Mud Hole Trip – Fishing – Spot.

Headed to the rocks both Sat and Sun. Saturday got up there early but it did not matter what I did I could not keep anything on the hook. Didn’t matter if it was a spoon, plug, jig, heck even a Rapala plug with three treble hooks and I was dropping fish. Also had a knot failure near the boat, was the closest I came to boating a fish, about a 15 lb bass…if anyone catches a bass with a chartreuse Rapala in it, can I have the plug back?

Sunday I was going to stay close to home due to the forecast. Broke the inlet a little later than planned as my crew never showed. Worked some blues near the inlet for a little while and felt better that I was able to keep something hooked. Then worked spoons South off Bay Head and again was hooking up and dropping fish. Even changed out the hooks the spoons, guess I have new rod syndrome.

Got some calls on the radio and phone to head up North again. Conditions were no where near predicted with just a 2′ swell with a little chop on it. So I picked up and ran up to the rocks but got there at the end of the bite and only picked up more blues.

Both days it great seeing fish boiling on the surface taking baits. It is a shame so many have to drive right through them and break them up. Seems like the lack of courtesy and boat handling is getting worse the more that obtain their captain’s license…oh I mean boating safety certificate.

The amount of spearing around this spring is amazing. Hopefully that is going to lead to a great fluking season as it did back in 2007.

I was amazed at the difference in the ride of the boat after having more work done on the wheels again this winter. Despite the conditions on Sunday I was able to cruise with a following sea at a comfortable 26 knots with no pounding on the way in with the swell and chop on the front quarter at 22 knots passing every other boat but the Fish Monger and the 36′ Bertram across the creek from us on the way home.

Had high hopes of running out to the Glory Hole but my crew bailed. Left the dock at 6 am solo, broke the inlet and was greeted to birds working and only two other boats in the on the action. Had non-stop action with spike weaks for two hours until leaving fish to find fish.

Moved out onto the Axel Carlson Reef and with very little wind or current and the few boats that were anchored and doing circles decided to drift the deck barges and rock piles. Again had non-stop action with mostly short sea bass and monster porgies. Had triggers coming up with the porgies but couldn’t hookup with any. Also released several would be keeper fluke. After boxing a few porgies I said screw it and headed further off.

Put lines in at the 15 line and the inshore slough and headed toward Little Italy. Shortly after I had a falsie on a green/yellow mini feather daisy chain. Reset the lines and 10 minutes later had another one. Circled back around and had big splash on the mini spreader bar. Then a smaller splash and I thought I finally had something good, but it came unbuttoned after about three minutes. Reset the lines again and trolled back toward Manasquan Ridge without a touch. Had great marks deep, never stopped to jig, didn’t feel they were concentrated enough warrant it, in hindsight, probably a bad idea.

Picked up and ran back to the reef and boxed a few more porgies and at 2 pm called it a day.

I also started using the Lucanus jigs that have been in the boat all season, they work pretty well. Had weakfish and sea bass on them Sunday and sea bass on last Tuesday. Only reason I tried them for weaks was I had broken off the leader on my spinning rig and didn’t want to take the time to re-rig so I tied in a dropper look to put on the chartreuse/yellow clouser that I was doing so well with the weaks and I started getting double headers. The jig that worked for the weaks was the green/gold. It was the 3oz size which was overkill for the drift we had in 30′ but I had only planned on using it get the teaser down but the weaks were all over it.

I normally don’t stay out that late and now I remember why…the inlet, train bridge and canal were a zoo. The hard charging outgoing from the moon and the SE breeze didn’t help the inlet with all the joy riders that haven’t been out in a month but it was still a great day on the water and glad I went. Water inshore was 66-68 degrees and pretty clean and green/brown, offshore was clean, blue/gray and 64-66.

I went down to the boat Saturday morning to ride out the storm and rearrange the tackle lockers Saturday and hopefully install rod holders and maybe the outriggers on Sunday.  Tropical Storm Danny was a big disappointment.  There was no wind to speak of and not much more than your average downpour as far as rain.

Got the lockers straightened out and hopefully in a more user friendly arrangement.  Billy came back in with a limit of fluke from a rough inlet.  He lost a couple of big fish in the 6 to 8 pound range trying to net them.  I then had a hard decision to make, go fishing or work on the boat.

I did what any self respecting fisherman would do…I went fishing.  I made a quick stop in the river before heading to the inlet.  Got a couple hits in the river but quickly moved on.  The inlet produced all the shorts you wanted, had a few hits on a jig that felt like weakfish but never came tight, which made think more that they were weaks being finicky and just mouthing the bait.

Was back at the dock by 1 pm, got cleaned up and just hung out with friends and enjoyed the beautiful day.  Hopefully I will get to the installations this weekend since fluke will be closed and wreck fishing may be as well.  I will post info on the pending closure of scup and sea bass as soon as I find anything out.  I should have an idea Tuesday night.

Sunday shoved off on the 35′ Bertram at 2:30 headed to the Atlantic Princess area. Stopped 1.2 miles short of our numbers just before first light due to breaking skippies, BFT and spraying bait. Immediately dropped one of my ‘Dragon Fly’ colored jigs down on a 50, clipped it the outrigger, before I could grab my jigging rod with another jig that rod went off. Grabbed the rod, fought the fish for about 10 minutes and the hook pulled. Moved back on that spot, had good marks again got the rods set and chunks going. But for the next two hours it was just catch and release skippies. Once there was enough light to see down in the water we did see BFT cruising below the skippies but they had lock jaw. We tried all different kinds of jigs, sardines, peanuts, squid, different plastic baits…nothing. Two hours after the first fish we get another hookup, same rod, same jig. Ryan (the owner of the boat) had come down off the bridge to go to the bathroom and get a sandwich said hey, this line release from the rigger clip. Funny thing was, fish didn’t take line right away. He went to reset it and as he was putting it back into the clip, fish took off. This little guy was feisty and we had to move the boat a few times as he kept running under it. Fish came to gaff rather quickly though and it turned out to be a 34 inch, 33 pound fish and Ryan’s first BFT and first tuna on his boat. We moved back on our spot but again continued with the skippies and that was it. We did see some bigger fish under them throughout the rest of the trip and a few boats around us hooked up but that was it for us. Trolled a little around the fleet without a touch and then headed in at noon. Back at the dock at 2:30.

