Nothing's Happening, June 2016

I've had a number of people ask me why I haven't updated the blog in a while.  Actually the reason is quite simple- I haven't been catching any fish.  It's prett ymuch been a perfect storm of mother nature (weather) and absence of fish.  Let's start with the weather, that will lead into the fish. We had a mild March, but an unusually cool/cold April, May, and persisting into June.  There was even an unprecedented late freeze 2nd week of May which conspired to kill all of my pears, cherries, and about 2/3 of my grapes. Some of the local orchards lost their entire crop of peaches, etc.  

As for the Chesapeake, this translated into a total no-show of most of the species which normally arrive late April to early May, including my beloved croaker.  In fact, as of my last trip out on June 18 I still had not caught a hardhead, trout, drum or otherwise.  The charter captains had not either, except for an occasional red or black drum.  Rockfish did show up well this spring, but as I've already explained I'm not really equipped to go out and chase the big ones, although I did make some unsuccessful attempts at fishing for them shallow water with soft crab.   The other part of the weather issue has been ongoing high winds, mostly out of the north/northeast.  I have had great difficulty finding a day where I was ready to fish where it wasn't blowing 25+.  This is the exact opposite of last year, where the fish and wind cooperated nicely beginning mid-June.  So, I'll stop making excuses and wrap this up.  I am planning to fish this coming weekend, beginning July 1.  The first pic below is my oldest son Brooks and his fiance Antoinette- we had a great time but only caught one small rock.  Below that is the lone white perch I put in the cooler last time out- haha.

End of 2015 crabbing, fishing, and hunting report

Nov 6, one more opportunity to crab.  Well, maybe more but you never know how many 70 degree days you’ll get the rest of the year. Used my electric motor to putt-putt the big jon boat out into the Dames Quarter marsh.  I really dislike this electric motor regulation.  However, I can see how progressed the silting-in of the place has become, as the water level seemed normal and the DNR came out with gas outboard and almost was swamped in the mud.  Anyway, gorgeous day and I caught 3 dozen nice sized male crabs, although it took me about 3 ½ hours.  No worries, I had all day. Crabs were tasty, although some a bit light, and lost about 6 by the next day. 

Nov 23, deer season arrives.  My buddy Pat, whom I met many moons ago freshman year at WVU invited me up to his very nice spread in south-central West Virginia.  He had been trying to get me to come up there for years, sorry now I had waited so long.  Actually got up there the afternoon prior, in time to get a tour of the property and an opportunity to choose my stand for the next day.  Are you kidding me?? Well, Pat had acquired a total of 160 acres adjoining his house, and what he had done with the property was nothing short of amazing.  4-wheeler trails were developed to allow access to all of it, but in a very non-intrusive way.  There were food plots planted at various places, in addition to automatic corn feeders placed along with them.  And to complete the picture, each one of these tailored deer attracting areas had multiple stands overlooking them, in well-designed drop positions. 

So, I chose a stand and was escorted back there by 4-wheeler next morning at 0630.  After just enough daylight to see for shooting at 0645, I had three deer down on the ground by 0745.  By 0815, I had all three field dressed and was back in my stand.  And at 0830 I capped it off by shooting a coyote.  Magic, pure magic.  Did I mention that Pat had also developed a shooting range, which I used to true up the scope on my 30-06 at 100 yards.  Back to the deer,… I saw the first doe on the food plot below at about 0640.  She was small and I watched as the 2^nd followed her within 5 minutes.  This second one was a good size doe, and I chose to take the 100 yard shot.  After the rifle crack, both deer scurried off out of view.  I would have to wait until later to check this out.  Since I saw both actually running, I assumed that I had missed.  When the small deer came back around closer to me about 20 minutes later, I shot her in my desperation to at least take home some meat.  This was a quick kill, one shot and down, the 180-grain core-lock doing its job.  Well, another 30 minutes pass and a really nice buck comes across and down the gentle hill above me.  I could see that this one was sporting 8 points and had a nice size body, so I put this deer in my cross-hairs and ended his life.  Now here is when things started to get interesting.  I left my stand with my field knife and went to skin the small doe which had circled back.  I was met with two surprises:  1) The small doe was actually a young button-buck (darn), and  2) looking down the hill, I could the downed body of the first deer I had shot at, the one I thought I had missed. So, here we have it, 1 + 1 + 1 = 3.  No going back now.  I proceeded to field dress all 3, then returned to my stand (to call my wife, etc) and wait for Pat to finish his hunt.  About 20 minutes into this wait, I spotted a coyote, hot on the trail of the entrails of the deer I had just taken.  Pat had given my clear instructions to shoot any coyote I saw (they are at nuisance levels there, and season is open 365).  I took a 100-yrd shot at the coyote down at the first kill site, and it took off after firing.  Well, dang if it didn’t circle around back to me, taking the same path as that small button buck.  This time, a 40-yard shot was effective.

