Last week I got a chance to fish with some of my closest family members, something that in the past was common, but due to my busy schedule gets harder and harder to schedule. I took out my Grandmother also better known as Mama Dot, my mother Beth, uncle Jim, and cousin Paxton. Momma Dot has not been out in several years, but back in her day was one heck of a fisherwomen. It wasn’t too uncommon for her to always catch the biggest fish on a fishing trip and show up all the men. She didn’t do much fishing, but gave Paxton all the moral support he needed to catch the biggest fish he had ever seen. This was Paxton’s first, but definitely not last trip out on the big pond. We started the day trolling around Lockwood Folly Inlet and found the Spanish very eager to bite the 00 clark spoons on #1 planers. Most of the bites were on the planers, but several fish did bite the top lines with trolling weights. It didn’t take long for Paxton to catch 9 nice Spanish Mackeral. He reeled in all the fish while Mama Beth and Uncle Jim hand-lined them in the last several feet. After we caught enough Spanish for supper, I spotted a shrimp boat about a mile off of Lockwood picking up his nets. This was a perfect opportunity for Paxton to witness first hand all the life that depends on the boats for survival. When we pulled up there were hundreds of seagulls and pelicans flying around and several porpoises swimming, trying to get all the tasty morsals of chum that were being dumped back into the ocean. Not only were there plenty of birds and porpoises, but the sharks were there too. At first Paxton spotted several nice sharks in the 30-50 pound range right under the surface of the water. I quickly filleted a Spanish for bait, hooked it up on a #4 J hook and tossed it right behind the shrimp boat. It didn’t take long for a shark to grab the bait and the fight was on. Paxton fought the first fish for 15 minutes before I could bring it along boatside and get some quick pictures before release. We ran back up to the boat which by this point was heading in and threw out one last bait. This time it took a little longer, maybe a minute before Paxton had the second shark on. By the way this fish was pulling line off the reel I knew this was a better shark. I tightened the drag and Paxton made quick work of the shark, which I lip- gaffed and swung the 40 pounder into the boat. We took a few more pics and released it back to fight another day. All in all we had an awesome day catching several nice Spanish Mackeral and two big sharks for my good buddy Paxton. I can’t wait for him to come back to Holden Beach and try to catch something even bigger.
Capt. Patrick