Since I was doing a solo trip I decided to stay inside instead of running off to some lumps for bonito after hearing from a buddy that it was a little sloppy out.

Had lines in at 6 and the slaughter continued until I ran out of bait. Fished from the mouth of the canal on the North side to the sea wall. Didn’t really matter where you were but what bait you were using. Out of all the boats I saw out there I think I only saw about two dozen fish caught. I fished fresh peanuts netted the night before and that morning. Took a whole 2.5 gallon bucket full to the top and used it all!  Lost count on how many shorts I caught after thirty something but would venture a guess of well over a hundred due to the amount of bait and leader material I went through.

Did manage two nice keepers both 21″. Water wasn’t too dirty from the rain and the rain was either light or stopped but came and went throughout the morning. I tried various gulp baits, spearing, squid…all they wanted was peanuts. They hit both the trailing hook and the bucktail and I had several double headers and several times when the drift was light where the fish had both hooks in its mouth.

They are feeding heavily and voraciously most likely fattening up to start moving on. Plus if this tropical depression off the Cape Verde Islands forms and comes up the coast you can bet that will chase them out in a hurry. I would definitely concentrate outside though, the last few trips we made outside produced some really nice fish…get them while they are still here.

Decided to make a quick trip to the river and then work on the boat. The storm at 4:30 delayed my departure by about an hour. Figures…there were weakies crashing peanuts in the creek during the lightening show. Finally left the dock at 6 and had the river to myself. Tried gulp, spearing, and finally peanuts. Had a fish on as soon as the peanuts would hit the bottom. Problem was no matter where I tried they were shorts…from about 8″ up to 17.5. Moved toward the Inlet and had a steady pick of almost keeper fish and some of the smallest sea bass I have ever caught or seen.  Soon after stemming the tide a bit to slow my drift down I started overheating. Threw the hook, hooked up the raw water wash down to flush the motor while waiting for it to cool a bit, cleaned the strainer (not much in it) and then headed back to the dock.

Pulled the water pump apart…had some grooving in the housing so I am ordering a new one today. Runs fine at higher RPM but at idle I guess the slight grooving causes it not to pump enough water. Not sure how long they usually last but she has almost 700 hours so it is probably time. Also checked the heat exchanger and that is clean as a whistle.

Drift was a little fast for my liking, water temps were 72.4 to 74.5 depending on location, peanuts were the best producer and the water wasn’t nearly as dirty as I thought it would be after the rain on an ebbing tide. There were also tons of small spearing all over. While throwing a small diving plug they would spray when the plug hit the water and while coming to the surface near the boat.

Headed out a little later (6:30) than normal knowing we probably were staying close to home and not doing much fluking. I wanted to run back up to Monmouth Beach to fluke but had a feeling the ride back when the SE kicked up would not be fun. Ran out to the Axel Carlson in a ground swell with very little drift. Was able to keep the jigs vertical with 1 to 1.5 ounces in 72′ of water and immediately put some nice sea bass in the box. We continued with a steady pick of sea bass and ling with some shorts mixed in unlike prior weeks.

Moved in on the beach after the bite died and played catch and release with short fluke on the Mantoloking pipe. When the wind started picking up around 11 we headed in, and glad we didn’t make the run North as we would have had to run into the ground swell with 2′ of chop on top and a head wind. We both had things we wanted to do anyway so it was good short trip with fish in the box.

Didn’t really pay attention to water temps but with ling hanging around still the bottom is still pretty chilly. The sea bass ranged from 14″ to almost 21″…almost my largest to date. They were hitting spearing and peanut bunker, the didn’t seem to like quid strips at all but also hit on squid heads, bucktails and gulp shrimp, with the best producing bait being spearing.

Too bad the garbagefish.com tourney wasn’t this week…we had a few small robins and two small skates but had a huge male smooth doggie, his tail hung off the motor box which is 44″ wide…so he was probably just over 4′! He was released and the numbers of the wreck he was patrolling were written down in hopes he will be there next week!

Saturday we went fluking up off Monmouth Beach. Ran up at 28 knots and was fishing by 7. Tons of fish up there, many 17 to just over 18″ fish. We didn’t keep anything under 18.5 so there was no question if stopped on the way in. Heard a number of boats were boarded. Fish were taking spearing, squid heads and peanut bunker. With peanuts getting the most attention and stronger strikes. I had a couple of double headers of both fluke and sea bass. Also had tons of sea bass with many shorts. Probably had 60 plus fluke and about the same sea bass keeping 12 fluke and 11 sea bass for the table. We also had birds workign around us most of the day, not sure what was under them didn’t really cast to them at all nor did we mark anything really when we drifted through them.

Sunday I mainly mated for a buddy who had to take a friend and his two kids fishing. This trip we headed out to some numbers I did well the week before with sea bass. Shortly after arriving in 75′ of water we had the first fish in the boat. I was hooking fish and handing the rods off to the kids. Once both were bringing in fish I decided to catch my own…big mistake. The rods I was handing off all had keeper fluke and big sea bass (16-20″ fish) but all I would come up with were skates, sea ravens and sculpins. Only fished about two hours but we put a couple nice fluke (19-21″) in the box as well as another 11 sea bass but none of the keepers were under 16″. Had a dozen or so short fluke and probably two or three dozen short sea bass to keep the kids on constant action. We also added a few ling to the box for a little variety. The ling weren’t as thick so bottom temps must be coming up a little. Again bait of choice was squid, killies, spearing and peanuts.

