The One That Got Away. - Striper Talk Striped Bass Fishing, Surfcasting, Boating

BigFish · 05-22-2003, 10:52 AM

We all have'em. Stories about the one that got away. Let's hear
all about it. If you ain't got at least one then man you ain't been
fishin'. My story goes like this. I am fishing live eels one night at
an undisclosed Cape area beach with my buddy Joe. People all
night are draggin' 25-35 pound fish off the beach all night and I
mean everyone. Well we had been fishing for about an hour when
all of a sudden my eel starts jumpin' and bumpin', I stop the retrieve and the line starts peelin' off like crazy, I set the hook
and after about ten minutes I land a 33 pounder and because
it is my biggest fish to date I lay it in the sand for the trip home
and go back down to waters edge and toss out another eel. Well
wouldn't you know it as soon as the eel hit the water my reel starts spooling so fast I thought I hooked a speedboat. So I set
the hook and I can tell right away this fish is an absolute cow. It
starts dragging me down the beach for about 3 or 4 minutes and
I am getting scared because I can't turn her around or get any control on this fish. Next thing I know the fish comes directly back at me and she must have wrapped the line in her scales. Well she
broke me off and I would have been really pissed of if I did'nt already have my 33 pounder on the beach. Good memory though.
OK, who's next step on up and cry on my shoulder.

BigFish · 05-22-2003, 11:08 AM

OOOOPS! Sorry I forgot the most important part. I estimate the fish I lost to be well over 40 pounds. Just breaks my heart to think about it but things like that happen don't they.

BigFish · 05-22-2003, 11:40 AM

Man, you folks either don't go fishing much or you just don't lose
the big one's. Come on let's have some fish talk.

Van · 05-22-2003, 12:25 PM

This one got away.

5' 10"........
Beautiful Long Blonde Hair...
Awesome smile....Big Baby Blue eyes....
Supermodel Shape....Sweet, Tender and Caring.....

HAPPY NOW ???????

BigFish · 05-22-2003, 12:27 PM

Van, sounds like maybe you were using a schoolie rod when you should have been using your 11' surf stick.

JohnR · 05-22-2003, 12:30 PM

I was fishing a So Shore spot a few years ago and had a good run of high twenty to mid thirty pound fish for a week on eels. I hooked onto a schweet bass that's started running - set the hook and I pray it goes to my left - Lot's of sand to play in. If she goes to my right I'm screwed - rocks and rip-rap like you wouldn't believe (well, maybe you do

). I was using my meaty 1089 and a Calcutta 400 and I could not in any fashion put the boots to this fish. Line is pouring off and I feel every rock on the east coast on this line. Nothing I could do... I honestly feel that was my first certain crack a my trophy bass. Others have had me wonder but that one was the most powerfull fight I've ever come across.

BigFish · 05-22-2003, 12:33 PM

Thanks for sharing JohnR. I feel your pain.

Adamfishes · 05-22-2003, 01:06 PM

i have just recently started salt water fishing (last summer) and have never got a keeper, although I do have a good story. I was fishing on Plum Island using sand eels and i was sitting on the beach when all of a sudden slam my rod bends in half and loks like it is about to break and i start reeling and realize the drag is on all the way and its way to tight. So the hook i assume riped right thru the lip. I really thought the rod would break. I still have dreams about how big that thing must have been. O well hopefully this season i will get a keepah!

BigBo · 05-22-2003, 03:17 PM

Almost the same story as JohnR in probably the same location. 3 of us on my boat. Me, my buddy and a friend of his. Me and my buddy have been catching fairly regularly for an hour or so and his friend is up on the bow pulling up skate after skate. He stayed up there cuz he wanted to light up a fattie and I told him I didn't want to see it. A few minutes later and we're bustin his b@lls about catching nothing but skates and my line just starts peeling of like no tomorrow. I cup the spool, set the hook, and I can tell it's going to be a while before I can turn this fish. The fish made an about face and headed for the rock piles and like John said, I could feel the line chaffing on every rock and sure enough, it broke off before I could loosen the drag.
I'm sitting there whinning about this cow that just got away, and this guy with red eyes and wasted voice says, "Uhhh.....I might have only caught skates tonight, but at least I don't have to go home with the heartbreak of knowing I lost the big one."

Yeah, thanks buddy. How poetic!

Van · 05-22-2003, 04:17 PM

BF. Proper equipment selection and no failures, it just was not meant to be !!

Oh yea, I lost a BIG FISH in the ditch years ago.
Had it on for a whopping 15-20 seconds.

I could fell her banging the rocks to get that pointy thing out
of her lip...and...SEEYA............

I've never felt anything pull like that since.

Maybe this year !!!

Team Karavi....

striperjackson · 05-22-2003, 06:35 PM

It deppresses me to think about it but, I was out in my 19' sportcraft about 10 years ago. I was chunking pogie and had a pickup. She took off like a frieght train, peeling a good 75 to 100 yards off my spool(40 lb test). then she turned around and came back at me, I could barely keep up. In my inexpirience I thought she would have been tired after 2 sprints like that so I tightend the drag up a little and almost got pulled overboard before she broke off, Damn, I never even saw her and I've still never caught a fish over 25 pounds, but this must have been huge. I'll get her someday.

