Newport Rockfish and Bycatch 3/7/14

[blitzburgh]

Late report. On the water at 7. Made a bunch of Macs at the entrance. Some horses and some nice 7 & 8 inchers that I planned on sending down for the Rockfish just to switch up from the squid. Got my limit in a little over an hour. 9 Reds and one Copper.



It was during the last half hour I decided to send a live Mac down. It was on the bottom for maybe 30 seconds before it for popped. Drag began peeling off. At first I was thinking I got lucky and stuck a ghost but after a few seconds fighting this thing it was clear it was a Shark. Made a bunch of freight train runs. Took me 25 minutes to get it to color from 185'. I thought it was a Seven Gill but I am certainly no Shark expert (someone out there can tell me). It was huge to me, every bit half as long as my PA12. After some pics I cut the beast loose close to the hook. It swam away strong. I was an awesome fight.






Not a soul out there with me that morning. Got home cleaned fish and showered by noon. Fred Hall after that. Nice full day