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Tough bite in the sound


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Fished the western sound yesterday for a long session (sunrise to 4pm). Decent blow out of the NE and then switched to NW. First windier day on the outback, yak felt stable & solid. Fished hard & covered a lot of ground. Got one schoolie on a bucktail in some rocks, and eventually started having windknot issues. Decided to call it and on my way back bumped into a school of adult bunker getting harassed. Livelined a bunker and went on a sleighride with a solid gator bluefish. Zero fish caught bottom fishing. No signs of funny fish and no birds working.

 

For you guys that fish the sound, what are your tactics when the bite is tough? I switched over to a porgy rig tipped with gulp sandworm on some reefs/rocks and was getting some bites but couldn't connect. 

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2 mins ago, tcal4404 said:

forgot to mentioned I dunked a rod & reel as well...

So far my sorta sealed Spinfisher and Shield reels have held up well to the kayak abuse. I keep a garden sprayer in the van to rinse them off.

 

I got no answers to the slow day thing, personally I've rarely caught anything but porgies and small blues there. I've seen tons of bunker but never action on them. My keeper bass last time was a 1st, but it was too rough to even know what they were feeding on. Maybe @cheech has more for you.

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When I go to fish LIS I am very aware of the wind direction...if it is NE or E with speeds over 10-15 knots the Sound gets very rough and it becomes almost un-fishable unless you can hide behind an island...and that limits your choice of the spots you can fish at. All other winds are less of a concern.

I caught porgies at every rock pile I cast catching 2 bass up to 26" as a bonus yesterday. Tried to troll but nothing . Water was 73F and it needs to cool down for fish to start biting more. This is a time between fluke season ending and tog season not starting yet so porgies are the only fair game...

porgy2021.jpg

dawn2021.jpg

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24 mins ago, computeruser said:

When I go to fish LIS I am very aware of the wind direction...if it is NE or E with speeds over 10-15 knots the Sound gets very rough and it becomes almost un-fishable unless you can hide behind an island...and that limits your choice of the spots you can fish at. All other winds are less of a concern.

I caught porgies at every rock pile I cast catching 2 bass up to 26" as a bonus yesterday. Tried to troll but nothing . Water was 73F and it needs to cool down for fish to start biting more. This is a time between fluke season ending and tog season not starting yet so porgies are the only fair game...

porgy2021.jpg

dawn2021.jpg

 

Appreciate the response. Forecast when I went out was calling for NW/N winds but when I got out there it was more of a NE so hiding behind islands was exactly what I did but didn't find much action. I think I need to take a look at my porgy rigs and downsize my hooks, I was also using pieces of gulp sandworms as that was all I had. What does your porgy rig + bait look like?

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Was out at sunrise yesterday in the western sound; perfect conditions, crappy fishing! One big runoff, and a couple small blues and porgies on a jig head with gulp. Bunker were only in the marinas and in the back bays.

 There were many anchored boats out around 30-40 ft. when I left at 10:30a. I agree, there needs to be a chill in the air, (or a miracle) for the action to pick up.

Tis better to remain silent and thought the fool, than to speak and remove all doubt.

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38 mins ago, cheech said:

Was out at sunrise yesterday in the western sound; perfect conditions, crappy fishing! One big runoff, and a couple small blues and porgies on a jig head with gulp. Bunker were only in the marinas and in the back bays.

 There were many anchored boats out around 30-40 ft. when I left at 10:30a. I agree, there needs to be a chill in the air, (or a miracle) for the action to pick up.

Yesterday (10/3) I had the complete polar opposite of you eastern sound at sun up..

 

 I was traveling to my money spots in the dark, wind against tide was giving me some nice swells before sun-up, it was better in-shore in 30ft where it was somewhat sheltered but out in 60+ foot was unfishable, too dangerous for me, fishing sucked until the tide flipped around & it settled down with the swells, I stayed in the 25 – 45 ft depths all morn. …. Started back to the launch around 9:30 Am

 

You westerners had all that land mass to your back blocking all that wind, once it got out over open water & out east it was a lot worse.

 

Best...

