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Dolphins & Kings
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Today I had the pleasure of having my good friend Randy from Raleigh down to fish with me on my boat. I caught some nice menhaden before he arrived and we headed out of New Topsail inlet around 7:30. They have been dredging the inlet and it is now in pretty good shape, the buoys were moved also.
The seas were decent, about 2 feet with a little chop on top. We went to the first set of box cars and by 8:00 we had our first fish in the boat, a king mackerel.
We lost a couple of more then I boated a nice 14 pound dolphin. We caught a shark and then the reels went quite for a while.
Finally we heard that sweet music from the clicker on the reel and this time Randy boated an 18 pound bull dolphin! I was using the gaff I have had on the boat for 4 years and we had used on the previous 3 fish that day. As I reached into the water the business end of the gaff just fell off and we watched it sink. Having a small boat, I never put a second gaff on board in order to conserve space. Randy and I were determined to get that dolphin into the boat, gaff or no gaff.
Thus a wrestling match ensued. As you may know, dolphin fish go berserk when something touches their tail or body, so as I grabbed the tail, he exploded in the water. Randy got to fight the fish a little bit more. So the next time I held the leader tight in one hand and grabbed him by the tail with the other. Again he goes berserk and I couldn’t hold onto his slimy, skinny tail. Randy gets to fight the fish a third time. This final time I just decided to reach over with both hands, bear hug the fish and wrestle him into the boat. Mission accomplished!
After a bit of a celebration by Randy and I, the fish played the drum in my fish box for us, we decided it best to borrow a gaff from a nearby friend of mine for any future catches. My wrestle mania was short lived.
Then as we were redeploying the lines, I got a strike as I was putting a bait out. It turned out to be the largest king of the day going just over 12 pounds! We were liking this pattern, king, dolphin, king, dolphin, etc.We ended up with 4 kings and a pair of nice dolphins. Not a bad day at all and no half-a-fish! I lost one of Randy’s kings (would have been #5) at the gaff - knocked the hook right out of his mouth, first time I ever done that…...duh.
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