It was a chilly and blustery day on Chesapeake Bay when Capt. Tom Weaver of Annapolis met his shopper Rob Cochrane for a constitution journey focusing on striped bass on Dec. 30. They putted out of the marina in Weaver’s 23-foot Sea Hawk, Miss Jimmy, after which headed for some open water close to Poplar Island.
“It was nippy, windy, and tough,” Weaver tells Outside Life. “It was so gnarly on the bay that Rob didn’t deliver alongside his daughter. It simply appeared too frigid and bumpy.”
A New Zealand native who’s been within the U.S. for 34 years, Weaver says there weren’t many different anglers within the space that day. However there have been loads of fish.
“We acquired into an enormous faculty of big stripers that have been crushing small 3- to 5-inch bunker on the floor, and we stayed with them, catching bass after bass.”
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It didn’t take lengthy for Cochrane to hook and land his first striper on a spinning rod. Weaver stopped the boat as his shopper fought the fish, then rapidly netted and launched it so they may keep on the varsity. (Maryland’s harvest season for stripers had closed, so it was all catch-and-release fishing that day.)
The 2 anglers repeated this train repeatedly. After a fish was caught and launched, Weaver would run again to the place the varsity was busting bait on the floor, after which Cochrane would hook one other heavy linesider.
“It was superior, and the fish have been large,” Weaver says. “By late afternoon Rob had caught a dozen or extra stripers, throughout 40 to 49 inches [30 to 50 pounds]. The fish have been simply all over the place.”
As a result of it was such a banner day for giant fish, Weaver even picked up a fly rod, which isn’t one thing he usually does with a shopper within the boat. Cochrane doesn’t fly fish, however Weaver does, and he at all times retains a rod on his boat that’s rigged in response to IGFA laws, with a 15-pound take a look at shock tippet on the top of the chief.
“It was an ideal alternative to catch an enormous striper on a fly on the floor, however Rob didn’t know methods to fly solid,” Weaver says. “Lastly, he was at one finish of the boat coping with a fish, and whereas I by no means fish with a shopper aboard, I noticed an enormous striper close by, picked up a rigged fly rod and despatched a streamer to it.”
He threw out a chartreuse-and-white Beast Fleye, a baitfish imitation designed by saltwater fly-tying guru Bob Popovics. The solid wasn’t his most interesting, however Weaver began stripping the 6-inch streamer and the fish slammed it. The bass instantly dove deep, and Weaver’s 9-weight rod bent over, line screeching off his fly reel.
“I knew it was an enormous one, and I informed Rob I used to be gonna be awhile earlier than I acquired it to the boat,” Weaver chuckles.
The battle lasted 22 minutes, and Cochrane captured bits of it on video. Finally, Weaver acquired the fish on the floor the place Cochrane may internet it and convey it aboard.
Weaver had an IGFA-certified measuring gadget on his boat for simply such an event. The 2 males fastidiously measured its size, took some photographs of the fish, after which promptly launched it unhurt.
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The striper measured 40.16 inches lengthy, and Weaver estimates it weighed between 35 and 40 kilos. He later submitted the photographs and a file utility to the IGFA for file consideration, and the group licensed the brand new world file this week. As the brand new All-Sort out Size Fly Rod World Document, it’s the longest acknowledged striped bass ever caught and launched on the fly.
On the time, nonetheless, the 2 anglers nonetheless had a faculty of stripers to chase. So Weaver acquired again on the varsity and Cochrane saved hooking them.
“There have been so many massive bass, and Rob caught some giants that have been a lot larger than the fly-rod fish I acquired,” Weaver says. “His largest was s 49-incher, and he misplaced one other one even larger than broke off. If he’d used a fly rod, that fish would have been the brand new IGFA file.”