Nov. 27th Report

[Mike]

Got out there saturday night right when the sun was setting.. Got 4 lines and had our first fish on in about 20 minutes on the far balloon line. Hooks pulled pretty quickly.

Reset up out deep and didn't see another bite.

The weather man called tonight wrong as usual. Big and sloppy seas and lots of wind.. We decided to head in early.

Talked to GomerP and Vinnie out there, but thats about all I heard.

We'll get em next time,

Mike

[INSPECTOR]

Was heading east on the 25.41 enduring 4-6 footers. Thought it may start laying down as the forecast called for. Decided at 9 miles out and the 4:30 marine forecast, to turn around. That forecast called for seas building to 4 feet. Heck, seas were already beyond that where we were. Not all lost, boated a 15 Lb Wahoo on the way out, an 8-10 Lb Blackfin Tuna, and a 4Lb Spanish Mackeral on the way back.

We'll give it another try when the weather cooperates a little better. Hope the ones making it out caught some nice ones to make it worth their time.

Regards,

[RiskTaker]

We headed out last night. The seas were the same as reported earlier in the day by fishermen (ie. my neighbor) who were out there: 4-5' but it appeared that the winds were not letting up nor rotating clockwise as per forecast.

We pushed out about 5 miles and the seas smoothed a little bit but it was still 4 ft. and we decided to try it another time. About face and back to Hillsboro by darkness. I was happy to get out there but I will never oppose a turnabout if it is a concern for safety. I saw 4 other boats heading for the grounds about the same time out of Hillsboro: I just wonder how they fared last night?

The women and children were all having a nice get together at my house while their "mans" were out fishing. So after docking the boat at a friends house and cleanup we "mans" decided to crash their party. We could have done our own separate party but it seemed to be the lesser of two evils. Besides, I had some frozen swordfish at my house. So I arrived first and immediately started defrosting a nice slab of fish. Then told the ladies our report for the 11/27 trip. The rest of the guys showed up and we wound up having a nice chicken and Swordfish BBQ dinner party and a good time for all.

Cést la vie. Another opportunity awaits for another evening. RT

[LuNaSeA]

we survived in my little 26..... i was out with gomer p. ran out there set up by 730 caught a little pup and released him unharmed by 830. That was the only bite we had that night besides a few squids slashed but never came tight. The drift changed directions (started drifting out) at about 9:30 mabie turning off the bite. Heard of one keeper fish caught last night head in at about 11

[Mike]

Good talking to you guys on the radio. I think Vinnie put a nice one in the boat last night... thats about all i heard.. we came tight on jsut that one fish and headed in

MIke

[CaptKen]

We were out last night,1st bite shark,mangled leader and cut off after 20 min fight,reset and same deal again,20 min later cut off,reset and same deal again but a runner all mangled and not cut off,reset and with about an hour rest in between this time,A runner off the bow on an 80 wide starts to scream and melts off 3/4 of the spool,We give chase and get some line back,And then He takes off again and almost dumped it this time,We give chase and get it back again,All is well and We think He is ours and about an hour later the hook pulls.Reset again and caught one 45",let him swim and packed it up for the ride home.
Ken

Modified by CaptKen at 1:35 PM 11/28/2004


http://home.comcast.net/~CaptKen1

[LETSRIDE]

i fished floyds wall as i have gave up on the packed swor grounds up here and lack of fish due to soo many boats....we have had great sucess in past 4 weeks down in the keys this weken bein the better of the 4

friday night- 1 pulled hook on estimated 150lbs fish 5 slashed baits home by 11pm

sat night- 2- 80lbers and we hooked into a fish at 12:30am and was all most spooled 3 times on a international 50tw(1speed) what a bitch to crank in high gear in a inch war!! needless to say at 8:09am we broke off at the wind on to mono connection at the boat!! est 300Lbs easy longest 8 hours of my life!!! but went home with 2 fish 80lbs each

did not see one sword boat either night!!

[RiskTaker]

Letsride:

Glad to see you are catching some fish in the low pressure grounds down south-west. But what a shame on loosing that Big one after the long battle all night long.
It seems natural to think that we are putting too much pressure on the swordfish grounds from Elliot Key to Palm Beach. I see a healthy number of boats out there some nights. But so far the general consensus remains stagnant with the fact that recreational fishermen account for less than 1% of the swordfish catch. Obviously, anybody can play with the truthful numbers and paint a picture in favor of their bias. But as long as the longline pressure remains vacant from the Southeast grounds we should remain in good shape.

I hope you reported the fish to NOAA: it is the right thing to do, not to mention mandatory. With a steady stream of reports coming from the recreational sector, the data will reveal whether this localized area is being over-fished or not.

It would be nice to start seeing some 200 pounders on a regular basis in this fishery. I would guess that would be a good sign that the fishery has clearly bottomed out and is rebounding to some extent.

Hey, but what the deal-ee-oh with that wind-on leader? These things should not be failing at all! Can you elaborate a little more about your wind-on connection?

Why do you think this connection failed?
How long since last replacement?
What was the failure point?
Was this a loop to loop interconnect or finger trap linkage?
Homemade or commercially produced wind-on, dacron, spectra?

Sorry about the gauntlet of questions. You may only need to answer one or two to properly reveal the failure mechanism. But this does not sound typical of wind-ons, but IT IS an interconnect, and it is such a shame that you lost your PRIZE fish because of this failure. It would be nice to learn from your experience. I will bet that if you examine the situation carefully, it will never happen to you again because of this particular defect.

Thanks in advance for feedback on this wind-on failure. RT

[Barf]

Went 1 for 1. Squid down 130ft, 80 just bent over and started screaming, ten minutes later a 48'' is in the boat.

