Shane Uriot

The marina was quiet as we rolled the truck in around 4 am. The moon was full and dancing off of the water. It was flat calm as we splashed the boat and headed out to open ocean.

We had a great crew on board this morning; long time tuna fisherman and MFCC member Jason Mazzola and MFCC member Todd Baranowski. I was excited as we left the dock.

The salt blowing in the wind as the boat sped out to the open waters energized me, despite the 2 am wake up. We had heard reports from the day before that there were large bass in the area and they were feeding on the surface.

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Our first plan of action was to catch live bait. This was exciting for me because it was my first time jigging for mackerel.

Ryan stopped the boat when we reached a point that he felt was deep enough and Todd and I dropped in a sabiki rig and started jigging. The first spot left us empty handed.

We moved on and Todd was able to pull up a decent sized mackerel, but that was all we could come up with. At this point the moon was starting to fade and we knew it was only a matter of time until we were at full light.

We decided to not waste more time on the mackerel and to start scoping out the area for signs of life.

Ryan moved us forward as Jason sat up front surveying the area with binoculars.

The sun was now rising over the horizon.

It had been a long time since I was able to enjoy the sunrise like that. Just moments after the sun had hit the water, Jason pointed out into the distance.

There were birds coming from every direction. Ryan accelerated the boated and we headed off towards the horizon. It was on.

We slowed the boat down and rolled our way into the flock of birds. Their squawking echoed over the ocean as we started casting out our lines.

Todd decided to try and live line the mackerel, Ryan and Jason were both throwing pencil poppers, and I went with the transparent white Canal Magic Swimmer.

I tossed the Magic Swimmer behind the boat and started reeling in. My heart was racing, I knew that it was only a matter of time until we hooked onto a fish. My first hook set though, was not with a fish, but with a sand eel!

It was a great find though because we knew that the bait was near the surface. Not a minute later, I heard Jason’s line start to pull.

He got a huge hit on his pencil popper and the fish took.

He fought the fish for a while until we were able to pull it up on board.

The first fish of the day was a 20+ pound keeper!

We could see more fish breaking in the distance as the birds started to move.

Ryan had suggested to me to throw out the Magic Swimmer while we were moving since we weren’t going to be traveling at a fast speed, and troll it behind the boat.

Not a minute after I felt the first knock on my line. At first it was a quick tap, then a second, and on the third, my rod tip bent and my line took. I was on!

We were using lightweight gear and the fight was incredible. I managed to get the fish to the boat, but it dropped while I was getting the plug out of it’s mouth.

It wasn’t a keeper but it was a fat and healthy fish somewhere around 25 inches.

It wasn’t long before everyone else’s lines were screaming.

Surprisingly, Todd had no luck with the mackerel and we decided to let it go free. He then switched over to a pencil popper.

Everyone was landing fish left and right. When the bite started to die off in one spot, we followed the birds and we were immediately all hooked up again. It seemed like every cast we threw we were hooking up.