My loyal fishing partner Jim and I took a quick trip to the Inland Sea to kick off the new year and in spite of ourselves were not skunked! The air temp was 25 degrees with a steady 10 mph N wind and 1-2 foot waves, lake surface temp was 38. We marked plenty of decent fish, “herds of them” as an old salt I know says, just very little bait to set up on. When we finally did find some bait after poking around for an hour we hooked up with a 14” salmon and yup, the reel was frozen solid so Jim kicked into ice mode and hand lined it to the boat for a quick pick and back it went.
The bite was on a longline 120’ back, pink Needlefish with bimini. Nothing on riggers set at 40-50 where we were marking all the fish. I am sure we would have caught more along with pneumonia had we stayed out longer but a certain someone (NOT Jim) underestimated the wind and should have brought another layer
Great way to start 2024!!
Hand lining video below
https://youtube.com/shorts/8s_usyw2XFU? ... JEnaEGLpDi
