Panhandle sharking with friends

My brother and I drove most of the night Monday night and picked up Don at the airport on Tuesday and met up with Elwin and family and hit the beach. It was very good to finally meet up with Elwin and his family for some fishing.

Elwin had a few runs early but were probably too small to get hooked up. Then a massive run on Monty's reel with the closest bait. After a long fight he lands this beast. A 9'7 lemon of a lifetime

During the fight my 130 gets hit twice on the head section of a big ray and it gets some big tooth marks.

After this Elwin's 12/0 and 14/0 get hit at the same time and we have a double on, Elwin lands a 6' bull, pics coming soon, and I fight the other on the 14/0 and land a 6'6 bull.

Don's Everol gets a good run and he hooks up on another surprise of the night, a 89" tiger, a PB all the way around for Don, 1st tiger and largest shark to date for him.

By this time we have only 1 bait in the water and it gets hit several times but never hooks up. The surf gets rolling fast with a side current and Monty runs out a bait and ends up way down the beach. At around 4am it gets rocked but does not hook up, that is the last run of th enight and we pack up at dawn to get some rest

Elwin and crew are fishing mostly during the morning and evening and doing very well and we are fishing mostly at night. Monty got a 6', 6'3, and 6'1 bull on the 2nd and 3rd nights. I will get the pictures of the first one up later, not on my camera, but here is the last 2. The 6'3 had a large damaged spot on its back near the tail. It made it very crooked, but it was healthy and fought well, it jumped several times when hooked too!


The 4th night started out slow with no hits until 1:45 am and then we got hits pretty steadily till daylight till every bait out got rocked. Monty got a nice 8' lemon and shortly after we landed it I got a 6'8 bull.


Then the fish I had been waiting for hit. It started on a slow roll then picked up speed and made the reel sound like it was going to explode by the time I got to it. I pushed the lever up and it came real tight and pulled me forward a little then stopped, then it took off and was peeling line off very fast under a very heavy drag setting. It got into the braid pretty fast and I pushed up the drag a little more to make sure the braid did not go over the bar. The fish stopped and then took off again and started peeling line and then the hook pulled! Heart breaking!!!
Right before daylight the last rod out with a good sized bait on it gets slack, I tighten it up and it shakes a little and gets slacks up again and I reel it in and it results in a 68" bull.

A small bait that had set out all night then gets hit within seconds of releasing the bull and the clicker screams but the line breaks before we can get to it. Monty's lemon had been into that line earlier during the night and had weakend it I guess. We ran out a few fresh rays and waited a couple more hours then packed up for some breakfast and rest

With a storm bearing down on the area the surf was rough and the weed was thick. I gigged a few more rays quickly and we got on the sand and Elwin and friends joined us for the evening. Monty ran out 3 baits and his lucky rod, the Firetiger, got hit right away and he quickly landed a 75" bull.

I got a hit shortly after and Monty saw it jump but it got off before I tightened down on it. A few hours passed and we were trying to decide how long to stay on the beach due to the storm approaching us and we needed some serious rest before the drive home. I had decided to reel in the baits starting at 11pm and pack up and at around 10:50 my reel sings and we quickly land a 76" bull

In all Monty, Don, and me landed 11 sharks this week, 1 tiger, 2 lemons, and 8 bulls, and most importantly had a great time doing so with good company!