Big Jamaica.......never again

[yankeesfn08]

went out on the big jamaica out of brielle on thursday for blues, light crowd due to weather. boat takes off 745PM.....driving.....driving....still driving and finally get to our first fishing spot at 10PM!! yes 10pm took 2 hours to get out there..were talkin bluefish ppl... start fishing 45min in a whole lot of NOTHING.. so lets move of course 30min trip to next spot now its 1115pm start of the second anchor. fishing and fishing and still NOTHING can i remind u that we didnt move after the first change of spots! that was it we sat in second spot for 2 hours and maybe 4 blues were caught on the boat. PLEASE REMIND ME NEVER TO GO OUT ON THAT BOAT EVER AGAIN.. btw didnt get back to the dock till 4am

[Luna Sea 5]

wow

[Hunter 2]

tuff daY

[Hotrod]

Ouch..

[bassnblues]

That sucks but I'm sure the last thing the capt wants to do is run 2 hours. He's out every day and has intel so I'd give him a break on that.

Fishing a spot 2 hours with nothing...that's not good.

[Pops Soul]

WOW OUCH I felt that bad trip even in my wallet 

[Capt. Birch]

Most of the time I just pass on these threads but.........It sounds like they steamed to where the fish were,  stayed on an area showing good sign and stayed late hoping the bite would happen. You can say a lot about that boat such as clientele,crew members, and cleanliness but when it comes to bring home the meat they are the real deal.Most boats don't run for hours just to Pee off there customers. In most cases if the fish were 5 feet past the jetty they would put the lines in. The Miss Barnegat Light is running up to the northeast because the bite on the  Barnegat Ridge fell off. Why would they run 30 mile each way instead of 14? Its because thats were they have the best chance of putting a catch together. Sorry you had a slow fishing trip but it sounds like it was just that....a slow fishing trip. I don't know if your next trip will be any better fish wise, but the Cock Robin who is a sponsor here has one of the cleanest bluefish boats on the coast and a very friendly crew. I wish you better luck next time.

[Hotrod]

Well siad Capt. Birch

[FishOn]

Capt birch said it well. The capt won't drive for 2 hours just to make you wait. He did that in an attempt to put you on good fishing. Why burn gas otherwise? I agree that sitting still for a while sucks but chumming blues is not like wreck fishing where shifting around can make a huge difference. With blues, sitting a on slick for a while can make a huge difference if a bite turns on. Do you know what the wind, current, or tides were doing?  You may have sat for 2 hours waiting on a tide change.

If the captain berated a customer for, well be a paying customer and doing nothing wrong,then you have a grounds to be pissed IMO. He can't make fish bite if they don't want to bite.

The only time I let a captain have a piece of my mind was 2 summers ago on a night blue trip out or belmar. The capt immediately aggrevated me by bumming cigerete after cigerete from my wife (not me even though i smoke and was right next to her). He then wouldn't let me swing blues over the rail since I was playing catch and release. He said "we gaff everything, no catch and release" (I was up on the bow with plenty of room and no risk to others).  Last straw was when I  asked for the cheeks of some fish that had to be gaffed.  He refused to have his mates cut the cheeks for me (guess what capt, money talks and they cheeked them anyway)

[Bucktail]

Sounds to me like you (and the captain) just had a really tough trip.  Back in the day, before stripers became so plentiful and easy to catch, my friends and I would do a lot of party boat bluefishing.  And, just like any other fish, even bluefish can be elusive at times.  Believe me I've had many days and nights of non-stop action and also trips where the whole boat got skunked.

I was even on a trip when the captain was so desperate to put us on fish he tried trolling!  He asked everyone on the boat to come to the stern and told us to drop our lines back while he started her up.  Imagine 40 people on the stern with AVA jigs, Hopkins, Bombers and whatever trailing behind a 100' party boat. 
Needless to say, that turned out to be a tangled mess!

Anyway, I don't know who the captain was the night you went out, but it sounds like he tried hard to put you on the fish.  I've been on the Jamaica quite a few times and they are a good boat with an excellent reputation.

I would just chalk this one up to a bad day fishing.