The peanuts were not big, only about 1.5″ to 2″ but very thick in the marina this weekend. After a fall, winter and spring of not throwing the net I was pretty rusty and only yielded a dozen or so a throw I was still able to put a good amount together for this weekends trips. Definitely need to get a smaller net to through in the launch ramp where they appear most of the time. The 8 footer is just too big for the small space.

Water temps were down a little but sinkers and fish were coming up warmer. Surface temps ranged from 66 to 69 degrees both days deepening on location and time of day. There was a small pod of dolphin just outside the inlet making the inlet a little more interesting with it being a holiday weekend, with all the armatures out with them site seeing at the same time.

Highlight of the weekend was Saturday night just after the fireworks displays up and down the creek there was a supposed jumper off the Beaverdam Bridge. The emergency vehicles and state police cleared out pretty quick though, not sure what the outcome was but they were cruising up and down around the bridge and walking all the docks in the marina.

I also heard rumors from sources I wouldn’t waste gas on but heard from a few people that a couple guys got YFT in the eastern parts of the mud hole yesterday. I do know there was another thresher pulled off the Sea Girt Reef over the weekend and heard a bunch of BFT caught south in the Fingers and also up toward the Mako Hotel.

Decided with the weather being a crap shoot to leave the dock late and sleep in. Shoved off at 5:30 with the sun rising, light to no wind and few clouds. Broke the inlet and was greeted with flipping bunker.

Pod hopped for a couple hours moving North as we moved on. Bunker was from MI pretty much all the way up to Red Church. Unfortunately they were small pods, scattered easily and had nothing on them. Most pods would sound as the line hit the water over them or the snag hit water.

Switched over to fluking and picked away at them and sea bass. frustrated with fish that were right on the 18″ line or just under we moved further North to where we had fish last week.

Right away we found a pod of fish making short 50-75 yard drifts over them. But again the fish were just borderline keepers. We kept a few that were just over and a couple of sea bass.

Also had a few small robins, a sculpin and a skate. Larger robins were kept for crab bait. Almost forgot…I guess we had some sort of inshore Garbage Fish Slam…sea robin, sculpin, skate, star fish and Jersey snow crab (spider crab). At least we had variety. We tried but could not find a doggie to complete the Grand Slam!

Water was flat for the most part, one in a while there would be a big roller. Had a couple sprinkles start about 11-11:30 as we were heading in. water temps ranged from 60.2 to 65.5 depending on time and location. Bait…pretty much anything worked…spearing, squid strip, sun dial strip, squid heads (my favorite) gulp jerk shads and shrimp.

Got back to the dock, gear off and the skies opened up…perfect timing…let nature do the washing!

Are the striped ones moving on or did the coming storms put them off the feed?  Hopefully they were just taking some time off of feeding and stick around a few more weeks.  Unfortunately next week we will be busy with the shark tournaments and Fourth of July weekend we usually take our first offshore trip.  If they stick around hopefully they wait till mid July to move on so we can get one more shot at them.

I had only a few hours to go fishing since I had to be home and ready to leave for a family party at 13:15 but we gave it a shot with a forecast for a bluebird day. After breaking the inlet just before 6:00 I was hoping to get a call that the party was canceled, it was one of the nicest days of the year on the water.

Knowing we had only a few hours and we would be fishing all day, weather permitting, on Sunday we did sort of an exploratory trip. We knew many boats, including charters and head boats limited out several days in a row to the North so we made a left turn after looking North, South and East out of the inlet through the glasses.

On the way up there were no birds working but rather just sitting and waiting and we only marked a couple of small bait balls with no fish around them.

When we arrived at the the rocks there were only about four boats there, and two minutes after getting there we were greeted with birds working and huge splashes about 75 yards away. It seemed to good too be true, and it was. It only lasted for about three minutes and we barely had time to get over to it before it broke up. Later I found out it was not bass but the giants had returned inshore on their migration south and we missed our first shot at a giant in December.

We jigged and trolled the area for two hours with only a small bluefish to show for our efforts. Being pressed for time we started South and stopped and jigged on some marks along the way a few times. We did manage to find a good school of adult bunker but there were no takers in or around it.

I look forward to reading the day’s reports later to hear if anyone did hook up with the giants and to see where the reports of keeper bass will come in from so we can make a last minute decision on what to target and where to go on Sunday.

With little reports from the North we again decided to head South. Broke the Inlet just before sunrise and turned right. Did not mark any bait or fish till we got down to the Piers. Jigged a little and then got up on the troll. Put out black tubes, blue/white shads and a chartreuse/white mojo. The tubes got hit almost immediately. Once that short was released and rig back in the water we pulled the shads and put out white tubes instead. Then we had both rods go off…again more shorts. After both rigs were back in we changed out the mojo for a Santini tube. We had a couple more shorts before making the run down to the old CG station to join Bri Time and Striker Joe.

I always have a hard time leaving fish to find fish but our biggest in the area was 26″ and it sounded much more promising further South. We could not believe how many boats were there as we were approching…there had to be two hundred boats easy, up North there were only a couple dozen.

We slowly cruised around looking for good marks to jig but after about 5 minutes of nothing concentrated enough we started trolling. Again before the rigs bounced off the bottom we had fish on. Although short they were a little bit bigger and were just short. We had steady action with one, two and even all three rods going off at one point.

