| Well the Rhode Island spring season has begun (kinda). After a string of seemingly never ending gale force winds/rain and cold temperatures (which has been causing a bunch of coastal flooding) we finally had a small window of milder and calm days. I took advantage of this on April 1st and steamed out on my kayak about a mile to look for cod. I was also hoping for tautog but have never caught one this early in the season in RI, so I had low expectations in general.
I started off by using asian crabs I harvested at low tide and cut them in half to get some scent in the water. I was spotlocked in the one spot hoping to build up a bite, but man it was slow. After over an hour with no bites, I tried moving around a little bit and finally connected with my first cod of the season. It was a rat, no bigger than 15 inches. Another hour passed with little to no action but after making another move I was able to connect with a bigger cod around 20.5 inches (a keeper has to be at least 23 inches in length). By then I was very cold (even with my drysuit) and steamed back to shore. I was pleasantly surprised at being able to land two cod, but it was a grind. I was hoping by spotlocking in my auto pilot I could build a bite, but I was only successful when I moved around to different areas (I did not have my fish finder so I had to use navionics on my phone). Regardless, fish are in our local waters. Game on. |
Bonito Running Thick In Rhode Island!
I got word that Bonito were running heavy in late July, so I launched my kayak to investigate. My first couple trips resulted in skunkings or just bluefish, but on my third attempt I finally got some bonito to play ball. I started off throwing epoxy jigs with mixed...
