took it off and tied directly to the mono. A fish sounded within casting range so I threw just past him and started reeling. Sure enough, I hooked up.
Fortunately, we were able to stay with those fish for the next three hours. This gave me plenty of time to refine my technique to the point that I could pretty much see the fish and cast past them fully expecting the fish to strike. I had a couple of bite offs and my line was getting twisted, so I went back to an in-line swivel above a two-foot 20 pound test florocarbon leader tied directly to the split ring. That solved the problem of the fish seeing the swivel. Since I was still getting a lot of strikes but not
hooking up, I also took the time to put a treble hook on my lures. I settled on a steady retrieve (no jigging) that wasn’t as fast as I could go, but still relatively fast. I kept the lure on or near the surface, never more than 3 feet deep always casting just past a sounding fish. I also caught some fish on a silver stingsilver, but I think the crippled herrings worked better because there is more wobble on a steady retrieve. I don't see why any kind of spoon wouldn't work. We eventually gave up on the net because it cost us too many fish. The best landing method was to start the fish toward the boat so we could grab the leader and use the fish’s momentum to swing it onboard. They always come up puking. I had mackerel & bluefish puke all over me including in my hair and even found a chewed-up bay anchovie inside a very fishy-tasting Natty Boh!
Dave was catching plenty of blues, but no Spanish. I think the problem was his 20 pound test braid, but we didn’t have any smaller line onboard. A cruise ship came through and spooked our fish. It was getting on toward sunset, so we headed back north but managed to find another school of blues, rock, and mackerel on the way back. This time, Dave got a nice spaniard, maybe the best of the day. (He had the camera & didn't send me the picture, but it was a nice fish.) In addition to the rockfish and a cooler full of blues, our total was 23 spanish mackerel with at least twice that many throwing our lures or getting off at the boat.
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