# 8-9-08 At the Petronious



## JMS (Mar 20, 2008)

I headed down late friday afternoon with the boat to my cousin and fishing partner's house in Milton.(Ben)We have had a trip planned for several weeks with our good friend Steve. Stevecame over from Ft. Stewart andjust got back from over a year in Iraq (this was his 5th trip overseas).Steve has been on the front lines every time and is a true hero. It was great to see him againand even better to go fishing. We headed out from Pensacola about 11:30 friday night. The seas were smooth and we had a nice tail wind from the north as we set out for the Petronious. We arrived about 3:30 and pulled right up and started jigging. There were a few boats there, not many though. We caught some hardtails in close to the rigand steve got a nice barracuda.As we let ourselves drift away we could see the fish on the finder at 50 ft. It was blackfin and it was every time we dropped. They ranged from 12 to 17#'s.Caught some smaller YFT jiggig too.A whole lot of fun. As the sun started to come up we put one of the hardtails on a drift line and started chunking with some of the smaller bft's(Thanks forthe reply to my question on the forum"what exactly is chunking")because cooler space was already a problem. As the suncame upsome more boats showed up troling the perimeter and we saw a few YFT busting but not very many. The water was bluish green. It was alright but not as pretty asI have seen it.. Aboutthe time the sun came over the horizon, the drifting hardtail got slammed. 20 minutes laterSteve has his first YFT in the boat. A 65 lber. We repeat the process. Get a line wrapped on the prop by a hardtail that wanted to hide under the boat. I go swimming to get the line untangled. The bite dies of as the sun gets up and we start trolling west towards the spur then turn south. There was somegrass but no well formed lines. 3 hours later and no knock downs we decided to try our luck at the marathon platform. Caught a few small almacosand some bait was working the top. Lots of barracudas. We had some bonitas hanging over the side chumming and saw a huge shark coming in hardin our drift. It comes right to the boat and circles us several times. It is a 6-8 ft hammerhead! Awesome. We take pictures of it circling and steve picks up a bonita we had laying around from jigging,hooks it on to the tuna rig, pitches it in and she comes right up and takes it. IT WAS ON. 1 hour and 40minutes later she is completely wore down and comes to the top. We were in position to boat her and the leader finally popped. What a great fight and Steve was a beat ass! By that time it was time to run in. The wind was in our face and made for a wet ride home. We got back around 7 that afternoon. A great time with great friends and 15 gallons of tuna Steaks.Enjoy the pics!


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## MillerLicous (Jul 15, 2008)

Hey man nice catch.....I went to the rigs last november and slottered the yellowfin its a blast...Hopefully another trip comes up soon....


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## cliff k (Oct 1, 2007)

thats a nice mess of fish right there. should be good eating for a while. congrats!


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## Capt. John (Oct 5, 2007)

?? Why would you kill the hammerhead do you eat them?? Capt. John.


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## JMS (Mar 20, 2008)

If wehad killed it, we would have cleaned it and I would tell you how hammerhead taste.


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## bluffman2 (Nov 22, 2007)

they are good to eat if properly handled quickly after catching them......


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## nextstep (Jun 27, 2008)

nice mess of tuna!!!:clap 

bluffman how do you do those sharks?


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## Capt. John (Oct 5, 2007)

After the long ride home with no place to keep him cold and the urine that excretes through the meat in the first 20 minutes it would not take a smart person to figure what it taste like PISS! There are to many good fish to eat such as those nice yellers yall got leave the sharks for a good fight and a few pics. Capt. John.:letsdrink


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## Caspr21 (Oct 4, 2007)

congrats on the tuna! Nice mess of fish! May have been the best thing that the leader broke, I wouldn't want to get near the business end of that joker, someone may lose a body part or three! Congrats again

wes


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## MissKristy (Dec 1, 2007)

Nice mess of fish. Just wondering if you can hook to the 255 rig during the night and jig for blackfins till morning.


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## Zuke (Oct 3, 2007)

I hope you can hook fish better than you can shoot!!!!!

:moon


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## JMS (Mar 20, 2008)

That's Funny Zuke! I saw they were cutting timber up around Brewton, Ya'll might want to check on those trail cams! Youand the rest of the Milton tree huggers association mght want to organize a "sit in" and all sit indian style arm in arm around one of those trail cam trees to blockthe skidders !!!!!!!!!


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## bamaben (Oct 19, 2007)

Haha... Hey Zuke you'll never know how good a shot you are unless you pull the trigger... :takephoto... 

I'm cooking up some tuna tonight, let me know if you and your boy want a couple of fresh steaks. :letsdrink


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## dorado74 (Oct 16, 2007)

They didn't kill the shark Capt. John, you might want to read the post again.


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## David Ridenour (Sep 28, 2007)

Great report and pictures. Be sure to thank Steve for me for his service.


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