Then we had a knockdown that started pulling some drag, we figured we finally had a solid keeper. After about 10 minutes it surfaces about 50 feet behind the boat…looked way too long and skinny to be a bass. It turned out to be a tail hooked 3′ spiney dogfish. Got that puppy released and reset the spread, joked with Bri time about it and a few minutes later another knockdown peeling drag. We joked kiddingly in the cockpit about it happening again and sure enough, an even bigger tail hooked spiney.

We moved slightly deeper and a little South and started picking at shorts again but never found a keeper bass.

Beautiful day on the water, wish we could have stayed out longer but we had two crew members that had to be in by 3 so we headed in about 1 and decided to head back out light, just me and Tommy to see if there would be an afternoon bite. Ducked in BI, there were a bunch of guys fishing the inlet but did not see any bent rods on the way. I almost followed a boat through the cut but decided not to since I had no idea who it was and if they really knew where they were going.

After dropping two off, and talking for a few minutes at the marina we headed back out MI. Went about a quarter mile out and looked around. We thought we saw the blitz of the season just North of the inlet. Upon arriving to the several hundred birds working a very small area we realized it was a small netter. We were not really sure what they were doing but they were throwing something over the side and pulling lines in. The boat was in only 15-20′ of water off Manasquan. A few minutes after us coming within 50′ to see what was up they left. We circled the are to see if anything was picking up the scraps from below but there were no promising marks.

We cruised around the inlet, south to Bay Head, in along the beach, out to 65′. There was very little bait around and no solid marks to jig on either. We came across a small pod of flipping bunker, snagged a couple and sent them down but found no takers.

Once the sun got down behind the buildings we headed for the inlet, again with no keepers in the box. On the way in we looked at the weather and discussed plans for Sunday. We had figured we would be able to get a few hours in the early morning before the blow came through. Hosed the deck down and left the majority of the mess for after Sunday’s trip and went to dinner. Checked the forecast again and decided to leave early-5:30 and get a few hours in…wrong!

At 1:45 am we were woken up by the chop slapping the hull, it had blown up way ahead of schedule and we had gusts from the East to 18 mph and about a foot of chop coming up the creek. We decided to check the weather and beach cams at first light and make a final call then but it was even worse by then. Had breakfast and then proceeded to clean the boat and gear in horizontal rain. Once we were done the rain let up…figures.

Hopefully next weekend we will be able to get back-to-back trips in if the weather cooperates. We are trying to get in as many trips before the boat comes out but someone upstairs seems to have other plans all the time.

We did finally get to try out the Tournament Grade Tackle Rod Riggers. We did have to grind out the notches a little for the heavy duty bar pins to fit since they are a 1/2 inch tall and don’t seem to fit most accessories. Even though the fish were not big enough to pin a rod in a traditional rod rigger or holder it was much easier to get the rods in and out of the rod riggers. It was also much easier to let out or bring in some line without having to lean out over the gunwale to reach the reel. They lay the rods down a little more than most others too, the rods were just about parallel to the water, plus if you have a rod to pull umbrellas that doesn’t have a gimbaled butt they hold them perfectly in the correct position unlike the more traditional rod riggers. Making turns is a bit easier as well, the cradles keep the rods from wanting to creep out of the rod holder. Everyone on board was very impressed by the quality and finish on them and we are anxious to try them offshore next season. Forgot to take come pics of them in action, will try and remember to do so next weekend.

Left the dock at 5:30 and a brisk 23 degree air temp and 33.5 degree water in the creek. No ice in the water. There was a dredge I guess in the inlet similar to the one down in Barnegat with only one light on it and it stretched from first ICW marker to the sea wall. I can’t imagine how they get away with blocking most of the channel with something like that, with no lights on it and not get fined.

Anyway, broke the inlet and had some birds and marks just outside…stopped and jigged but nothing. Started heading North since the plan was to hit Shrewsbury Rocks for bass then the Elberon Rocks for blackfish on the way back.

Made a couple stops off Spring Lake, Belmar, Asbury and Monmouth Beach jigging and trolling hear and there. We had a steady pick of just short, really fat fish the whole time. No blues brought to the boat although we suspect one jigged up fish that was lost just as we started to see color may have been due to its erratic fight.

Then while up off Monmouth Beach jigging I hooking into something really heavy and pretty much dead weight. I thought we might have a nice monkfish but it turned out to be a tail hooked spiny, one of the biggest I have ever seen.

On our way back South to Elberon Rocks just about at slack water we came across a bunch of birds working close to the beach and decided to jig a little more before the tide change and get setup on the hook. It was all blues about 3 pounds. it was fun for a while with poppers and jigs but then that wore off.

Made our way through the fleet onto some structure that looked good and got setup. Unfortunately I didn’t end up right over the structure but with a short toss of the baits we were into steady action and since it is not high profile structure decided to stay put. We had great action as long as you pitched to the right place and put 6 keepers all around 3 pounds and one 3.5 lbs in the box.

At about 11 the wind started kicking up and we had some pretty good white caps and taller chop so we decided to started heading back down to MI. After running about 5 minutes along the beach it flattened out again and the wind dropped out we decided to look for birds and readings and fish a little more but we found nothing. Just after noon we decided to head in early and call it a day.

Water temps outside ranged from 47.2 to 50.8 and inside from 33.5 to 35.7. Trolling we had most fish on blue/white shads with some on wine colored tubes (Thanks Brian and Ken for the color tip, finally found some this week). White tubes, black/white shads and black tubes produced nothing. Jigs we used dorado color MegaBait jigs, black/silver and blue/silver did not produce. All our short bass were spitting up peanuts and rain bait…did not see one sand eel spit up. Same with the bluefish. The blackfish were very aggressive and there was no missing a subtle bite as there were none. I even caught two fish dead sticking while making a sandwich…something I have never been able to do before. We were a little apprehensive about the day after the first stop and the rods and reels being iced up from frozen spray the first few stops but then we just brought the rods in the cabin between stops and all was good.