Nov 27- a 75 degree day and I am taking the boat out onto Tangier Sound on slick calm seas.  Unfortunately, completely unable to coax a rockfish out of the water, either by trolling (swim-shads) or jigging in various depth waters. The boat would get winterized and covered days later.

Nov 30 and I’m down to Deal Island for Maryland deer rifle season.  The weather is not optimal, warm in the mid-50s, light rain and fog.  But, I suck it up and at least do evening hunts.  With the passing years, I am less and less a fan of being wet and cold.  Wednesday is all of the above, plus windy.  Finally, Thursday rolls around, it is clear, sunny and windy and I can at least get the boat wintered.  Since I finish up at 3PM, I decided to finish the day hunting, and I drive right the street to the public hunting area on the island.  At 4:30, A decent doe emerges into the field, but guessing it is about a 250-yard shot, I pause and consider.  Glad I paused, another nice doe emerges right in front of me, about a 60-70 yard shot.  Fortunate to have the wind covering me (and blowing in my face and away from the deer), I manage to get my shooting stick into position and put deer #4 down with one shot.  Before I get up, I look back to where deer# 1 had emerged, and see that it has been joined by a friend.  Deciding to pass, I go and begin field dressing the one I had shot.  Again, two surprises await me:  1) the doe I shot is actually a spike buck, with one antler broken off and the other about 8 inches long;  2) Another doe pops out of the woods at about 75 yards away, which I also passed on.  Four deer was more than enough, as I gave the final one away to someone who could use it more than me.

And that’s the final story for 2015.  I’m not sure where 2016 is going, but I can say that 2015 was overall an awesome year.  I am thankful that my wife gives me ample opportunity to pursue some of the things that I love to do and which had very little time for while we were busy raising kids.  This is a season of life I have been forward to for a while.  I’m also thankful for my good health, for allowing me to be physically able to do the things I love.  I’m thankful to have a job that provides me enough time off to pursue these interests.  Can’t wait to do something else blog-worthy.  It might be springtime,… although 2-day winter deer season is just around the corner hahahahaha.

Playing catch-up on this post

Looking back at my last post I'm ashamed to see that it's been almost 2 months ago.  Truth be told, there hasn't been much to write about, although it's been an exciting two months.  I'll attempt to re-cap and stick to outdoors stuff,...

First up was Labor Day.  I went out fishing once and drew a blank, which seemed to match the current experience of everyone else fishing the area, including the charterboat captains.  Apparently, some pretty heavy gill-netting in the area put a major whammy on most fish in Tangier Sound.  Oh well.  A last-minute invite to sail aboard skipjack Kathryn, the boat that I've been helping to restore the last 3 years was quite a surprise and I jumped at the opportunity.  It was a beautiful day for a skipjack race except for the fact that there was absolutely NO WIND, a real bummer in a sailboat race.  So, 2 1/2 hours into the race Captain Stoney Whitelock joined most of the other captains and called it a day.  

