You remember what happened the other night, with belt at home and all that?
Well, the night after that I had to give that place another shot but instead of plugs I only carried a bag of rigged eels. This is the only way for me to stay true to rigged eels, otherwise I have tendency to think about switching to lures
Bluefish?
Well, if they chop up my rigged eels so be it. I really don’t want to feed them plugs either.
Unfortunately I did not look at the forecast and downpour greeted me as soon as I stepped into the water. !#$%&…..At least the mosquitoes won’t be a problem. Of course , no one was there. Probably because of rain, after all, we all know that fish do not feed in rain. They don’t like to get wet.
Two hours into it and I was starting to feel fatigued. Casting a five or six ounce rigged eel for hours will take a toll on your shoulders. I started to do what I always do when I am at the end of my patience, countdown.
I say to myself I will make ten more casts and then I am gone..ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four….wait, was that a bump or my imagination? Who am I kidding, fish don’t “bump” rigged eels, right? Unless they are small….hmmm…oh whatever…three, two , last cast…another bump. No, this was a fish, I felt the rigged eel move as fish was breathing on it (you laugh all you want, but I get really close to my rigged eels :-)).
Ok, suckers bet…let’s make another five casts
Five, four, three, two….whack!!!!
Holy Christ, what is this? The line is dumping off the VS in alarming fashion. Is my drag too light? No, it cant be…I set it before I made a first cast but this fish is peeling the line, slow and steady pull that giant stripers are known for …and she is heading down ,towards the bottom. I have reservation if my hook set was good so I give it one more yank
WTF happened?
The line goes slack. Did I lose it? Suddenly I feel the line moving away, the fish merely changed direction! I reeled like a madman trying to catch up. Sick with worries what is happening to that hookset without tension. Mind is racing ,want to regain the line and re-set the hook!!!
Few more turns, three, two, one …set the hook again….whoosh..
You got to be !#%&!* kidding me?
I feel the weight of an eel coming back to me. I lift it out of the water and stare at in disbelief. The eel is broken in two places but no sign of bluefish teeth marks. No precision like cut that I’ve seen a hundred times over the years. The meat of the eel looks like it was torn apart instead of cut.
No time to cry, new eel and back into the water. Two hours latter without a bump, I take the eel for a closer inspection and few pictures. I emailed some of my friends, some who said bluefish and other who said bass. One of the best rigged eel fisherman I know sends me a picture of his big bass with eel in same shape as mine. It can happen…
It can be a bluefish too, but if it was then I had a world record on.
You know the song…
Grandma got run over by a reindeer
Walking home from our house Christmas Eve.
You can say there’s no such thing as Santa,
But as for me an’ Grandpa, we believe.
Whatever it was certainly did a number on this poor eel. It’s sacriface was in heroic fashion. But don’t let the rest of them see this. This could be too much trauma for them. You might be looking for a good “EEL WHISPERER” if you do. Just tell them that you and the eel had a long talk, and you both decided it was time for him to leave the nest and go out on his own.
↓Sure looks like a big blue. No bass could have done that and the bite is too small for a shark………JC
↓You are probably right..I defer to Master 🙂
↓whatever it was it was fun while it lasted
It was’nt fun for you, but! the story was fun, especially the comment about other eel’s possibly seeing thier mangled brother/sister, and me thinking for a millisecond that I should explain to my eel’s about your eel’s demise! wtf?
↓Friday night I had one of those… ” hey I got a hit…. Oh damn.. it’s just the bottom… but it’s moving!! ” After 20 minutes and a few short but hard runs, I had gained about 50 yards and she decided to turn with the current again and lost about everything I had gained.. 5 minutes later the hooks pulled. Talk about let down.. The next drift I nailed a 44″ so I could temporarily forget about losing the first.. But now I can’t get it out of my head. The next night the same thing happened to my buddy..Only his siwash straightened,,oh well,,misery loves company 😉
↓Look closer at the eels skin for sandpaperscratches just to confirm but my votes that it was a bass
↓It was the big one that got away!
↓I vote the big one got away…
↓oh man that hit it like freight train. Only Zeno could gives us the best guess. She will keep you coming back to met her again and she will show her face one day I have much pride for SJ crew please keep up the great mag thanks
↓Weird.
No sawing teeth marks – relatively clean cut – almost looks like the dacron got exposed and somehow sliced right through the eel. . . which would mean you likely had a very large morone saxatilis on your line who was old enough and large enough to know a thing or two about using leverage.
You mentioned it peeled off some line and was tugging slow and steady like a striper – did you feel any head shakes?
↓Ok, if it was a blue big enough to take drag, he would have cut right through the rigging line. I’ve had blues cut doubled over eighty pound dacron with one bite. Was not a blue, big bass, shark or this time of year even a seal.
↓It’s the fight that counts only this time the other guy won.
Possible scenario: You had that cow – by the front hook. Bluefish also wanted the eel while it was hanging out the cows maw. Blue grabbed what he could and set the bass free. Have had it happen a few times.
DZ
↓what ever it was is still there and I bet you’ll be right back out there after it. Or just tell me where it was and I’ll go look for ya,Z
↓Looks like Dennis could have the most reasonable senario suggested. We very rarely lost “hooked” fish on rigged eels but one time Bentsen lost one when his drag siezed up. The fish ripped the tail hook out and snapped the head hook (9/0 9510XXT) in half! (very impressive)……….JC
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