Date:          October 14th-16th, 2016

 

Time:         

 

Wind:       

 

Location:   GSB/Ocean

 

Bait/Lure:   Storm Shad/Spot/Bunker/Shad/Jigs

 

Fish:          Striped Bass/ Bluefish

           

 

 

I don't think I ever fished so hard. I fished in the Oakdale Yacht Marina striped bass tournament. The tournament started Thursday night at 9pm and ended 4pm Sunday. We ended up in a three way tie for first! How insane is it that the three winning fish all weighed 34.2lbs. We just missed the board in the bluefish division. The 15lb blue that I weighed in came in fourth place. Congrats to a fellow Fishgaak reader Chris who was also part of the three way tie.

 

In total we probably caught about 80 bass. 

 

Thursday at 9:30pm we hit the bay and did an over-nighter at the bridge. It was cold and windy. We ended up with 14 bass that were too small to weigh in. As the sun popped up we headed back to the dock to drop of Tim and Scott.

 

Friday morning after we dropped those guys off Roger and I headed back out. We caught about 15 small bass before Roger dropped me off at my house. Once again all small fish. My day was done. Scott, Tim and Roger went back out in the evening. Once again about 15 small fish were caught.

 

I woke up feeling great Saturday and ready to roll. I met the crew at the marina and Roger knew I had a game plan in mind. We hit the bumpy ocean and were on the hunt for bigger fish. We settled in at a spot that I have done very well at in the past. I give Roger a lot of credit for making sure we gave the area longer then a few minutes. With morale sinking I looked up at the screen and before I get out the words "there's bass under the boat" Scott screams "I'm in." After a quick fight we net a nice healthy 22lb bass. The bass bite turns on as the ocean begins to lay down. After a few more bass. All hell breaks lose. Out of nowhere acres of bunker rise to the surface and are getting blitzed. It turns out that most of the damage is being done by huge bluefish. We land several of them. Just as quick as it started, it ended. We stayed on the bunker pods and we continued to land more bass, I landed a really nice 24lb bass. At the end of the day we were in 2nd and 3rd place in the bluefish division.

 

Eager to get back out there Roger and Tim came by the house early Sunday morning. Scott wasn't able to make it out on Sunday. When they picked me up it was flat calm. By the time we got to the inlet it was howling. Not the forecast I expected. It was rough and windy. Tough conditions on the mind and body but great conditions for bass fishing. Tim started the day by landing a nice 27lb bass. After a few more fish things went quiet. About 10am things turned on. The bunker showed up and the bass started to chew. On every drift we were picking up 1-2 fish. Then finally it happened. Roger our captain hooked into a really nice fish. I handled the boat while Tim netted what would later become our first place fish. To say that were earned that fish would be an understatement. The inlet was a mess. Roger did a great job getting us back in safely.

 

Thank you Roger for the invite and more importantly thank you for running your boat this entire tournament. I'm sure this won't be the last time the four of us team up. We caught a lot of fish and more importantly we had a lot of laughs.

 

Every time out I try to learn something that will make me a better fisherman. I can honesty say that I learned a lot from fishing these bunker pods. I can't wait to apply what I learned this past weekend. However I need a few days to let my hands heal.

 

 

I love fishing on Roger's boat. We have the same electronics. If you are looking to upgrade your boat's electronics, Roger from CMI is your guy.