It was a great day with some fish in the box and a warm dry ride home. We ended up running 51.1 nm putting 7.3 hours on the motor and burning about 28 gallons of fuel for 1.82 nmpg and an average burn of 4.8 gph. I definitely see a big difference with plus (89 octane) fuel and my nmpg and gph numbers. At the end of the day getting in the slip was another story with the blowout tides though…we had to stop short and tilt the outdrive all the way up and float her in.

Left the dock at 6:30…didn’t realize I goofed on departure time till I got to the dock. Forgot to adjust my routine to standard time from daylight savings time.

Broke the inlet and the sun was already up and there were birds working at the mouth. With good marks on the sonar I jigged for a few minutes with not a touch, I also did not see any of the other five boats hook up so I did not stay there long.

Ran South and kept pod hopping and jigging. Had a steady pick of a range of blues and bass with about a 50/50 ratio, at this point it was still all shorts. I would move on when the fleet would join me.

Started working off the piers in 35-38′ of water and had steady top water action with mostly short bass and an occasional bluefish for about an hour before the fleet showed up and put the fish down. Had a blast with small poppers and was about to get the fly swatter out but that was when the bite died due to boat traffic.

After speaking with Bri Time, and others from BFH I headed South along IBSP again pod hopping till I got to the pavilion. Still with about a 50/50 ration to shorts to blues. Then I jigged up and lost two fish that were about 30-32″ trying to get them in the net. This was the first time I was using the larger net solo so it took a few tries to get the coordination down of the large hoop and long handle. Next fish was a 28.5″ that I swung thinking it was short but found its way into the box.

Shortly after bite started to really slow I went up on the troll. I pulled a black tube rig and chartreuse and white homemade mojo with a 6″ Gulp chartreuse power grub. Within 10 minutes both rods went off. The mojo seemed to have a larger fish but I decided to tend to the wire line first. Bad move…the umbrella rig yielded a short and after boating that fish, grabbing the other rod, taking two cranks it was gone. Most likely a bass as the grub had no teeth marks or missing parts.

Released the short and reset the spread and had pretty steady action zig zagging up and down between a 1/2 mile North and South of the pavilion in 35-45′ of water.

Had to leave to go to the eye doctor and left the fish biting though it was slowing down as it approached slack current. Did not mark much on the ride North back to MI and only say one pod of birds working. Did pass a fin, stopped to see what it was since it was small…was a baby mola mola, only about two feet across. It was a little timid at first but then swam right up to the boat. Tried to take a picture but it did not turn out good. It was the smallest one I have ever seen.

It was a beautiful day on the water with very light winds, flat seas and non-stop action. It was good talking to all the BFH members. Thanks for twisting my arm and calling me down Brian. Was considering going wreck fishing and not having to make the long run home. It was a little frustrating though, I dropped a lot of fish for some reason. I changed out hooks and tried singles, doubles and trebles…it did not seem to matter if jigging or trolling. I would take a half dozen cranks sometimes more and fish was gone. At first I checked the barbs on my hooks thinking some of my buddies may have played a trick on me but they were not flattened. I did lose about about a half dozen jigs to bluefish competition bite offs but that is to be expected.

I tried several jigs, Sea Striker JigFish (Mega Bait style jig), AVA’s, Kroc’s, SPRO prime swimming (don’t think they are made anymore, great sand eel imitation though) and bucktails. Had blues on everything, bass all came on the JigFish jigs in blue/silver, blue/yellow/silver or black/silver. Blue/Silver and blue/yellow/silver seemed to have the higher catch rates though.

Anyway finally tally for the day for the fish that made to the boat was around 30-40 bluefish and 27 bass with one keeper in the box and two lost boat side. Total for dropped fish was around three dozen. My back, shoulders and arms are sore today s I type this out but its all good!

We had non-stop action all day…while it was not some of the species or sizes of them we wanted it, it was an awesome day on the water.

Left the dock at 6:25, broke the inlet, looked North East and South…saw some birds to the South and started jigging around them…nothing. Continued South away from the fleet near the inlet and kept working the birds and bait pods…had a couple of bumps on plastics, bucktails and various irons but no fish.

Headed down to Seaside when we got a call on the phone from a friend of one of the crew that was catching bass. Put out a dark red tube rig, pearl and black back shad umbrella rig and a chartreuse mojo. The tube rig got a couple knockdowns but nothing came tight. Shad rigs and mojo’s started hooking up almost immediately.

Had a steady pick of medium and large blues with short bass mixed in about every two blues then a bass. We kept working that area and bait pods and switched out the tubes for pearl and blue back shads and that became the hot color so we switched both umbrella rigs to pearl/blue and put out the white/black mojo’s since I did not make up any blue/white yet (shame on me for thinking they would not go after a blueback herring pattern yet). We kept at it with several fish on each pass until about noon when we picked up and ran up to a wreck in 65′ of water.

Put the anchors out and two of the crew had sea bass in the boat before we came tight. Once we came tight over the wreck it was drop and reel action the whole time. We shifted a couple of times over it to try and find some bigger fish. We had a constant pick of sea bass and monster porgies (near 2 lbs). Then the wind died out and when the current went slack it was hard to stay over the wreck.

We picked up the anchors and drifted a few near by rock piles and put a few more fish in the box before heading in around 2:30 pm.

My best guess on the final tally was around 30 blues (kept 10), 5 short bass, 100 plus sea bass (kept 20) and 60 porgies (kept 15). What a great November day on the water, calm seas, fair winds, warm sunny day and fish in the box. It was great talking to all the members of Barnegat Fishin’ Hole on the radio…shee’s a keeper, just a fluke, Davo, heard EMALS but I don’t think he could hear me, speedbump, sorry if I missed anyone (talked to dozens of guys on the radio yesterday), and even Jim made it out yesterday-I bet the neighbors are glad to see the lawn ornament gone!

