Call me Captain Ahab. I have been in search of the white whale since last week when one got away due to old equipment that has now been replaced and though I didn’t catch a whale, the 42”, 30 to 40-pound Shovelhead shark pictured above would have defeated my efforts if I had not upgraded as I did.
My trip to the Goleta Pier was such a disappointment, that instead of going to try Stearn’s Wharf or the Port Hueneme Pier today, I decided to stay on my home pier in Ventura. I only caught four fish but each one was different and each one was larger than the last.
Here they are listed in order of appearance:
- 6” Croaker
- 12” Mackerel
- 14” Sand Shark
- 42” Shovelhead Shark
Yes I did “catch” two sharks today but the first one ticked me off so much, it was all I could do to keep calm as I, hopefully, saved the little guy’s life. More on that later.
I had been fishing off the end of the pier while I hunted sharks using squid as bait. After a few hours, though, all I had to show for my efforts was the Croaker, the Mackerel, and the Sand Shark. So I decided to move landward and fish in the exact same place where the shark got away last week. Another hour passed, the wind started blowing ferociously, so my drift lining had to end, nothing was coming of it anyway except for Smelt nibbles. Then I heard the sound that I had been longing for all week: the screeching of my drag. Today, though, I didn’t race to my Wishing Pole since I knew I had adequate line in both length and quality to deal with what ever was taking my squid to the deeper end of the ocean.
I picked up my outfit, looked at the line as it shot off the reel and when the fish hesitated for a moment, I pulled back to make sure the hook was set. After that, I knew that whatever it was had no choice except to either bite through my 40-pound test leader or come to the pier.
Once I had the fish to the surface, I knew that I would have to gaff it to get it on the pier, so I called to a neighboring fisherman for help, and as all fishermen will do, he gladly came over and took my gaff out of my bucket. Then he held my pole as I lowered it into the ocean. Once I had it in the shark’s tail, he reeled in my line as I lifted the shark over the railing.
After taking a few pictures, I put the shark back into the ocean, not much worse for wear. He would survive and hopefully my first shark would do so as well.
The little 14” d Shark that I “caught” was a lucky little thing. I didn’t really “catch” it, though, what I caught was the line on the jig that was wrapped around it. If you look closely at the picture above, you can see the red and green beads on this jig. The line on the jig was anchored by a 2-ounce inverted pyramid weight. Apparently this little guy somehow became entangled in the jig and broke the line it was attached to then managed to swim away. I don’t know if it could have fed since several of the 6 hooks on the jig were embedded in it. If it had been able to feed and grow, the line, anchored in its skin by the hooks and weight, may have eventually killed it due to the inability of it to eat as needed or tearing its skin so it would bleed then get devoured by other sea creatures. Crazy as it may sound, I think the little guy knew that was trying to help it as I worked the hooks out of it then wrapped it in my fishing towel. The look in its cold, reptilian eyes seemed to soften just before I put it back in the ocean where it slowly swum away into its future.
In my opinion, people who jig like this do it because they are too stupid and lazy to fish. The practice needs to be outlawed because of incidents like this and the fact that so many of those who do this keep what they catch, like this little guy, undersized Perch, Smelt, Mackerel, etc. Every time I see a someone jigging, I have to resist the temptation to cut their lines and throw them into the ocean. I mean, if we kill all the little fish, there will be no big fish.
The man fishing next to me felt the same. As I worked on the little shark, he said more than once that jigging “ain’t fishin’” as he described just how he wanted to deal with these lazy fishermen.
I could only shake my head in agreement and know that grandpa would feel the same..
