Mondays are my day off from Connecticut Outfitters so I was going fishing today, regardless of the forecast. Although it was forecast to gust to 25, it was going to be ou of the north, the chop wouldn’t be too bad. Justin and I left the docks in Niantic at 6 and headed out to see if we could find some stripers first. We had no problem jigging up a mess of porgy for bait. We were in about 25 feet of water, with the wind cranking strong, we had a hard time keeping the jigs down on the bottom. Even with the trolling motor helping out, it was a pain. We got a quick dozen or so porgy and headed out to a little deeper water.  Unfortunately, the bluefish were right where I had left them on Saturday. We went through our bait in short order and decided to start hunting for albies…

I had a hunch that they’d be along Fishers Island. We stayed tight to the south shore in an attempt to stay out of the worst of the wind. The conditions were much better there. There was still a huge swell coming in from the open ocean from what was left of hurricane Igore but it was not a problem to fish in. It was pretty cool watching the waves pile up along the shore line…

It wasn’t long before we found what were looking for… The birds were in a frenzy and the albies were tearing through the pods of bait. Justin started with a Deadly Dick and I used a 95mm Sebile Magic Swimmer. We both hooked up right away 

With as many birds as we have working the pods of bait, we seem to tangle with at least one every trip. Today was no different. This time though, instead of a bird flying into my line, the gull actually dove and grabbed my Sebile. I managed to hook him right in the beak. He was PISSED! With a wind blowing at 20, the bird had the upper hand for a few minutes, pulling drag better than any albie I have hooked. It was a lot like flying a kite. I eventually got him to the boat andwas able to quickly send him on his way.

We hammered away at the albies, putting a bunch in the boat. As usual, the boat looked like a crime scene in no time at all. The albies were puking up anchovies all over the boat. The deck felt like skating rink…

During the melee, we were  unhooking fish as quickly as possible to get the lures back in the water. It was bound to happen soon or later… I zigged and my albie zagged  and the next thing I knew I had on set of hooks stuck in my hand and an unhappy albie still attached to the second set… Sunofabitch! I manged to pin the albie to the deck with my knee and told Justin I could use a little help. Somehow he knew without looking what had happened. The first thing we did was get the lure and albie separated. The albie went on his way and we sat down to survey the situation. I had always heard about popping the hook back out with some pressure on the shank of the hook and snapping the hook backwards with some line wrapped around the bend of the hook. That was our only option… I cut a piece of fluorocarbon and looped it around the hook and told Justin what I wanted him to do… One, two, three, yank… I looked down to see the lure still stuck to my hand! Justin’s hands were wet still and the line slipped out of his hand. OK, dry the hands, rewrap the hook and let’s try it again. Second go around was much better. I tied my lure back on and got back in the game.

We boated a bunch more fish and I was able to play with my new toy. I recently purchased an underwater housing for my HD camera and was really looking forward to seeing what it could do. I have a few things to figure out but I was pretty happy with the initial results… See for yourself:

Here are few more pics from the morning…

Stroby and I launched at 3 this afternoon in search of stripers. The fishing has been so poor and the bluefish so thick that I haven’t actually targeted stripers in over a month now. The fall run should be setting up soon and I want to be there when it does. We took a ride in search of albies first, making our way through the Race, Ruins, Gut and then the Sluice Way. It was absolutely dead!  No birds, no bait… Until we got to the Gut. I think every bird in the Sound was there. The flock stretched across the entire width of the Gut. There were quite a few boats but everyone was jigging bluefish. There was very little surface action. We watched for a while hoping to see an albie pop but it was all blues.  On our way between the Gut and the Sluice, we stopped to jig some porgy to trade in for some bass. we found what we were looking for and headed east to the Sluice Way. The tide was cranking pretty good with drifts about 3.5MPH. We fished there for about a half an hour before running out of bait thanks to an endless supply of blues.