We headed out a little late due to my getting out of work late. It would have been nice if the crew readied the boat but they started cooler diving early. We broke the inlet about 3:30 PM, just as it seemed the action was breaking up down off Seaside.

We had some small areas of bird activity but nothing to write home about. Had a couple of knock downs on red and black tubes. Snagged bottom letting one rig out in an area I had no idea had any structure…marked that spot as it seemed to be holding some small fish…will have to stop on it in the future when we have bait aboard.

Switched over to jigging and had a few blues in the 8 lb range and some short fluke also on both bucktails and iron. They must be really hungry, some of them were barely twice as long as the jigs.

It wasn’t the numbers and species we were looking for but we had a good time, burned very little fuel and got to test my new LED lighting on the way in.

We left the dock at 4:15 AM…I was told the night before 4:30 and was woken up at 3:55 to the sound of the diesels being fired up three slips down and Mark yelling COME ON JOE! Jumped up got dressed and hopped aboard just as the dock lines were being cast off.

Broke the inlet shortly after in very dark calm conditions due to the full moon. Not sure what the draggers were doing but it looked like one was coming into the inlet on the North side of the North jetty but it turned out they were dragging the beach for something.

The ride out was nice but then our port motor temp gauge was reading a little hot…hotter than normal. We quickly took readings on both motors with the thermal gun and everything was fine. Then we lost all gauges for the port motor. We then shutdown the port motor and cleaned the sea strainer which did not seem that bad but did it just to be sure. Fired her back up and the thermal gun was reading just about them same temps and then about 10 minutes later the gauges came back and everything was reading normal…by this time we had first light…which we were hopping to be out there for was creeping up and Mark put her up on pane finally and headed right to our numbers. If it wasn’t for the thermal gun we probably would have limped back home on one engine and bagged the whole trip. You can never be too prepared.

Since we were behind a little we dropped the lines in about a mile or two short of our destination since we started marking bait, fish and had some whales in the area. It was pretty uneventful all morning. There were whales a porpoise around all morning, an occasional free jumping mahi and we marked a lot of fish in the 100 to 125′ depths all morning that would not come up.

We stopped twice and jigged on some bigger concentrations of fish but no takers. We were also able to make a couple of wrecks not on any of our charts…we will be investigating them further on other trips.

We then zig zagged through a maze of what seemed to be endless pot strings along the ledge. Rum Runner picked up a small mahi in the maze.

There was one knockdown that we never saw the fish…it bit right through the wire on the pre-rigged bally. Water was probably a little cold for a wahoo so we suspected a small mako.

After that in the next hour I release two bags, that once filled with water put up a fight similar to a large cow-nosed ray. They were released unharmed to the garbage can to die a slow painful death.

We were getting ready to call it a day and decides to troll another half hour. Wayne and Tommy were sleeping, Mark was driving and me and Ryan were on the bridge talking…and then she hit. By the time Tommy got to the rod she dumped about a third of a 50SW. I came down from the bridge in two steps and landed on the cooler. Tommy fought the fish for about 10 minutes and had it just about to the leader, it looked at the boat and headed right for the bottom…well about 20 feet short as we watched it sound on the fish finder. Tommy got her back up a second time and same thing…right to the bottom. Third time she came up I stuck her right in the gills and she was in the boat.

While we were hooked up Rum Runner fast trolled over, circled us and immediately hooked up a fish and boated it just after us. We worked the area for another hour, Rum Runner again hooked up and we did the same fast trolling over and circled but we could not find our under fish as they did. We trolled another 15 minutes and picked up the lines and headed in.

It was a joy not rigging baits at 4:30 that morning, especially with having to deal with the gauge and motor temp issue. The pre-rigged ballys from Sun Harbor held up better and didn’t wash out like a lot of pre-rigged baits we have had in the past from other tackle shops.

Water was very clear but gray in most spots and also a grayish/blue in others. We stayed in the colder water…67-69.5 degrees. This is where we had the best readings of bait and fish deep. It was just a mater of getting the speed right to get them to come up. We trolled between 6 and 9 ballys naked and skirted in various colors and a WWWB varied from bird/bally, bird, daisy chain and spreader bar. The fish hit the port flat line bally.

It was an eleven day on the water with great conditions, beautiful sunny skies, good friends and a fish in the box. She weighed in at 59.7 dressed. One of the best parts was the 37 minute ride to break the inlet…catching BFT close to home…priceless!

Left the dock at 5:30…got to the inlet and thought we were making a big mistake when the Henriques and Viking in front of us went down into the trough and all we saw was their hard tops and antennas on their fly bridges! Hit the bottom of the first trough and took water of next wave over the pilothouse…still not through the inlet it was too late turn around so we proceeded out to the bell buoy to see what it was like. Once out away from the inlet it was not too bad…4-5′ rollers with little or no chop on them. I guess we just happened to leave at the wrong time of the ebbing tide as guys who left later said the inlet was not that bad.

Once we picked up everything off the floor we proceeded to the Axel Carlson. Hit several wrecks until we found the ones with fish willing to feed. Marked bait and fish on almost everyone we stopped at.

We had a constant pick of fluke (both shorts and keepers) as well as many keeper sea bass. Actually most sea bass were keepers.

The lack of drift I don’t think was the problem with fluking…the ground swell and wicked bottom current in the morning had the fish off. The little bit of wind there was there was opposite the current but once they were going th same direction the fluking bite picked up.

Once the South wind really kicked in we headed into the Mantoloking pipe to give that a shot before heading in. More of the same…plenty of sea bass on it and some fluke as well.

