A Croaker of the “Right” Kind. Another PB Falls + New Species. S.W.A.T. Saturday 10/2
With the rest of the S.W.A.T. Crew incarcerated with college, work and/or husbandly duties…Lieutenant Bones and I set off on a search & destroy mission this morning. Dropping into enemy territory at grey light looking for a fight.
Conditions: Overcast gloomy weather with thunder & lightning with late morning light rain. Incoming 4 ft high slack tide, light wind, 2-3 foot swells, fair water clarity, moderate salad, water temp 64 degrees, light baitfish presence.
Location: North Malibu
Mission Duration: 6:30am – 11:00am
Techniques: Throwing hard baits and swim baits.
The enemy has been deploying some of their top officers into the battlefield to combat the S.W.A.T. advance… and they continue to fall. Another PB bites the dust today.
Our adversaries are lucky that S.W.A.T. is mainly about “Catch & Release” not “Catch & Decease.”
We will continue crush anything they throw at us!
Mike, we lost a couple of valuable ordinances today (LC’s), but it was worth the sacrifice. Always a pleasure going into combat with you my friend. Congrats on a multi-species day.
Until the next mission…
Have a great weekend everybody.
Arthur (Wingnut)
I dream of giving birth to a child who will ask, "Mother, what was war?" Unknown
Declassified mission photos…
Gearing up in the cover of darkness.
Lieutenant Bones, stop wasting ammo…
While working a set of submerged boiler rocks about 30 yards to the left of Mike, I saw some baitfish scatter and come flying out of the water about 20 yards out. With a flick of the wrist, the LC was right on top of all the commotion. No more than a few cranks on the Daiwa Luna handle and the LC stopped dead in its tracks. I could tell right away that I had something big on the other end of the line. The fish immediately went on a 8-10 second drag smoking run. Fishing in the vicinity of a lot of kelp and boiler rocks, I had my drag set pretty tight and this fish was still taking line with pure power.Mike ran over to me and asks, “What is it?!?” I replied, “Something big…” Knew right away that it wasn’t a Halibut with that kind of blistering speed. The fish was smart, kept heading for the boilers and some floating kelp mass… any structures that it could find. After about 5-6 minutes of careful maneuvering the fish around the obstacle course in the surf, I could tell that it was starting to succumb to my “Weapons of Mass Destruction” known as the Carrot Stix and Luna 253. LOL We finally get a glimpse of the fish towards the very end and I started to get nervous once I realize what it was… As soon as Mike said “Oh my God… it’s a huge White Sea Bass!” My heart started to go into overdrive. My thoughts went from, it’s probably a big Leopard Shark… no big deal, to Oh crap, I better get this thing on the sand… On the fish final pass in front of me in the surf, I saw that it was hooked solid with two of the three trebles on the LC firmly in its mouth. I usually zone everything out while I’m on a quality fish but I can faintly hear Mike’s voice saying, “Take it easy… nice and slow… you got it buddy…” A minute later, the beast was on the beach. My PB White Sea Bass.
During the entire battle, there was thunder rumbling and lightning crashing in the distance... so very cool.
Mike hooked up to another big fish afterwards, what we thought was another WSB.Taking crazy drag... he fought it for a couple of minutes and it snapped off and took his brand new LC.
What a bummer! You'll get another chance soon Mike.
Solid and fat! 35” WSB
I had it on my Boga Grip model 315 that max out at 15 lbs and it pegged bottom. So I’ll just say that it was around 15 lbs.
The release…
Resuscitation successful, send Poseidon my regards.
Custom “Death Dealer”
Paying homage to Poseidon.
New species! Snagged & released. The LC catches everything!
I’m pretty sure I might have the first legal Bug of the season.
A Croaker of the “Wrong” kind… Sorry Mike, couldn’t resist!
Bonus reconnaissance photos.
Swells were manageable for most for most of the morning…
Got considerably larger later…
Dead Thornback ray.
Surfer colony.
We ran into our new friend Mike “Midgettosser” on our hike out. Nice to see you again buddy, hope you did well out there today.
Notice “Rock on head…” Rockhead!
Heading back over the hill on Kanan. Just love those curves!
Parting shot.
Go Redskins!
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Congrats and much props on landing that beauty.