Bringing ‘Jaws’ to Justice
By LEE TOLLIVER
By Lee Tolliver
The Virginian-Pilot
Picture the scene: A boat of anglers, miles from shore, the sea sparkling from a brilliant full moon, then they appear. Sharks, lots of them, surrounding the vessel.
A moment from the movie “Jaws,” right?
No, it was just an overnight fishing trip off the Virginia coast with the crew on the Git-R-Done .
Once a wildly popular excursion, overnight fishing trips are steadily making a comeback for Virginia and North Carolina fishermen.
One reason for the renewed popularity is that, in this day of high gas prices, less fuel is burned.
The trips also offer the opportunity to fish longer one afternoon, fish all night, and beat the crowds to the first-light bite.
But there were no crowds that night for the guys on the Git-R- Done, a Rudee Inlet charter boat captained by Trick Standing .
As the western skies darkened with a disappearing sun, and a huge orange ball of moon rose over the eastern horizon, these guys found themselves all alone.
“It’s amazing what you see out there at night,” said Ross Hickam , who organized the trip.
“There’s a lot of life out there. Rays, pilot whales, porpoises, big squid, sea turtles, a school of small tuna pushing baitfish all over the place … all kinds of fish.
“You see a lot of that stuff sometimes during the day, but it takes on a new life when you’re seeing it all at night.”
The Git-R-Done crew had caught dolphin and tuna during the afternoon troll, then decided to set up for some shark and swordfish action. While swordfish eluded the gang, catching shark proved to be no problem.
Action came quickly.
“We put the chum bags out with a light and we were almost instantly surrounded by sharks,” Hickam said.
A hammerhead and a couple of brown sharks were the first to take the baits. But Hickam’s crew was looking for mako – a fierce, battling beast that is one of the best sharks to eat.
Seeing no makos, a relocation to a temperature break in the water was in order.
Again, things happened quickly.
“I was dropping a Boston mackerel down and something picked it up almost instantly,” Hickam said. “I free-spooled it for a little while and then locked it in. Thirty seconds after putting a bait in the water, we’re hooked up and a 6 – to 7 -foot mako that starts jumping about 15 feet out of the water.
“Absolutely incredible.”
That fish finally tackled, the crew dropped another mackerel down. No sooner than the rod had been placed in a holder, another fish was on. It was another mako within 10 minutes of the first.
“We knew we had the temperature change, a high-pressure system, the full moon … all worlds coming together in our favor,” Standing said.
“When that big orange moon came over the horizon, it felt like we were on another planet or something.”
Lee Tolliver, (757) 222-5844, lee.tolliver@pilotonline.com
(c) 2007 Virginian – Pilot. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.