# 55068: Subject: Gulf of Mexico, Alabama

Submitted by capt_dalton (ip 199.254.206.4)

• Fished on 5/17/2006

• Report received: 5/18/2006

Water Temperature: 73
Water Clarity: 2'
Seas: 3 to 4 feet
Weather: West wind 15 to 20, a few clouds and kind cool
Fishing_for: Red Snapper
Boat: Mar-T
captain: Chris Dalton

Report:
Wednesday, May 17 aboard the Mar-T out of Dauphin Island

I had a 10 hour trip yesterday with a group of guys from Birmingham and Daphne. We were to leave at 7 and return at 5. At 6:30, still no deckhand. I called and woke him up and told him to no worry about coming to the boat, ever. Once again, I was fortunate to have a pretty experienced crew and they were willing to go without a deckie.

The forecast called for 1 to 3 foot seas with a NW wind of 10 to 15 changing to west around 15 in the afternoon. Shouldn’t be a problem, hopefully more towards the 1’ than the 3’. Well, that was just plain wrong and I know one fella who would love to put the smackdown on whoever dreamed up that forecast.

Things looked decent as we passed the light house, but, the seas picked up pretty good the further we went. So, I decided to see if there were still some good fish in close like last Friday.

I got the guys some bottom and sow rigs laid out and showed them how to cut and rig the baits. I put them on the first set of numbers and the fish marked OK, they just didn’t bite at all. It was obvious that the 15 knot west wind was already blowing at 8:30, and building. I also noticed that where the water was 76 to 78 degrees last Friday, it was 72 to 73 degrees yesterday. I went to my next set of numbers where I totally expected to boat a basket of fish. We put a few in the box and released a ton, but, not exactly the action I had expected. On to the next spot. This one was supposed to be the SPOT. We had our first great sea battle, but, lost it to pulled hooks well into the fight. The angler didn’t believe me when I told him it was likely a snapper. I decided to try and wait the fish out there and it paid off, mildly. One of the other guys bowed up good there. After a good fight, a 12.14 pound snapper came to boat side and they took turns trying to gaff it. The angler finally got it in the boat after 4 or 5 attempts each time dropping the fish off the gaff on the wrong side of the boat. I am not trying to get down on him by any means, it was too rough for me to get back there and gaff it. If I left the controls, the boat gets side sea and everyone gets thrown around by the 1’ to 3’ foot seas. It became a joke throughout the day. When water would come all of the way over the hard top and drench them in the cockpit, that would be a 2 footer, as in two feet of water would get in the boat on that particular wave.

I found two more of my close in spots that I had not fished this year and we managed a decent bite there. By 10 o’clock, we had just ten fish in the boat, all good ones with a 12 pounder and 10 pounder being the best. The rest were 16 to 20 inchers. But, we still had a lot of fish to catch and the seas had built to a steady barrage of 3 to 4 foot white caps very close together and the west wind settled in around 18 knots. Yippee.

Since I was out of close spots I moved a little further south. About 4.5 miles of that was all I was in the mood to take. With A LOT of maneuvering, I was able to somewhat hold up over a tank and the guys managed a few throwbacks and one 20” snapper. The throwbacks were thick and not worth the effort, so I eased a little to the north and was going to try some bridge rubble when I stumbled across a spot I can only assume to be part of the Tulsa, or somebody’s private reef. We basically trolled back and forth across it because I just could not keep the Mar-T still. If I let off the throttles, we were headed east, fast. The guys made the best of it and put a couple more fish in the boat there. I look forward to trying that spot in less challenging conditions. The fish marked very well, but, the spot isn’t that big.

One of the crew had caught the saltwater virus after the third stop and was rendered immobile except when he had to go “yell at the fish”. By the way, those wrist band thingies with the pressure point buttons do not work. They do however come in handy for wiping puke dripple off of your chin. I felt for the guy. He never once complained.

I decided enough was enough and headed back north. I did make a couple more stops at some of the places we scored on earlier in the day. On one of those drops one of the guys hooked up BIG time. He thought he was hung in the rocks. After fighting the fish for about 25 minutes, with me running the boat into the seas and eventually turning around and backing down over the fish, I convinced him were had actually traveled about a quarter of a mile from where he hooked up. It was fighting like a big bull shark and time was about out, so I tightened his drag and told him to push the fish. About five minutes of that and the leader cut at the hooks. Such is fishing.

I had hoped for a much better outcome, but, given the circumstances, the crew did pretty good for themselves. 13 really nice snapper and a 3 pound white porgey, (caught in 60’ of water, which I found odd). Another thing I found odd, when we were back at the dock I found that we had used practically all of our bait. One 25 pound box of pogies, which had about 10 pogies left, 1 box of cigar minnows and one box of squid. That tells me there was a lot of fish biting or being thrown back. I can’t say I have ever run out of all bait. Oh, and nothing hit on the live bait we offered. I think it was just too stinking rough.

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