My next trip to Deal Island was the following weekend, but I only came to run in the 2nd annual Skipjack 5K, and of course mow the grass.  Proud to say I finished 2nd in my age class, and so what if there were only 3 of us. With a business trip the next week, the last week of September Candy and I got on a plane for our long-planned trip to Hawaii.  It was a great week seeing the island and visiting Kara, and I ended up putting all fishing on-hold for month of September.  We left Hawaii on a gorgeous Oct, with 86F and warm winds, only to land in Philly a day later with 50F and a Nor'easter blowing through.  Yuk,.... Finally, Oct 9 and I absolutely had to get down to the island and at least cut the grass.  Saturday was not so warm, about 63F and time to try crabbing.  The marsh level was high and the water felt chilly.  I caught two crabs in two hours, mirroring what everyone else out there was doing.  Pretty certain the nor-easter had put a temporary whammy on the crabs.  Sunday was a nice 73F day and I managed to get the boat out and do some trolling.  It was worth the effort after putting two 20-inch striper in the boat.  This was from trolling west and north side of South Marsh, near high tide, and using swimshad.  

The following weekend was squirrel camp. When I was younger and mostly before kids, every early October I would join some of my college buddies, the ones that taught me to hunt, in southern VA/WV at one fella's hunting camp near Warm Springs in Bath County VA.  It was always a fun time, roughing it (VERY remote, no running water), a great wilderness hunting experience, and lots of just having fun back at the campsite.  When I moved to Delmarva, the 6-7 hour drive became overwhelming during the years I was raising kids.  So, now that that season has for the most part passed, I was able to re-join the guys in Oct.  It was a clear but chilly weekend, waking up to temps of 22F the last morning.  I limited out on squirrels Day 1 using my 16 gauge Remington 1100, but not so well day 2 on a windy day.  The squirrels out there are wary, not the playful tame squirrels you see in your neighborhood.  And, as time goes by I realize I am not becoming a better shot, especially with the little to no practice that I get in.

Ok time to wrap up this entry with a quick overview of his past weekend.  Oct 23, got down to the island and had enough daylight left to do some switcharoo with the gasoline in my outboard (external tanks).  Boat had run rough the last time and it sure seemed like bad gas, hesitating, coughing especially when cold. I transferred the old fuel (probably 2+ months old now) to my truck and put 5 gallons fresh fuel in the tank.  Boat ran rough at first, probably until it burned the gas in the line, then smoothed out nicely.  This ethanol fuel really sucks. Anyway, at the suggestion of Capt Harry (Nauman), I decided to bottom fish in ~52 ft near buoy 12.  Drifting and within eyesight of Harry, I caught zip, zero using frozen soft crab.  I remember him telling me to get bloodworms, which is what he was using, but I didn't listen.  Instead, I watched as he caught a few sea trout, some perch, and many small kingfish.  This was quite a turn from the usual, and I was humbled at least for today. Next day (Sunday) went crabbing.  It was overcast and 62F, but not too breezy.  Water level was low in the Dames Quarter impoundment and I almost didn't go out.  Glad I did.  Caught 1/2 bushel (21 crabs) of really nice sized crabs, mostly 6 1/2 to 7 1/2 inches, all male, mostly heavy.  Didn't stay too long and was hungry, so steamed them up down there and that was dinner.  Even forgot to take any pictures- DARN.  

At this time of year, not sure of when I might go down again.  It won't be this coming weekend. Need to be ready to spring into action at the forecast of a heavy freeze so I can drain the plumbing on the camper.  Maybe Nov 8???

8/29/15, End of summer and a new fishing scene

As I mentioned in my last post, its been a great year bottom fishing and the freezer is full of croaker, so its time to tun attention to some other styles of fishing.  I love love love catching rockfish , they fight in a completely different way from their bottom-dwelling croaker brothers.  They are more of an ambush, attacking type fish.  And, they want to run as far as they can after getting hooked, different from the croaker that seem to want to refuse to come up off the bottom.