Moron_Saxatilis · 05-23-2003, 02:03 AM

My 1st or second season in the salt I was chunking pogies in Wickford harbor before work. I was in the channel in the shipyard between some draggers. My line kept sweeping to the left. I start to real in and gilled an adult pogie. A school was passing and running into my line. I put a hook in it and underhand tossed it out. About 10 seconds later the pogies is freaking out on the surface and then whoosh! I could make out a huge swirl a line starts screaming out. I let it run and set the hook. The fish then headed out of port fast. I kept tightening drag but it kept going. My line was going around the wires and ropes... of the dragger to my right. I started thinking about climbing on the boat and doing something. I'm not sure what? Then I hear a lobster boat chugging out down the channel right towards my line. Tightened drag all the way, planted feet and try to turn fish in desperation. You know the rest... Biggest one I ever had. Never really even slowed it down.

Got Stripers · 05-23-2003, 08:43 AM

Blitz from heaven one day at Peggotty Beach in Scituate, where I'd bring my lunch (Marias Sub Shop best subs around) every day, to sit overlooking the beach and hope for some action. Well this day in 88 I think, the sub never saw the light of day and I was pulling my rod out of the car before I had put it park. The entire cove was nothing but white water, with 12inch bunker flying out of the water everywhere you looked attempting to flee the toothy bastards below.

I had a 9 foot garcia Hermans Sporting Goods special rod, Penn 710 with 15 lb mono, wire leader and an atoms popper already rigged up. For two hours it was either a 12-15 lb bluefish or a large striper and when I say large; my first fish was 42 lbs and went on the beach right away. I landed probably 12 stripers from 30-42 lbs and more large blues then I could count.

About an hour into this action, with only one other guy on the beach to share this with, I had a monster stripper come right up to my feet to grap my popper at the last minute. I watched her coming in fast and saw the take right below me in 2 feet of clear water and as she turned to run my mouth dropped at the length and size. With already a couple 40's landed and two 50's since, I'd put that fish at a solid 60; maybe mid 60's. I just held on as she easily peeled line off the reel, which only lasted seconds and then slack. I think the close proximity to the hookup probably either didn't get a good set or set too hard and tore a hole. Either way, that's the big one for me that got away, but in light of the day I was still having; I didn't loose a beat and was hooked up shortly after.

179 · 05-23-2003, 09:53 AM

Ok here is mine sought of. Was fishing my favorite spot at BI last summer (no not the SW Ledge) I had brought my uncle and his son out, he was ill at the time so it was great medicine. After dragging up a few fish into the 30lb range it was time to let his 16yro have a shot who had never fished before. On the next trolling pass the tube-n-worm wire setup hooks up. The kid is hooked into something big as I see the rod bending like never before, the kid is struggling almost hanging off the boat his dad is holding onto his waist, the fish took him straight down. We asked him if he needed help and he commented "no this is my fish". I kept telling him rod tip up and don't let the line slack, well guess what the first time he let that happen the fish was off (about 5-mins into the fight). We never caught a glimpse of the fish but I would bet a weeks pay the thing had to be mid 40s easy.....I wanted so badly to grab the rod from him and take the fish but it was his turn.......

BigFish · 05-23-2003, 10:15 AM

Got Stripers, that was one of the best stories
that I have ever heard. Thanks for sharing it with everyone.

MountainBreeze · 05-23-2003, 10:26 AM

No doubt... All good stories!

Thanks for sharing!

BTW:

GS,

My sister-in-law dropped her keys in the tin of salsa at Maria's once. The girl behind the counter didn't miss a beat. She just put her hand right in the tin, pulled out the keys and handed em' over. She says, "Don't worry. Happens all the time."

I loved that pace! MMM...

BasicPatrick · 05-23-2003, 11:57 PM

John R,

Love them rocks. I got a nice and comfortable couch to nap on and I am just up the road from that lost fish

fishweewee · 05-24-2003, 06:48 AM

I broke off a real heartbreaker of a fish - estimated 40+ lber because I didn't set my drag correctly. MV in late September.

That incident continues to haunt me to this day, and it drives me nuts thinking about it at night.

Got Stripers · 05-24-2003, 07:35 AM

Boy you wise crackers are slipping, I almoste went back to edit my post and correct the spelling of stripper, but I wanted to see what might result with my have a stripper at my feet and my rod bent

.

bluzjamer · 05-24-2003, 08:36 AM

Was fishing Mill Cove in Warwick, RI three years ago. Was right around this date, the weather was lousy, damp , raw, wind in your face. Well I had some fresh herring to chunk and tossed out a piece. I looked at the wife nice and warm in the van and said I'll give it a maybe 30 minutes. Just as I was ready to walk over and start winding it in, the rod went over. Using a bait runner I let it take some yardage out then set the hook with 2 heavy pulls. The reel sang its song and all I could do was watch the line peel off as the fish broke water. Its tail was over a foot wide and its body was at least 4 feet in length. It was the biggest bass I'd ever had on. I looked down and I had only about 75 yards of 20# test left, so yup.....I socked it down a notch and as I did the line parted. It's been the only Bass of this size that I've hooked up on but there has to be one more out there for me, so I still fish for it.

Now that's the.......

Bluz

mrmacey · 05-24-2003, 09:43 AM

went goodbye well it was just the begining of this month well i was down ri mt hope area, that place where the railroad bridge and the little harbor is, there a sea wall on both sides to the entrance and a channel marked by cans well anyone that knows that area knows the current coming in is very strong i would pull the boat up and let the current take me in the harbor while i drifted bait well as i was drifting in something grabbed the kastmaster i was jigging around and made it to the railroad bridge before i knew what happened snap lure and all my line gone dont know how it happened what it was but itll allways be the trophy that spooled me!! until you can prove me different!