All fish were on spearing. I tried various gulp baits throughout the day and did not get a touch on any of them. Tried deadsticked and jigged…spearing did not matter jigged or deadsticked the fish just hammered it everytime.

All in all it was a great day on the water ending the day with seven keeper fluke to 23″ and a dozen sea bass to 3 lbs! The highlight of the day was my personal best sea bass at 21.5″ and 3 lbs.

Since I still have yet to hear from the manufacturer of the boat about any resolution to the condition of the fuel tank we took Mark’s boat out for opening day of the 2008 fluke season.

Due to all the reports we turned right out of Manasquan and ran down to the bathing beach. We had spoons in the water before 6 am and zig zagged our way to the CGS. Marked a ton of fish and bait, had a half dozen knockdowns, had three fish on for two minutes but nothing to the boat.

Around 10-10:30 we switched over to fluking. Stopped on a couple of small lumps with bait…only dogfish and skates. Moved further North to a small wreck off Lavalette and had tons of 16″-17″ fluke. Spearing was the preferred over any type of strip bait but Gulp shrimp out fished the spearing.

Water was cold…started the day with 51.2 and ended the day in 15′ of water with 55.3…most of the day was around 53 degrees.

I was amazed at the lack of boat traffic. I don’t think we saw 100 boats all day including only 1 head boat. The huge crane being towed North was something…that thing was gigantic.

I did hear from a couple of guys after we returned to the dock that the few that ran North had pretty good results on 20 and 30 pound class fish up on the mussel beds and rocks, and they reported large bunker schools up there as well.

We watched a tug towing a huge crane all day. We first saw it before 6 am a little South of Barnegat Inlet. When we were packing it in around 12:30 it was up to Lavalette. All in all it was a great day on the water…great weather, great friends but not so great fishing but we all still had a great time.

I will start off with what a day! It was beautiful out. I first ran outside just to take a peak and run the boat a bit. Started marking bait here and there, then started marking tight isolated pods of fish.

Thinking this was going to be a bass and flounder day excitement started running high. Had to take short drifts with 1 or 2 shots to hook up on each drift over the fish. First few drifts ended in frustration with the fish just mouthing the baits. Felt strange though and not like bass. On the third drift about an 8lb weak was brought along boat side. I continued working the weaks for another hour and half There ran from 8 to about 12 pounds. I lost one boat side due to it not fitting in the net, so I have no idea of the weight.

All using my homemade bucktails. When the current went slack the bite died off. At that point I decided to run back inside and get on the hook and try for some flounder.

With most reports during the week coming from the river side I setup in a hole between the main channel and the old channel. I baited two rods and put them out. Before I could get the first chum pot in the water I had a fish on, nice 15+ incher and fat. Got the first pot in and the second rod goes off. Another nice fat fish. It did not matter gulp sands live sands they both produced. Fished four about an hour and had the best fishing of the season with non-stop action till the water temps rose above 51 degrees. Not one short and all fish over 14″ with many over 15 and a couple in the 16-18″ range.

What a day on the water. Great weather, great fishing, life does not get any better.

Saturday was a slaughter! I had fish all day, now the day was only about two and half hours of fishing but it was non stop action. I made quick stops at Shark River Inlet and the mussel beds of Monmouth Beach on my way up to the Rocks but there were only very small fish in both places.

Once at the rocks there were gannets diving everywhere! It was the mother load….and mostly bass. Most fish were 25-27″, and in total I had about seventy fish with eighteen keepers. I kept three for the table and they were 10lb 9oz, 12lb 4oz and 12lb 10oz. And only five to seven bluefish, so few I did not bother to count.

I wish I could say Sunday was just as good but most likely due to the South winds and the full moon it was not. We headed to the same area and looked for marks and birds. The bait, fish and birds were scattered and it was difficult to stay on fish for any period of time. The water had also dropped three degrees since the day before. We had three bluefish and two short bass and that was it for the trip.

Later I heard that chartreuse shad rigs were producing on an East to West pull a little North of where we were. We gave it a shot but only had bluefish. There were also several boats that were attempting to pull North to South with the current and crossing everyone else that was going East to West and West to East making it very difficult to troll so we called it a day and headed towards home.

We did make a few more stops where we saw promising marks and birds, I had a couple of hookups but dropped the fish before getting them to the boat. Sunday was just not our day. And from the sound or the radio chatter and other reports I read later in the day it was an off day for most.

I arrived at the boat at 5:15 AM and it was cold…33 degrees and no wind to speak of. All of the flags within view were totally limp. The water level was very low due to the strong west winds and the gunwale was about six inches below the dock…luckily there was enough water to float out of the slip. We had to cancel a few trips last year this time due to not enough water to get out of the slip. I started the engine and started loading the day’s gear onto the boat. Soon the engine was warmed up and with the heat on the pilothouse started warming up to a nice and toasty 68 degrees.

After finishing storing gear and readying some items for the trip we were ready to shove off. Once the crew arrived we were underway.

We broke the inlet about 6:15 just before sunrise. There were birds starting to take flight in anticipation of an easy meal. The fish finder was all lit up and we started jigging up shorts and bluefish right away. As soon as the sun started to rise above the water’s edge the birds started diving and screeching. And the fleet of boats soon showed up. As it started getting more crowded we started moving south chasing the fast moving schools of migrating fish.

We continued to see fish breaking the surface all over and the spray of fleeing peanut bunker from the ravenous bluefish. Moving from pod to pod of bait we just followed the marks and jigged most of the day. Eventually we ended up off Top of the Mast where we had our best bite of the day. On one drift we produced about a dozen short bass, one nice 31″ keeper and only one bluefish. Continuing to work that area produced non-stop action of mostly short bass with a few bluefish mixed in. At one point I reeled up leaving five or ten feet of line out, leaving my jig in the water to net Anthony’s fish and a follower just slammed the jig.

