lawless_fishing Posted February 16, 2021 Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 Mid-January in South Jersey. Had some ice a few days before and then a warming trend. Water got all the way back up to 45 but I didn’t have a chance to get out until it started dipping again. When I finally got out, I was seeing temps between 41-42.9. Watched a pickerel t-bone the Legend twice early in the morning but couldn’t hook up. Made my way to an isolated brush pile off a point. I’d caught fish off of it before and had a feeling it might be holding a fish or two. Power poled down when I got within range of the brush pile. Felt weight on my first cast to the left of the brush pile right as I passed it - I actually thought I had a stick. Ended up being a solid 3+. Snapped a couple of selfies and made some notes in my fishing log. My next cast was to the right of the brush pile. Stuck another one - a 2 something. Pretty sick sticking them on back-to-back casts. Made another 2-3 casts at the brush pile and I was working the bait about 10 feet past the it when the Legend got absolutely obliterated. If you look closely at the video, you can actually see a flash of yellow gold under the water when she gets transported by my hookset. Net job was bungled (lol) but still was able to get her in the boat. The super tuned Legend was a necessity - we have a lot of what we call “black death” down here in South Jersey and I needed to keep the bait up outta that. Started off with the Chad Shad and was having a hard time keeping it high enough in the water column to avoid the Black Death. Switching over to the Legend allowed me to stay out of it, by and large. She went just under 20” and weighed in at 6.19. Awesome start to 2021. She checked a lot of boxes - PB Northern Strain, PB swimbait fish, and January PB. IMG_6855.MP4 twil93, JoeLo7, aholodnick and 16 others 19 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawless_fishing Posted February 16, 2021 Author Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 8’ H Daiwa KAGE Swimbait Rod Daiwa x SLP Works x Gancraft Tatula Mago 20lb Big Game The KAGE has a little more backbone than I like for treble hook baits. Switching up to mono from fluoro really improved my hookup/landing percentages. Streamer 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CG_Fishes Posted February 16, 2021 Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 Dude that's a tank Jersey fish, and in January, good work! I'm still frozen here in NY but this gives me hope lawless_fishing 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawless_fishing Posted February 16, 2021 Author Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 8 minutes ago, CG_Fishes said: Dude that's a tank Jersey fish, and in January, good work! I'm still frozen here in NY but this gives me hope Much appreciated! We keep going back and forth - not near enough ice to ice fish, but too much to launch the boat. We’ve got rising temps this week should have some more open water. Looking forward to poking around some CG_Fishes 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swimbaitrookie Posted February 16, 2021 Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 Fantastic catch! That gives me hope for when our deep freeze finally breaks lawless_fishing 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawless_fishing Posted February 16, 2021 Author Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 28 minutes ago, swimbaitrookie said: Fantastic catch! That gives me hope for when our deep freeze finally breaks Seems like right after ice out is juiiiiicy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bassbass Posted February 16, 2021 Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 Great fish and congratulations lawless_fishing 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
porkmeatballs Posted February 16, 2021 Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 That looks bigger than a 6! Great job! lawless_fishing 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Millerst12 Posted February 16, 2021 Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 Great fish...very cool pictures - congrats! lawless_fishing 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawless_fishing Posted February 16, 2021 Author Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 44 minutes ago, bassbass said: Great fish and congratulations Thanks! Took about an hour for the heart rate to go back down, ha Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawless_fishing Posted February 16, 2021 Author Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 25 minutes ago, porkmeatballs said: That looks bigger than a 6! Great job! Much appreciated! She was real short, but super thick porkmeatballs 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawless_fishing Posted February 16, 2021 Author Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 15 minutes ago, Millerst12 said: Great fish...very cool pictures - congrats! Much appreciated! Was by myself so I recorded video with the go pro and screen shot a couple pics. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fried Lemons Posted February 16, 2021 Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 That’s a really heavy 20”er. Great catch gives me hope for myself despite the lousy fishing here. lawless_fishing 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jim137a Posted February 16, 2021 Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 That’s a Jersey Giant. Mkel83 and lawless_fishing 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawless_fishing Posted February 16, 2021 Author Report Share Posted February 16, 2021 3 hours ago, Fried Lemons said: That’s a really heavy 20”er. Great catch gives me hope for myself despite the lousy fishing here. Believe it or not she was a touch UNDER 20 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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