Skippy and I hit the water about 8:15 Thursday morning. Our intent was to do some jetty fishing. My boat is not a rough water boat, so when we checked the forecast Wednesday night with light winds and calm seas we figured this would be a good oportunity to go after some big reds, and I hadn't been to the jetties in a long time. I normally fish the area around Nassau Sound, but after a fellow co-worker (a great fisherman) told me that he and another friend fished the Nassau Sound area hard a couple of days before and only caught 4 small trout, the idea of going to the jetties sounded better.

Armed with a couple dozen bull minnows and live shrimp we headed out to the end of the south jetty. I maneuvered the boat to a spot where it's known to hold big reds and I've done decently there before. The fish finder was marking good numbers of fish. Everything was looking good up until that point. We slid the anchor over and dropped a couple of mud minnows down. Though it was calm, the swells were big but far apart so we didn't expect anything to go awry. As it turns out, the anchor broke loose and we were drifting. By the time we reeled in our lines it had set again, but not where we wanted to be so we started to pull anchor. NOT! It had set again, and I mean set. Unable to get it loose by hand we tied the line to the cleat on the bow and atempted to pull it loose but the boat would just spin around once the rope had stretched to full tension. So I told Skippy to tie it to the cleat astern. BIG MISTAKE! DOH! The line stretched to full tension and as I tried to maneuver, a big swell lifted the boat up and back down putting more stress on the line. I quickly grabbed my knife and handed it to Skippy and told him to get ready to cut the line. Yup, the next swell came and the anchor was dragging us under. I yelled "Cut the line!" and he cut us away just before the stern started to go under. That was a close one. Skippy was all bummed out that we lost the anchor but I told him it was a lot better than going for a swim and treading water. After a breather we decided to come back inside the jetties and used the trolling motor. Caught one redfish but get this, it was only 17 inches.

After a while of occasionally taking water over the bow I was getting tired and decided to move in to Tiger Basin. We rigged up a couple of float rigs and caught 3 or 4 trout, all of which were around 14 inches, and a small flounder. Skippy commented he couldn't believe how deep it was. I pointed and said "it's around thirty feet over there" but that we were in only 4 or 5 feet of water. I said "somethings wrong with the fishfinder." He looked at it again. DOH! It was in demo mode! All those fish we marked at the jetties were just ghosts. DOH DOH!

We decided to make a run down to Horsehead. Horsehead is a flat with scattered oyster beds that you can see from the Shaves bridge at low tide and looks quite fishy. The oyster beds were under water and since I had never fished the area before and Skippy has in his kayak he ran the trolling motor. The flats had filled in, and since we had our rigs set up with floats we figured we'd just shorten the depth and throw up into the oysters. Skippy finally got his skunk out of the boat with a couple small trout. Suddenly, Skippy's rod bows over! I'm at the back thinking "good job Skippy!" DOH! His line was wrapped up into the trolling motor. ????? When he finally got it out we fished a little while longer and then called it a day. Can you believe it? No mishaps on the way in.

It was an exciting day to say the least. Absolutely ideal fishing conditions. Better luck next time. Care to go fishing?

I always use one of those rebar anchors when I'm at the jetties. With that ring and the rope tie banded to the shaft the anchor will 1)come up 2)the tie band break and the rope pulls up from the anchoring part 3)the rebar bends and you still get the anchor 4)you lose it but they are cheaper than a regular anchor

The anchor I lost was a mighty mite. Designed similar to the rebar anchors except it's all alluminum and doesn't have a ring. That being said it does come with a hefty price. I leavee my anchor in the boat when stored and I didn't want rust staining my boat, then again I can allways take it out after a trip. I have a bunch of rebar leftover from construction laying around the house and a co-worker has a welder. Think I'll just have him make several up for me for a 12 pak or so.

Make sure you include the ring, it's the most important part to retrieving a stuck anchor!