Flood as in Big Evening High Tide from the New Moon...
Well, it was Tuesday and I had to consider if I was going to shark fish. Steve was taking care of very important family matters up at his parents place in Central CA and I put the call out for anyone who wanted to fish. No takers so I started getting lazy and wasn't sure if I wanted to do a solo mission or not... but I powered through and said I'd give it two hours and see if I could get one in that short time window.
Lots of kelp and grass on the beach, but the water was very clean. Waves varied from almost flat to 3-4' hard breakers depending on the surge. About 45 minutes into the soak (2nd bait), I get the 7-gill rod bob, followed by a heavy pull and tail slaps! I was on! One big roll and direction change and POOF! GONE! Pulled the hook.... Time to re-bait and get it back out there. (Funny thing was I did get the bait back and except for the tore up mackerel nose, it looked sushi grade)
30 minutes later and I get a THUMPING BITE! I jumped up to grab the rod and it was gone. I gave it a 5-minute more minute soak before reeling in no bait.
I'm now setting the 15 minute timer as it is closing in on 10:00. i look up to see a small tap on my line. I walked up and got the rod in my hand when the line just loaded up and I buried that hook into him! My drag was rather tight, and I got him close in before he realized that he he was hooked! Now the fight began and he grew quite a bit. It was actually a tough fight and it did not want to come in. i was guessing a juiced up male as I have noticed the swollen males seem to have a lot of spunk in them.
The bastard took me down the beach about 70 yards even though I tried to keep him in my zone. I threw the tail rope on him more as a tether to give me a rest. I need a bigger rope if i really want to use a tail rope correctly.
Big Mad Male
He wasn't very cooperative, but I got the data. Trying to take pics while gathering the data was an entire different thing. lol
Look, he's in the shape of a 7... lol
90". Male. Took a Mackerel Head. Waning Crescent. Flood Tide. 2-4' surf.
He started to spit up his stomach, so i worked fast for the quick release. He was a little sluggish when returning him, but got his bearing and swam out from my hands.
Well, another one for the 2017 books! Thanks for reading and until next tide!