Taking advantage of a surprise day off last July from his day job with Capt BJ of Flippin’Out Charters, our friend Greg and his good friend Phil Duckett headed out onto the waters off Newport.
The winds were projected to be light out of the South so they decided to take Greg’s (very) small 14′ aluminum and head just North inside of the Newport Bridge. The plan was to chunk up some mid-summer Bass.
The pre-dawn bite had been good and they already had a mix of 15 to 20 lb stripers in the boat. While they had thought about switching to fluke, Phil wanted one more striper. He convinced Greg to stay later into the day than they normally would. Since the sun was up and bright they decided to relocate to a deeper break and set out the last of their chunks into about 25′ of water. That’s when the real fun began…
When the fish hit Greg’s Bunker/ pogy head the first thing he noticed was the line started moving upstream and actually passed by them on its way to the bow. This was odd as all the stripers that day had hit and run immediately down current sending the Fin Nor Marquesa clicker into a frenzy. This fish just picked up the head and headed up stream. When Greg set the hook the bow in the line was more than expected, and they realized the fish was already at least 10 yards ahead of the boat! It cleared the water on the hookset and kept the guys guessing at first as to what they had on the line, as they had not had good look at it.
Phil thought it looked like a shark, but given the jump that seemed odd. After a bit of battle they got it to swim close enough to the boat to get another look at it. Sure enough, it had shark like features but when it turned and Greg saw the single stripe he knew what they had one the line. Cobia! But off Newport, Rhode Island?
Greg is a veteran fisherman of the Gulf and North Carolina where he had landed a few Cobia. But when he and Phil set out that morning they never expected to meet up with one!
After a very spirited fight, it bull dogged under the boat and played over/under with the anchor rope each time it circled the boat. Getting it in the net was no easy task as cobia are long, maneuverable and uncooperative. After a pair of swings and misses, Phil got it right and in the boat she came. “What happened next was ugly,” said Greg “my microcraft boat is pretty shallow and the Cobia went crazy on the deck, twice almost flipping out of the boat and making a mess of pretty much everything we had on board.”
They ended up practically sitting on the net with the fish under it until they could get it into the cooler. Once it calmed down a bit they took a few pictures and were finally able to relax and enjoy what turned out to be pretty rare catch. She was weighed in at Riverside Marine and Tackle and came in at a touch under 20 lbs.
According to Greg, cobia steaks on the grill are as good as swordfish. if anyone gets the chance it should not be passed up!
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