5/16 St Marks Reef / Dog Ballard

[StMarksAngler]

Ran out to St Marks Reef just after sunrise, hit a few different pieces of the structure with squid, menhaden and live pinfish. Only managed to snag a couple of remoras and a very large stingray. Jumped in and swam around a bit, managed to find and shoot one keeper gag.

Moved out towards Dog Ballard and spent the next 6 hours or so working various areas of bottom with the same baits, but only ever found more remoras, tons of small black sea bass, lots of grunts and a couple small sharks. Had one small cobia swim up to the boat for about 5 seconds and had a king mack take a single pass at a Yozuri plug.

Was nice being out on the water, but kind of a disappointing day. Maybe I'm not deep enough for this time of year? Surface temp was 80.

[Srbenda]

The last few times I've been out to Dog Ballard it's been quiet too..

[milto]

We went out Tuesday afternoon as the forecast looked good for a quick cobia trip. When we got out there it was much rougher than expected. So, after catching some bait, we made it out to St. Marks reef and pulled up grouper after grouper, and even managed one keeper 28". Then, my trolling motor, which we used to anchor lock, died. As, my wife was reeling in her pinfish, she hooked into a keeper 34" cobia. So, we came home with some nice meat.

Yesterday, I took my dad out to look for more of the same success. We couldn't have asked for nicer weather. After catching some bait, I was heading back for St. Marks reef, but saw a boat there with their dive flag up, so I decided to run over to Dog Ballard. As soon as I get on the spot and get the chum going, a 32" cobe hits my pinfish within 30 seconds of being in the water. We boated a total of 5, all 30-32" unfortunately. On 2 of the catches, they had friends with them. Did see a nice one, but of course the little guys got to the bait before the big guy did. Either way had a good day on the boat with dad and back in time to have dinner at Bumpa's for the RTSO captains meeting. Fun Day!!

[StMarksAngler]

Ha, that was us at St Marks reef with the dive flag up, and then drifting near you at Dog Ballard later in the day. Recognize the boat in your sig. We heard you guys over there "woooo!"-ing a couple of times, figured you must have been on the cobes. You've definitely been having a lot more success than I have out at those reefs the past couple of weeks. I've been using pin- and pigfish under floats or just off the bottom on knocker rigs. You doing anything dramatically different?

[milto]

Ha, that was us at St Marks reef with the dive flag up, and then drifting near you at Dog Ballard later in the day. Recognize the boat in your sig. We heard you guys over there "woooo!"-ing a couple of times, figured you must have been on the cobes. You've definitely been having a lot more success than I have out at those reefs the past couple of weeks. I've been using pin- and pigfish under floats or just off the bottom on knocker rigs. You doing anything dramatically different?

Good stuff! Kind of figured it was you guys since you were the only boat we saw out there surprising enough as that is. The only thing we are really doing is usually a free lined pin and a bottom rig with mullet or pin/grunt. We tend to have the most success with the free lined pin fish tho.