September 24th 2020

 

Finally we have a Roger sighting! It's insane how hard Roger works. Just like every trip I go on, I throw Roger an invite. This time he jumped all over it. He and Chris met me at the boat at 1:45am and we headed into the Patchogue River to get bait. Thankfully one throw and we were done.  The inlet was flat and so was most of the ride out. When we arrived I didn't like what I saw, so we went to grab some mahi. After we iced up a few it was time to look for tuna. As you can see from the photos we found them. It was one of the best days for us. However, we had a problem. Roger got sick! I can tell right away that something was off. After he added a few of his own chunks to the mix, he landed 2 fish and then went down for a nap. I felt horrible for him. I told him that we would head in. He replied "not a chance in hell are we going back in ." As Roger closed his eyes Chris and I went to work. All yft were caught on live bait. Chris caught a ton of albies on jigs so he quickly put the jigging gear away. We were only fishing with one rod. It got silly as yft were blowing up all around the boat. We brought 3 fish home, released a ton more. As you can see from the radar we weren't alone. You would be crazy to go out there without live bait.  I would love to go Saturday but I just can't do it physically. I felt so bad for Roger. I'm just glad he was able to get 2 fish before the old lady of the sea put him down. Riding out in total darkness can play tricks on your mind and body. Throw in the lack of sleep and you have the ingredients for a possible queasy stomach. This has been the best tuna season that I have ever seen. Once these yft move on I will start to chase ghosts. Roger felt a lot better on the way home. I'm looking forward to catching a ton of bass with him over the next two months.