It must be real scary to be a little fish. I was doing pretty well on trout & reds on jigs when something blew up the shoreline chasing bait. It was too far off to chase for now but I had a topwater ready whenever the chance came along.
My guess was Crevalle. They do enjoy the surface toys.
I didn’t get a chance until about an hour later when about 10 yards of shoreline went from flat to froth in a second. One cast in the right spot and no takers. Another cast (to the wrong spot) and after 5 twitches I crank as fast as I can bouncing the plug back to cast again quick.
5 feet from the boat (my kayak) the plug gets blasted. I’m amazed a fish could have gotten to the lure and I'm still believing it’s a Jack. It’s big and fast but when it didn’t turn and my drag was really (really) screaming I should have remembered what a big Spanish can do. Add the fact that it caught up to a plug bouncing across the surface and I really should have known.
Big Spanish in November up against the Spartina just isn’t in my Rolodex of possibilities.
Is now. After a great long fight I got it to the boat and it went I’d guess 25 inches & was very thick. It might have been bigger but I caught some this spring that went 32 and this one didn’t quite get there. I had the camera but I didn’t get a shot. I had a towel on the fish but when it shook one of the hooks straightened out and it got away. I’ve caught a lot of big Spanish but I’ve never tried to deal with one that big in my kayak. Big teeth & trebles in a kayak can get ugly fast. I needed a grip tool. I actually upgraded hooks on a bunch of lures that morning but since this lure was a new lure I didn’t.
I did get picks of redfish & I’ll post them when I can.
Great to get out. I missed all of October & most of September.