By the end of the day we ended up just North of the bathing beach. We must have reached that area just as the bite died off as we had little luck in that area. It also started to cloud up a little more and the temperature was starting to drop. Which seemed to signal the end of the bite for us. We continued to work our way North and worked several schools of bait and fish but did not have the action that we had earlier in the day when it was a few degrees warmer. This seemed strange to me since the water was still 53 degrees. Usually we see this type of action when it is later in the year and the air and water temps are much cooler.

I would have included a picture of myself holding my fish here but there was an unforseen camera malfunction…or user error. We are not clear on what really happened.

It was a great day on the water with very pleasant sea conditions despite NOAA’s forecast (no surprise there) and the non-stop action only topped off the day. We ended the day with a total of two keeper bass-with 9 and 12 pound fish. We had several that were between 1/4 and 1/8 of an inch short and about two dozen or so fish that were 26 to 27.5 inches in length. Mixed in were probably near 40 to 50 bluefish.

We broke Manasquan Inlet at about 6:30 AM to birds working and fish breaking the surface. It was not long after dropping a jig to the bottom that I had my first fish on-a short striper. Then it occurred to me-just caught my first fish that has game fish status. We figured this is going to be a great day having striped bass to the boat right away. The more fish we hooked into the more blues we started to catch. Moving around with the birds and watching the sonar we were able to keep a steady pick going with bass mixed in with the blues.

Nino got his first bass of the season and almost his first keeper, there were a lot of fish 26-27″ and a bunch that were less than 1/4″ short. As always all short fish were returned to grow up and fight another day.

It was a busy day unhooking, measuring and releasing fish. Something nobody ever complains about even when it is hectic on deck with multiple fish flopping around and more waiting for the net.

When there was a lull in the action we decided to go on the troll, covering more ground and it paid off in short time. With one umbrella rig out rigged with tubes and one bunker spoon we soon had fish on. At first it was blues but then we homed in on where the bass were. Again we had many shorts but after switching to both rods running tube rigs we quickly started picking up some bigger fish.

The bluefish were just gorging themselves on sand eels that must have been carpeting the sea floor. I have never seen blues with their stomachs so extended. The bass were getting in on the feast as well as they too had full stomachs of sand eels. It is amazing how much they can fit in their stomachs…this is the contents of a smaller 4-5 pound bluefish.

At the end of the day everyone had sore arms and big smiles. We ended up keeping 9 blues but released dozens of fish. We also had about 15 stripers and kept two for the table. It was a beautiful fall day on the water with calm flat seas, good friends and plenty of fish.

I had no particular plan except to spend the day on the water. I wish I could have planned on targeting stripers but when I broke the inlet and was created to 64 degree water and the sun was just coming up I figured that would be a lost cause. I marked water as warm as 67.2.

As I started running down the beach there was not a bird to be found except for migrating geese. I made a few quick stops along the way where we had fish last week but there was even a lack of bait on those structures. I continued south and started to mark bait and fish between Mantoloking and Ocean Beach.

There were a lot of boats working the area and all they were doing was working. I decided to drop down some gulp on a bottom style rig. Immediately had a double header of spike weakfish. With the small size of fish I decided to move on.

I setup again off Top of the Mast in 60′ of water and began catching 18-22″ weakfish. I setup on a bait rig and sent it down to see if there were any takers. I continued bail the weakfish and quickly had my limit. I had no takers on the live lined fish.

I stopped on a couple of inshore wrecks on the way in and had more weakfish and hoards of 11.5″ sea bass. I did have quite a few real strong hits that stripped the gulp bait right off a bait holder hook. Didn’t feel like blackfish…there was no tap, tap, wham! Just a single strong hit. Will probably make quick stops on those spots again this weekend to try and figure out what was down there.

Spoke to RTK and John on the radio (From Barnegat Fishin’ Hole)…sounded like they both had small bonito throughout the day. I trolled back to MI with only bluefish on the clark spoons. I would have though 6 kts was fast enough to avoid them, even increased to 6.8 and still picked up blues.

All in all it was a nice relaxing day on the water and fish in the box. Hopefully we will see a drop to normal temps, this 10+ degrees above normal is going to really kill the fall run. I hope the fish when they come south around LI don’t stay out far and pass us by

We decided to do a little scouting for a tournament we are in next week. Anthony and I headed out of Squan in the soup.

A blind man could have located bait. Although with very low visibility pretty much everyone was blind. Our first stop we could hear birds working and splashes but could not locate them in the fog (I had decided not go any shallower than 20-25′ when not able to see the shoreline). The bait was everywhere, I think in the 45+ nm we covered there were only about 3 nm that had no bait. It was on top with birds working it, blanketing the bottom suspended you name it we found. Unfortunately there were no bass working the schools.

We made several stops that had more promising marks on the sonar and jigged. Anthony had two hookups that soon dropped off. Once the fog started to lift a little more we gave up jigging and made the run to our intended destination. With flat seas we made good time at 28kts to our nest stop.

Once there we jigged a little with only a few hits decided to go on the troll. Trolled up the rocks, across, up to the cedars, along the west side of the reef and back down to the rocks. Had one nice knockdown and boated two bluefish with Anthony dropping one boat side. He called it a graceful release or something like that but I wasn’t buying it.

On the way in we made a quick stop on some mussel beds but there were only short sea bass and blackfish. There were a lot of boats drifting and anchored bottom fishing the mussel beds and rocky bottom areas. There were also tons of pots and traps there which was suprising. I have never seen that many there but I guess with the pressure from Reef Rescue we will win the reefs back but lose some other productive bottom in the process.

It was a nice day on the water once the fog lifted. The fog definitely made for an uneasy run out but all in all it was good to be back in my home waters.