Did Someone say Striper season is over?

I love salt water fishing.

  

especially when we catch fish.

Thursday turned out to be a great day for boat fishing.  The high tide was late morning so we did not have to get out on the water at the crack of dawn.  It started out cool (sweatshirt weather) then by about 11AM it was tee shirt warm.  The water was smooth with a light breeze.

We had no luck until we encountered a school of mackerel, whereupon we managed to land 7 or 8.  We hooked about twice that many but they got away before we could get them in the boat.

The fish keeper was not pumping fresh water and unfortunately, the mackerel died before we could get to where the striped bass were.

So, instead of "live bait fishing" we had to cut up the mackerel into chunks.  No problem:  Captain Clarke knew a "honey hole" where the Stripers hang out.  They went after the fresh cut bait with gusto.  Clarke landed a huge (40") fat boy.  I reeled in the biggest striper I had ever caught - in fact the first one of "keeper" size.  There were several other (smaller) strikes as well.

Despite the fact that I enjoy eating striped bass, we released all of the stripers, as they seemed too magnificent to chop up.  They gave us a good thrill, which you probably need to be a fisherman to understand.