A unique website dedicated to fishing information from Florida's Northern Big Bend. This includes the area from the Econfina River west to the Apalachicola River
Use this area to post offshore fishing reports from the area. Please try to include relevant information such as:
Location, date, time, water conditions, weather conditions, baits, techniques, species caught, etc.
Crab Joe and I hit mashes for an afterwork grouper trip yesterday. Seas were flat calm and we could have probably done better but Wil's boat just didn't want to cooperate. First the port tab stuck again and the only way I could get it unstuck was to bleed the line into the bilge. Next, the motor just didn't seem like it was running right. I cold only get about 38 mph out of it with a half tank of gas. Oh well.
We got out to the Marker 24 area and begain to troll stretches. There was bait everywhere but no fish striking them like there normally is. We trolled for about 30 minutes over good bottom with only one hit and he got off.
Next we anchored up in 30 feet and began to get strikes on frozen lys. I lost 2 good fish before I landed the first short. Joe landed a couple of shorts and lost a good fish. I tried my jigging rod and got hits on every drop catching 4 gags and 2 reds all just an inch short.
We moved again with the same results as before, but this time I got one of the good fish to the boat, a 28" gag. Just as I'm unhooking him, the flatline starts screaming and Joe grabbed it. He made the mistake of trying to thumb the spool to slow the fish down and got a nice blister for his troubles. After about a 10 minute fight a 15 pound king comes to the boat via the gaff. All this just as the sun was setting.
We quickly pulled anchor and headed in again at 38 mph, then without warning the boats rpms drop and the speed dropped to 34. Just lost a cylinder. We pulled into mashes with just enough light to load the boat, all the while the HPDI is spitting and trying to cut out. The lesson here is do not run the cheap West Marine oil in an HPDI because you will foul the plugs.
But it sure beat working.
Total tally:
2 rock bass
1 28" gag
1 15 pound king
“Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you are a mile away from them and you have their shoes.”
My heart sank when I read that "lost a cylinder" part. I hope it was just a spark plug. You have to run good oil in that thing. I'm not sure if it helped,but I always used yamalube and put in a dose of ring free with every fill-up. Good to hear you caught a few fish anyway.
Chug
I put new plugs in it and everything is running fine now. I'll never use West Marine brand oil again. btw- Advantage Marine (a.k.a. Avery Marine) will soon be selling Yamalube in bulk for really cheap.
