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Author:
PECo
Date:
Dec 29, 2013
Subject:
Housatonic River - Shelton 12/28
Message:
Although I'm not a fan of weekend fishing, DirtyDawg10 (aka Derek) is usually only free to fish on weekends, so he and I headed down to the Housatonic River in Shelton on Saturday. When we arrived at the Sunnyside Boat Launch Facility at about 7:30 am, the parking lot was mostly full. The boat trailer parking spaces that are directly across from the ramp were [b:29a4acbb8d][i:29a4acbb8d]completely[/i:29a4acbb8d][/b:29a4acbb8d] full. I immediately noticed that the guy from the City of Shelton who checks for permits wasn't there. Yet. :wink: When Derek and I began preparing to launch my boat, The Other Woman, Too, he finally showed up. I ended up parking my trailer in one of the boat trailer parking spaces on the side of the lot next to the marina. And the guy from the city said that the New Yorker who had parked his trailer in 1-1/4 spaces [b:29a4acbb8d]would[/b:29a4acbb8d] get a ticket. :lol: Sunrise was at 7:18 am, high tide at 7:46 am and low tide at 2:52 pm. After we launched, although I wondered to where almost all of the other boats had gone, we headed upriver to the skim ice in front of Two Mile Island. We quickly marked some fish with the fish finder, but the schools were small and sparse. They were apparently hiding underneath the thicker ice inside the cove, and would swim out and back, again. We opened up some water by circling the boat through the ice and began fishing. Although Derek had caught a keeper striped bass while snap trolling during a charter on the Sunbeam VI in June, he's new to striper fishing on the lower Housy. We couldn't get the fish that we marked to bite, but pretty soon there were half a dozen boats around us. I guess that a lot of the other boats couldn't find hungry fish, either. :? It wasn't until 9:40 am that I finally boated one of the finicky little schoolies: [img:29a4acbb8d]http://img853.imageshack.us/img853/678/iv0k.jpg[/img:29a4acbb8d] Although I wanted to catch some fish, I wanted even more for Derek to catch some. We joined the fleet on the upriver side of Two Mile Island for a while, but couldn't get much. I think I might have gotten one. But the highlight of of fishing with the fleet was watching another fisherman fight for several minutes with what I told Derek was either a very large striper or a snag-hooked schoolie. When the fisherman yelled for his buddy to get the net, we knew that it wasn't a snag-hooked schoolie. After the whooping died down, we heard that it was a 44+ inch, 34+ pound keeper. :shock: That was really sweet to watch. :D Anyway, we soon headed back downriver in front of the ice sheet in the cove at Two Mile Island. While we were there, we saw another fisherman boat a schoolie with a lime green fluke or Slug-Go. Although I didn't have any lures as brightly colored as that, I remembered that I still had some Bubble Gum Zoom Flukes, so Derek and I both gave them a try. I quickly discovered that a fast retrieve off of the bottom followed by a pregnant pause could trigger a bite: [img:29a4acbb8d]http://img513.imageshack.us/img513/2264/j8yr.jpg[/img:29a4acbb8d] And a few minutes later, at 12:50 pm, it worked for Derek, too: [img:29a4acbb8d]http://img547.imageshack.us/img547/7123/vu5h.jpg[/img:29a4acbb8d] Whoo hoo! Derek's first ever striper! :D And, no, the one he caught on the charter boat [b:29a4acbb8d][i:29a4acbb8d]and[/i:29a4acbb8d][/b:29a4acbb8d] the one he snagged up earlier in the day don't count. :wink: Anyway, our day was much more productive after that, although that's relative to our sucky morning. We ended up boating 15 before we got off of the water in the fading light at about 4:45 pm. We may not have had a great day of catching, but we really enjoyed a great day of fishing: [img:29a4acbb8d]http://img809.imageshack.us/img809/4394/tkmy.jpg[/img:29a4acbb8d]
Author:
Michael
Date:
Dec 29, 2013
Message:
Nice to see you got into a good bite after the skunky start
Author:
fishfinder
Date:
Dec 30, 2013
Message:
Did you see tgat 44"er at all? Thats by far the biggest fish Ive heard of being caught this time of year! Good to hear some big girls are still around. Biggest Ive caught in the past 2 months is 35"s and like I said in another thread it felt more like I snagged something off the bottom and reeled it in. Almost no fight at all.
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