Set up today at o-dark thirty and caught the end of the flood. Water temp. was 52 deg F. South West wind at 10 MPH. Fishing 54 feet of water. Bait was JPS and Eel.
Friend Rob was with me today and we were looking for his first keeper. Graph was stacked with fish; wind and tide were aligned so the conditions were perfect. Had a few promising pull downs before the start of the ebb, but couldn't connect. Once the tide turned the wind dropped to nothing and the river turned into a mill pond. It began to drizzle a bit, but conditions for fishing were perfect.
It was then that Rob's rod went off, not at all like a normal bite, but more like the screaming fish that has hooked himself and is heading out. The first move it made was to head under the other rods and turn for the bow. This forced me to jump on to the swim platform and thread his rod under the others. Once clear, I handed Rob the rod back and began frantically reeling in the other rods. I then ran for the bow, connected my float and turned us loose in the tide, then I started the engine and began backing down on the fish. All the while Rob had not hardly even slowed the fish down and had not even gained and inch of line back. He was down to about 1/4 spool. As the boat began to pick up momentum in the tide, the line loss began to slow. And then as suddenly as it all began, it ended. The hooks had come loose... but what a rush while it lasted. We were both shaking from the adrenaline and it probably took us 30 minutes to regain our composure.
I ended up hooking one shaker after that, but that was it. Both fish came on JPS.
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