Wednesday afternoon seabass/porgy beatdown

[Arbutis]

Left around noon with high hopes of an afternoon filled with fun and fish. The weather was perfect, the sea not too rough, tides were with us going out and coming back. Excited to test out the new Garmin Echomap today...

The machine worked perfectly. Headed to the first spot after passing over school upon school of bunker. 60 ft of water - immediately started marking streaks all over my screen which looked to me to be huge schools of stripers. Pulled out a jigging rod and gave it s shot with metal, then rubber shads - nada.

Moved around to some structure and wrecks and we were very excited to see massive clouds of what should have been seabass over every spot. Dropped bait (worms, squid, crab) as well as the seabass jigs - nada, nothing, not a hit.

We were beatdown for hours hopping from one promising spot to another without a single taker. I was dumbfounded. I don't go seabass porgy fishing that often so I immediately started thinking about what I was doing wrong??? I thought once you mark these fish it was just a matter of dropping on top of them and they would eat. Not today. My friend caught 2 micro seabass and a dogfish (highlight of the day) and I didn't feel a tap the entire trip.
Everything went through our heads - previous day's weather?, afternoon bite - maybe the fish only ate in the AM?, bad spot?, bad captain?, faulty sonar readings?, wind against tide?, no other boats around at all?, too much bunker around?, wrong bait?, wrong lures?, barometric pressure?, Trump?, the Coronaverse?.... Thank god we brought a few beers this trip.

What a beatdown for sure! The only positive was the nice weather, light wind, easy ride in and out. But we went far in our search and came home empty.

I just read Captain Ron's report and although I feel bad for him and his crew, it made me feel like it wasn't my fault for not catching the fish Wednesday. Some days the fish are there but they just don't feel like eating. There were MANY very promising marks and if I get another chance to get out, I hope the fish are hungry.

Doug

[Jigman13]

They'll chew today... just how it is sometimes. You'll get em next time!

[frugalfisherman]

Bottoms probably still churned up from monday. Fish were there just not biting.

[wyldbillnj]

One month makes a huge difference...was out last Friday at a 90ft ledge I have #'s for and there was nothing but small sea bass and spineys there. About a month before, sea bass were STACKED and chewing their heads off there....couldnt keep a single one then .