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3 hours ago, tcal4404 said:

 

Appreciate the response. Forecast when I went out was calling for NW/N winds but when I got out there it was more of a NE so hiding behind islands was exactly what I did but didn't find much action. I think I need to take a look at my porgy rigs and downsize my hooks, I was also using pieces of gulp sandworms as that was all I had. What does your porgy rig + bait look like?

This is what mine look like, a 1/2oz swinghook bucktail with a #2 baitholder and a hoochie. The theory is a retrieved jig brings the bigger fish. And it's more fun than just a hi-lo. I've had a deadstick hi-lo sit untouched baited with the same squid I'm catching on with the jig. Plus I've had bycatch of fluke, bluefish and tog. And robins of course.

 

I make it from a 3/4 oz mold, so I cut it down a bit. I've started cutting them on an angle like a shad dart so it rises on retrieve. I buy huge fresh squid at a local Asian market for $4/lb, and cut them up into 1/4lb packs that I freeze to take on trips. I use very little since the strips are so thick they're hard to steal. The tentacles are so tough they'll never get them off. And its cheap enough that if I don't use it and target something else it's no big deal.

 

5c80089f24b31_porgyjig.PNG.04d27cf48474245d92a6d2f32a357079.PNG

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On 10/1/2021 at 1:48 PM, tcal4404 said:

 

For you guys that fish the sound, what are your tactics when the bite is tough? 

Head south... lmao

 

Nah but seriously, when it gets tough I tend to downsize. Sometimes the fish are just being picky. This past weekend I was slamming bass on finback shads the whole night, had over 50 fish on just shads (and a bucktail when I ran out) then the following day in the same spot with a wind change they just wanted one color of shad. Wouldn't touch a swimmer, bucktail, nothing. Struggles to catch 15 fish. Sometimes they just want a smaller profile.

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Roger video is great ( there is me in it too) ...he taught me what to do....I use small yellow or white bucktail jigs, 1/4 - 1/2oz, tipped with piece of fishbite ( pink strip about 1/2" long) and I cast it around rock piles...depth 4' - 25'...and in my experience I will catch larger fish than if I use live bait on the hook with sinker. Lighter the rod outfit you have more the fun ...and as gellfex said a lot of by-catch...fluke , bass, sea robin etc etc

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12 hours ago, computeruser said:

Roger video is great ( there is me in it too) ...he taught me what to do....I use small yellow or white bucktail jigs, 1/4 - 1/2oz, tipped with piece of fishbite ( pink strip about 1/2" long) and I cast it around rock piles...depth 4' - 25'...and in my experience I will catch larger fish than if I use live bait on the hook with sinker. Lighter the rod outfit you have more the fun ...and as gellfex said a lot of by-catch...fluke , bass, sea robin etc etc

I found if I went too light on the rig I had a hard time with hookset in their tough mouths, and dropped a lot of fish. I settled on an inexpensive 7' Penn Squadron II Xtra fast action 1/16-5/8.

 

@BillZ I'm dubious about a bare epoxy catching when they're ignoring squid on a hook. I think the action of a bucktail attracts them and the scent of squid or fishbites seals the deal. Barehook vertical jigging always seemed like voodoo to me, even when it works. Other than fluking, jigging tins and rubber is still mysterious to me.

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13 hours ago, gellfex said:

 

@BillZ I'm dubious about a bare epoxy catching when they're ignoring squid on a hook. I think the action of a bucktail attracts them and the scent of squid or fishbites seals the deal. Barehook vertical jigging always seemed like voodoo to me, even when it works. Other than fluking, jigging tins and rubber is still mysterious to me.

Sometimes the bites just off & nothings biting anything, I get that,  just mess around with a jig when the bite's on, I think you'll be surprised, slow lifts 6" or so works, you can let it just hang there & they'll nail it just sitting there just from the natural rising & falling of the slight chop on the water.

 

You got way more experience with porgies than I do, I don't even target them, I do target BSB though & I just cant keep them off the jig, big ones too, I'm talking world record big ;)

 

I'm not a bait guy, never was, even in the surf the only bait I use is live eels so if I were to sit & have some fun with the porgies on the kayak its gonna be with a jig or something like what Buddaha162 is doing, I cant even use Gulp for BSB, the porgies rip it off the hook too quickly.

 

Edited by BillZ
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