Quote:
Originally Posted by Joe
That's crazy.....
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more than crazy Joe, sadly it's the truth. Seals taking advantage of fishermen while the seal gets an easy meal has been a reality on the Cape beaches for as long as I have been fishing out there since 97
They are the Hoovers of the sea.
Kenyee, It takes a decent rod and reel setup and experience fighting large prey, Tony S landed one on Nauset once, and he got his plug back I think. I just about whipped a small seal on Nauset in 2001 but after 4 runs it was in close enough for me to see it coming up for air so I opened the bail to allow it to scrape the hooks out and I tried to reel in what was left of a 30" bass as my reel was ruined. I did that with 14 lb fireline on a 9 ft rod.
I have had them hit my fish whether bluefish or bass at night unexpectedly quite a few times.
I can't count how many plugs and fish I've lost to them at sunrise
You hookup with fish, then sometime during the fight(while you pray that some other poor bastard has the seal chasing his fish instead of yours) all of a sudden you see the submarine buldge of a wake persuing your fish, the bluefish darts, jumps and does whatever to get away from his almost certain fate. It takes the sport and fun right out of hokking a 10-12 lb bluefish from shore as you now have to reel him in like mad, sometimes I'll run up the beach too, it works. The seal sometimes chases all the way to 5 feet of the shoreline. I was in the water one time and one got way too close for my comfort one time.
Also you can open your bail once your fish is stolen and wait for the seal to eat it and leave the head, most times they can avoid the plug which is usually in the fishes mouth and the seal does not get any hooks in them at all. Sometimes they are done with it so you reel it in then another seal sees it moving and grabs it a couple of times it happened like that, untill you get it all the way back in. When using tins you have a good chance to allow the seal to eat what it wants then reel in the rack since it's only one hook, but most times the line breaks at some point so I don't get anything back.
One time I was ready for it, Saltiga 6000gt reel, 65 lb test whiplash line, 52 lb leader, on an all star 1266 rod with the drag set at 25 pounds
I stopped a seal about 600 pounds atleast and I thought the rod would break, 30 seconds of tug and war and a few headshakes and pop the line broke.
They eat live eels too for your info
anyway, that is my 2 cents
that took so long to type I was logged out by the time I hit reply