The weatherman should be shot or forced to ride out another night like Saturday's in the tower, whichever is worse...

[RiskTaker]

Yeah Mon,

That is why most of the meteorologists these days are beautiful and attractive women. It is a little bit more difficult to complain while you are drouling while looking at the forecast.

But the reality remains: to err is human; to really screw up requires a computer.

And weather forecasts are not really forecasts if they are stating the present conditons. Those activities are reserved for the present conditions reports.

Don't even think about listening for a forecast in the Bahamas. Such a concept is not popular. If it is raining, then the weather forecast for the moment is that it is raining. At least it is accurate, you have to give that much credit; just hope that the forecast is not too late.

[hannaman]

Last night Sunday we headed out with north winds increasing 15-20 knots. Wasn't to bad. Swells building 4-6 feet. The wind held us back at 2 knots or less. The bite was slow as usual for the time around the full moon. I talked with a couple of guys who didn't see a bite all night. We had our first fish 3 minutes after all the rods were set up on the tip rod. Put my guy on his first Swordfish, unfortunately we had to release a pup about 36 inches long. But what a nice perfect speciman hooked in the inside corner of the mouth. I held him boatside to revive him, he wasn't moving so I slapped him on his side and he kicked back to show me he ws alive and I let him swim away. What a good feeling. We had one more bite as I was letting out the 300 line withthe balloon. As I was letting out the balloon it was creeping away as usual and about 20 feet from the boat it just stopped. I figured it was caught on the tip rod. Reeled in the tip rod and it wasn't attached, rteeled in the stuck rod and felt a little pressure and then nothing, reeled it all the way up and the squid was mangled. That was all we had last night.

[bullfighter]

We were one of those out last night (Sunday) without a bite. 3 solid drifts but all baits (live and dead) untouched. We'll get that elusive 200 pounder next trip.
Drop U'm Deep
Team Bullfighter

[LETSRIDE]

it was loop to loop fom the mono to the wind on..the part that broke was the loop of the wind on...guess too much pressure. but i will use them again most likely that rod did pull 2 80lbers an hour before we hooked ol' monster. i just would like to know how everyone attaches their mono to the wind on's any info appreciated

[Mike]

Just like this:

[kai akua]

some guys do about 10 twists to distribute the load of the braid more evenly over the mono. i dont think 4 cuts it, but ten is a alot and takes some paitence for it come out smoothly.

bummer on teh big, next time you will get em!

tighlines and good conections!

Robbie

[LETSRIDE]

i did it up to step 3....and the mono broke

Sorry, i should have posted this sooner.
I went out with Dragon Bait, Doyle, and Barbie. The 5-10 knot forecast should have been 5-10'. Ran into a squall line on the way out and we took a couple over my windshield. I told my experienced crew don't worry that it will flatten out after we get on the other side of the rain. I was wrong. We set up in some good chop offshore of 48.5 and within 15 minutes, we had one on. Ray whipped the small sword in pretty quick and we released
it in the water. I heard of a few other pups being caught and a couple of keepers. We lost a dolphin a little while later. The winds were howling 20+ and there was some nice rain thrown in for good measure. Drift was 4+knots and we didn't want to beat it against the slop to set up for another drift, so we decided to call it quits after 1/2 night. We also had one other missing bait, all the bites on red squid.

I looked at 3 models before I decided to go out and alll of them really
blew the forecast. cheers, arthur

[RiskTaker]

Letsride:

Did you say you were linking up a loop to loop connection? And the mono broke from your 50 lb/80. test mainline, right? That is exactly where I would suspect the weak link would be. (I would guess you pulled so hard that you over-stressed the monofilament: if you do not think that was true I suspect it may be time for you to re-spool with new mono. (May I suggest you try Momoi Diamond monofilament next time you respool: it is advertised as being up to 200% stronger than its rating states.) Typically your dacron/spectra loop is much stronger than the mono you are looping to since it is rated to the wind-on monofilament strength as a minimum.

Another comment: Somebody correct me if I am wrong. But I believe that you should be able to simply perform one single loop to loop and that is good enough to match the strength of the mono. If you swap out wind-ons often, it seems like the most convenient way to go. I have my wind-on with 4 loops like the instructions of the wind-on shows but that is because I plan to have my wind-on for a full season or until it wears down, whichever comes first.

Capt. Bouncer did a seminar a while back and he demonstrated that he had a one loop connection on his rig, because he could grab it and loosen up the loop to loop inter-connection in 1 second. Multiple loops would require your to fiddle with the connection to get it loosened up.

LetsRide - You are not allowed to let the next big slob get away due to line failure; it is not an option for you. It will either have to pull the hook or get eaten by a shark... Capish.

Good luck with the next one. RT

[LETSRIDE]

trust my RT i wish that slob didnt get away..........ya i beleive we are gonna respool to braided with top shot...because of the lack of line from his runs as well as the strength.....
also do you think those chafing gear plastic slip would hurt if i put one on the mono loop connecting to the wind on? just an idead

[kai akua]

iam at lost for that one letsride. are you talking about the tubbing? will it go through your guides? not sure what your idea is exactly..

RT, i have never seen it put is a common myth about a single loop conection with braid and dacron that it will cut the mono. i dont belive it, but having more surface are in contact with eachother could not be a bad thing. 80lb spectra when pulled tight is like a razor IHMO. i have cut myself a few times with it on my spinning rods when casting with about 6Oz of weight.

since iam not a wind on guy, have you guys tried a uni to uni connection with the double, about 6-8 turns each i assume? i have tied spectra together using this method and it seems quite strong.

R.