Streak Ended

Some of you may be wondering about the results of the last boat trip.

So here is it. I did manage to catch one fish. In the process I used up about 20 gallons of fuel. So it was a fairly expensive fish - all things considered.

I caught a porgie. I think. It looked like a porgie. I think. Anyhow, supposedly porgies are in the grunt family. Again - I think. I am not sure.

But I caught one. ONE.

Now of course, this is one more fish than I expected to catch. If you go out and expect to catch a lot of fish then most of the time you are going to be in a bad mood. If you go out and expect to have a few beers and spend some time in the boat and listen to some music then you will at least have that going. And if you manage to catch a fish - it is like a bonus!

Anyhow, I left the marina and ran out across the bay and through Biscayne Channel (through the famous Stiltsville) and then to the Fowley Rocks lighthouse. And then off into the deep stuff. I trolled some ballyhoo and an artificial lure. Nothing. No hits. Nothing at all.

Thinking "this sucks" and realizing that if I have to concentrate on trolling and looking for birds and stuff floating in the water really put a damper on time I could be spending consuming beer, I switched to drifting. Nothing. But at least drifting does not use up gas!

So I ran to the Hawk Channel and then south to some patch reefs. After dropping the anchor and deploying all the chum I caught the porgie.

By the way - "chum" means all the shit in the freezer that you are afraid to eat. What is that??? Is it pork??? Beef??? Chicken??? Well whatever it is, it is encased with ice. What will you findif you dare defrost that thing? How long has it even been in the freezer anyway???

And then there is the mystery stuff wrapped in the foil. All you know if that you do not remember when you put it in there.

And of course, there is all the stuff saved just for fishing. Shrimp heads and tails, bits and pieces of fish, and so on.

So all that stuff went overboard. HEY! That thing in the plastic bag was a meatball! How about that? I was going to guess "boiled egg".

By the way, old pork tenderloins stay on the chum hook better than old cuts of steak. And pork sinks, beef floats. Neither attract fish very well. But the frozen inedible shrimp parts did the trick. I think.

And now the freezer is mostly empty. There are some frozen veggies in there, but they only attract sea cows, and you are not allowed to keep those. You have to throw em back.

I really need a stainless steel boat chum grinder. You attach them to a downrigger plate (which came installed on the boat) and then you cram the gross stuff in the top of the grinder, turn the handle, and fish attracting paste is dumped overboard. But this is low on the list. I already have a garage sale blender that is used for blending disgusting stuff into a paste, which is then frozen into blocks and tossed into the ocean in a feeble attempt to catch fish.