So I was sitting there in my office, being productive, getting my work done, feeling good after the recent tournament, when I decide to give Kayak Kevin a call to wish him a happy birthday. When he picked up I could tell he was excited about something. It turns out he had a 46" red drum in his lap! My palms instantly got a little sweaty and my mind started racing (I know, I have an addiction). I immediately wanted to be out there fishing for those powerful bulls. He went on to tell me the story, which I'm sure he'll share on his website, then hung up to chase some more. He was under the CBBT fishing for sheepshead when the reds showed up. About 10 minutes later, I get a call from Kevin's buddy Lee Williams and he says "dude, I was on
your piling fishing for sheepshead when I hooked into a massive red!". He continued to tell me how it came undone, then he had to take off to go to work. By now, I was standing out of my office chair, with both hands grasping my hair, mind racing even faster, completely incapable of doing work at that moment. I had to go.... SOON. I immediately checked the weather forecast and tides then called the one other person that I knew Kevin wouldn't mind if I told. The news had a similar effect on Justin Mayer. We called our respective wives and the plan was set in motion.
We launched around 9:30pm after a full days work and an hour and a half drive. We fished the CBBT lightline for schoolie stripers on the way out to the target area. We each caught 4 or 5 and as the current started to slow down, our anticipation grew. We both put two rods out with whole crabs on fishfinder rigs and jigged a 6" chartreuse swimming mullet Gulp on a 2oz jighead. Justin got a hit first. One of his lines with a crab started peeling off, he engaged, and just as his kayak started getting pulled, it came unbuttoned. About 10 minutes later I suddenly lost tension on my jigging rod. I reeled in the slack and instinctively set the hook knowing that something picked it up and moved upward. The ensuing headshakes and screaming drag run quickly made me realize, this was a big fish! I was very lucky it didn't go straight through the set of pilings that were near by. Instead the beast pulled me in between the two bridges then did a 360 and ripped drag back toward the pilings. Luckily it veered away again, and after about 7 or 8 more minutes of tackle testing drag runs, I leg lifted the brute red over my gunwale.
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Heavy 48.5"
Citation Red Drum |
Those were all the bites we had. I got home at 5am feeling tired, but still buzzed from having caught my biggest fish thus far.
