Weakfish in Three Takes Weakfish - Take One... After a week of waiting around in my consulting firm's office for something to do, I was looking forward to wetting a line. I knew I was getting out of work a little early on Friday, so myself, my father and my brother had plans to see if we could get our first weakfish of 2001. My brother loves weakfishing. Unfortunately, fate was not smiling upon us Friday evening. We loaded our stuff on the boat, and, when we went to put the motor down, found a problem. Seems something had drained both of the batteries in the boat. Last time the motor was started was Wednesday, and things were ship shape (pardon the pun). However, some gremlins had found their way into our boat. We assumed it was the light in the cabin that drained the batteries, which we believe is haunted. It turns itself on at some inopportune times.

We pulled the batteries and threw one on a charger. After an hour the meter still read "dead", so it was off to Boater's World for two new boxes of juice. My credit card loves me.

The new batteries were charged up during what was left of Friday evening. Saturday they entered their new home in the stern of a Grady White. Everything was working again. A quick boat check Saturday afternoon found the true culprit of the battery drain. Touching the windshield wiper motor would cause first degree burns. It was red hot. We fixed that problem by removing the fuse. And, just in case, we took care of the cabin light the same way.

Weakfish - Take Two...

Dad, Jamie, and I decided to give weakfishing a go on Sunday night. This time we left the dock without a problem. Dad wanted to go to the weakfish hole we knew of right in the middle of the bay, but all the reports I had heard were that the weaks were on the west side of the bay. We ran down the west side and found a nice spot to set up.

Dad started off the required pink fin-s, Jamie started with a rat-l-trap, while I threw a rainbow trout colored salt shaker. It took me 10 minutes to find the bluefish near the surface. I missed the first hit completely, paying more attention to the center console off our bow than I should have. The lure was still intact enough to use, so I made another cast. The second hit I saw the fish, and it mauled the salt shaker.

I figured while I was down off the bow rigging up another rubber tail, I'd give Capt Gene from Shore Catch a call on the radio. Here's how part of the conversation went.

Gene: ...I'm getting bluefish

ME: I just had a blue mangle a salt shaker, where are you?

Gene: We're on the west side, where are you at?

ME: I think I'm nearby, do you see a Grady just to the southeast?

Gene: Put on a popper and have some fun.

Which is just what we did.

Jamie got the first blue to the boat, and it was a big one. After he got it back in the water, he realized he should have kept it for his buddy from work. I told him not to worry, he could have the one I had on.

This blue took me all over the place, it hit a long way out, and took a lot of line with the drag set on "weakfish." I eventually got him in, and he went into the cooler. Now that I had a fish under my belt, I switched to a fly rod.

I rigged up my 10 wt with a bobs banger in blue. I started casting off the bow, while my brother and father kept beating up the blue with poppers in the stern. When I break out the fly rod, I get exiled to the bow of the boat.

In three drifts I had one blue swipe at the fly and miss. The other two were doing well on fast retrieves, but I could not imitate them. Even stripping in the line with two hands, the boat was drifting up on the fly too fast.

Right about the time I was ready to switch back, Dad and Jamie got tired of blues and decided to see if we could find weakfish somewhere else. We made a run to the BB buoy, where a small fleet was forming, and began a drift.

Weakfish - Take Three...

On Dad's first cast, he hooks and lands a 25" weakfish. It joined the solitary bluefish in the cooler. We made a call to Gene, figuring the weakfish bite was hot. That was one of many sucker fish.

I started out using the fly rod with a pink/white jiggy fly. However, I was having the same drift problem and decided to go back to a conventional rod. I rigged up with an "albino shad" bass assassin. Within 5 minutes I had a hit. It didn't feel like much, almost like a clump of seaweed got hung on the line.

When I set the hook, the fish came to the surface just feet from the boat. It was somewhere between 30" and 32". It shook its head 6 times, dislodged the jig from its jaw, and slowly sank into the depths. I was shocked, but not very disappointed. Losing a fish is part of the game.

We made a few moves after that, the first farther to the east to avoid, of all things, a jet ski. The second move was back to the west since nothing was hitting near the middle of the bay. By now the sun was dropping fast and it was getting cold. We started talking about going in when Jamie (who had switched to a bass assassin too) had a bump. Then my father did. Then I hooked one, and fought it for a minute before losing it. Then my father lost one. Four more sucker fish; we stayed another half hour.

Our cue to go home was a "go-fast" boat who, although he had the whole friggin bay, had to buzz around the fleet of boats weakfishing. I guess the driver had the "look at me" syndrome that has given jet skiers a bad name.

The ride home would have been frigid if it wasn't for the canvas "cabin" on the boat. We all huddled in there, out of the biting wind. We cleaned the boat quickly and talked with another guy form our marina. He was out and only had a couple a hits.

I guess we did pretty well.

Until next week...