Friday 8/29, able to just get down for a quick fish and then back home so I didn't have much selection when it came to tide etc if I wanted to align with an evening fish, which I did.  So, launching at 4PM on a hot afternoon, I headed straight across Tangier Sound from Wenona to north end of South Marsh Island.  Actually, I stopped just shy of north end and started a troll around the edge of the island with swim shads.  Nothing biting and I managed to lose both rigs on something submerged.  Oh, did I mention it was middle of outgoing tide??  OK, enough of that so I moved to the center of the north end of the island, anchored in about 7 ft of water.  Surely something would find my soft crabs appealing.  I tossed one bottom rig out with no weight, sort of on a drift.   I like this approach and it seems to work best with some decent tide moving. Other rig weighted with 2 ozs.  It wasn't two minutes before the drifting rig started zooming away (I had left bail open) and I retrieved a small rock.  After another 10 minutes, another bite on same pole only this time it really started to run nicely.  Pulling it in I had a nice small keeper rock on one hook, big crab on the other.  In fact, it proved tough to keep the crabs off and they did serious damage to my bait.  This was the last of the action for today, save for an 11-inch croaker just before 7PM and a skate before that.

A co-worker of mine reported having gone out mid-day Sunday (2 days later) and caught a mess of rock.  This was on incoming tide, but what was remarkable was that it was middle of the day.  Note to self,....perhaps this time of year tide more important than time.  Planning to return next weekend but not sure of what the fishing opportunities will be- it will be Labor Day weekend after all and focus on the Skipjack Races.  More on that next week.  For now, hoping to get out on Friday (high tide 7PM) afternoon, also maybe Saturday depending on the weather but forecast now is windy and out of the East NE.

8/15/15- Launch of Skipjack Kathryn, and the close of Croakerfest 2015

I began volunteering to help restore Skipjack Kathryn in January 2013 as a father-son project.  The details of my lifelong passion for skipjacks, the last sail-powered commercial fishing fleet in the U.S., and my connection specifically to Kathryn are described in earlier blog posts.  Briefly- we were right next to her when she almost sank during the 2011 Labor Day Skipjack races at Deal Island, so when the opportunity to be part of the group restoring her became available, we just had to do it.  And now, 2.5 years after we joined in on this project, Kathryn is finally returned to the water where she belongs.  I would like to thank Kathryn owner Stoney Whitelock for inviting the public to be part of this.  And I would also like to thank master shipwright Michael Vlahovich for patiently teaching us the skills necessary to contribute to Kathryn’s rebirth.  I’m estimating to have put in between 5-6 weeks (40 hour weeks) of time on Kathryn over this journey.  It was the most backbreaking uncomfortable work I have ever done, much or most of it lying on the ground underneath of Kathryn.   I lost the tip of my right index finger, but hey- I have 9 other fingers, right?  My reward has been the education of how skipjacks are built from the bones-up, as Kathryn’s re-work was total and comprehensive.  I know understand how skipjacks are planked, how they are framed, and exactly what a knee, rib, and worm-toe are.  I learned skills of planing, fair lines, how to thicken epoxy just right, how to make a butt-board, and a million other things that I can apply to other areas of my life.  And I also experienced the joy of working alongside inmates- glad to have the opportunity to emerge from beyond the confines of their prison walls for short periods of time.  So, seeing Kathryn float again for me was huge, and it was emotional.

Summer of 2015 has been rather spectacular in terms of bottom fishing in Tangier Sound.  From middle of June on, I caught a LOT of fish and never had to work really hard doing it.  And, the fish were sustained better quality than in the last 5 years or so.  As I vacuum-sealed my filets at the end of this last weekend and shoe-horned them into the freezer, I realized that my freezer was indeed full and enough was enough.  Also, the telltale signs of this particular style of fishing slowing down for the year were starting to appear.  This weekend, I fished Friday, Saturday, and Sunday in order to accommodate some family members that joined me.  First up was oldest son (now 24) Brooks.  We had not fished together in probably 10 years.  Brooks never really got the fishing bug, but rather seemed to tolerate it when he was younger.  I continued my exploit of the area ~one mile north of buoy 12 and on the west side of the channel- why mess with success.  The winds were light and blowing out of the WSW, and we were nearly smack in the middle of the outgoing tide.  Squid continued to be effective, and we picked up fish mostly from 40-50 ft depth, with one surprise fish at 67 ft just prior to moving.  I put 12 fish in the cooler, Brooks just 1, so I have to say that his little sister has the edge on him here, nearly matching me fish for fish a few weeks ago.  What was remarkable was the size- I caught the biggest fish of the year at 15 inches, and there were several others at 13, by far the nicest size fish in quite awhile.

The next day I repeated the effort, fishing solo and just a little bit later in the day.  Conditions were similar, maybe just a little bit hotter out at upper 80’s (water temp a steady 80F throughout the weekend).  The result was 9 fish in the boat including one Spot, with the largest at 14 inches and several at 13 again.  Sunday I took my brother Ross and his 9-year old son Owen.  This time, we were aligned with the beginning of the outgoing tide, but wind was straight out of the south and I never could get our drift going the way I wanted.  Unfortunately, the fish seemed to care less and we were plagued by lack of fish, crabs on the line, and toadfish.  In fact my brother seemed to be a master at hanging toads and crabs.  A hungry 9-year old ordained an early conclusion to our trip, and we returned with 5 fish in the cooler, including one small kingfish.  This was by far the least productive day on the water since early June, and perhaps the expected sign that the incredible bottom fishing off Deal Island in 2015 is running out of gas.  

Since it will be at least another 2 weeks before I return and my freezer is full, I will turn attention to the shallow water fishing surrounding the islands in quest for rockfish, speckled trout, and maybe a drum.  I am starting to hear rumblings of a few specks and rock being caught in these areas.  

July 31, 2015- Fishing with the Homecoming Queen

I came home from work on a Tuesday and found my daughter waiting for me in my family room.  The remarkable thing here was that I had not seen her in 5 months and she was supposed to be in Hawaii.  What a surprise- Kara snuck a trip home for a one week visit and kept it hidden from us.  So, aside from demanding to eat croaker while she was home, another thing at the top of her to-do list was to fish with dear old Dad.  Since I was already planning to fish, I was happy to oblige.

We launched at 4pm on a very sultry and clear afternoon, catching the last half of the outgoing tide.  Not one to counter what has been working since middle of June, I took us to the west side of the channel in Tangier Sound, about one mile north of buoy 12 off Wenona.  After a few drifts, we quickly found our groove.  The 10 mph SW wind pushed us just right across the 36-46 foot ledge that was working for us.  And another familiar sight- charter boats anchored near us in 60 feet, only to re-locate after the spotted us whacking the croaker.  We kept this up for a couple of hours until Kara’s arms hurt from reeling and the fishing finally slowed down.  These were probably the nicest fish of the summer, with many in the 12-13 inch range.  Kara was also quite proud of her doubleheader (see pic).

Next day was not really worth mentioning.  After putting 23 nice fish in the cooler the day before, the lack of wind and 93-degree temps conspired to drain me of energy and enthusiasm, and I called it quits after only a short time. As I was fishing solo, the decision was unanimous.

I don’t know when I’ll get to fish with my daughter again, but the time was priceless and easily the best day of the year so far,….. I hope she comes home soon.

July 24, 2015 - Quick trip and still killing it

Got down to the island Friday for a quick trip.  It wasn’t on my regular every-other-week schedule, but the fishing has been so good lately I couldn’t resist. Launched right at peak low tide, intending to catch the first three hours of incoming tide.  Forecast was for winds 5mph out of the NW.  Yeah, it was more like 15-20 out of the NNW.  This made keeping on bottom incredibly difficult, and I had to really work my line, continuously letting more out.  This eased up about 2 hrs into it, and I was actually able to get a 2^nd line out.  The bite was slow at first but picked up nicely after an hour.  I put some really nice fish in the cooler, many in the 12 to 13 inch range this time.   I even caught a 13-inch double header which was quite a nice pull on the 6’6” Ugly Stik.  Almost all fish were caught in the 36-46 ft range, more shallow than usual for afternoon.  Most of these were 42-46 ft.  It might have been a function of not being able to hold bottom in the deeper water, I don’t know.  I put a total of 19 fish in the cooler and am confident I could have limited out had I pursued the back end of the incoming tide, but enough was enough.

Still no reports of trout or drum, so I’ll continue to work the hardhead while they are still available.  I’m expecting the bigger fish to go scarce at any time, so I’ll take them while I can.