The sun was getting low on the horizon, so we decided to run to Bartlett’s, reload on porgy and try our luck there. The porgy were no problem, but the blues were. We went through a pack of hooks in the blink of an eye. Just before dark, my porgy started doing it’s typical death dance and then got thumped. This definitely was NOT the machine gun feel of a blue!  As soon as I was tight to the fish I knew I had a bass and a good one at that. Never got a weight, but she was 50″. It sure felt good to have a big fish in the boat again! That was it for bass…

It got dark and we moved off to Black Point hoping to get away from the blues. We switched from porgy to eels and hit my three favorite waypoints. There was an absolute TON of bait but, once again, the only fish around feeding were bluefish. We went through 6 or so eels and finally came to the realization that there just was no escape. We were back at the ramp around 9. That one bass made it all worth while, hopefully it’s a sign of things to come!

They were a bit late in showing this year but they are here now! I had been hearing some great reports from Montauk for close to a week now but they hadn’t made it to the eastern end of Long Island Sound yet and I was tired of waiting for them. Andrew, Jay and I left the ramp in the dark at 5 and made the 25 mile run to Montauk to get our albie fix. Boy, did we get our fix!  I have a fish counter that I hang around my neck to make it easy to keep track and by the time the day was done, we boated 101 albies!

There were lots of horror stories of all out combat fishing over the weekend. Luckily we avoided all of that. There were a few boats but we managed to find our own fish and for the most part had them to ourselves. Even when there were other boats nearby, everyone worked together. There were even guys out in kayaks that were hammering the fish.

Jay and Andrew stuck with the deadly Dicks for the most part and I used a Sebile Magic Swimmer. We had too many doubles to count and at least 6 triple hook ups. At one point, we had a grand slam on at the same time, a blue, a bass and an albie… The birds were thick all day and would really ball up tight when the fish pushed the bait up. We were treated to a great show on more than one occassion.

With birds and fish and fishermen working so close to together, it was inevitable that we’d snare a few birds along the way. I think we got 5 birds in the boat. All flew away unharmed… That is not the birds blood on the deck!

As we fished we kept setting new goals. We wanted to hit 50 at first… 9 am… What next? Let’s get 75… 11:45, now what? Can we really get 100? Number 100 came on board at 2:05.

Here is some video of the action:

We decide that once we hit 100 that we would pack up and head home and check some local waters. We made our way to the south side of Fishers Island and worked our way west towards the Race. We came across a couple of pods of albies that were almost as thick as what we left at Montauk. For whatever reason, these fish were pick. Jay ended up putting number 101 in the boat but that was the only local fish. We were all pretty beat by then and after the day we had just had, we didn’t feel like working for them anymore. We were back at the ramp just before 4. 80 miles and 101 albies…. Maybe that’s whay I feel like I was in a car wreck!

After Monday’s succes on the bonito, I was itching to go again. This time Andrew and Al joined me. We left Niantic at 5 and headed out to Block Island. We made the run in less than an hour and were fishing as the sun came up.

It took a while for things to get going. There was quite a bit of bait spraying out of the water, but no real sign of bonito under them. Most of what we saw was small bluefish tearing through the pods of bait. We had no action till a little after 7, then the surface activity started. The bones were spread outr and in small pods. They didn’t stay up for long, but when they happened to pop up within casting distance, we had hits. Andrew had the first couple in the boat.

The higher the sun got, the tougher it got. The water was like glass. Albies and bones feed much better when there is a little chop on the surface. We picked away at a few more. They were really chowing down the silver sides. It was tough to match such a small bait but I knew I had picked the right lure when I had 3 hits in 6 casts… A small Sebile Magic Swimmer was the key to the last few fish in the boat.

I needed to get back to Connecticut Outfitters for the afternoon shift so we had to start heading back by 10. It was a short trip, but as always, Block produced for us yet again!

With the striper fishing slow and the bluefish still too thick, I haven’t been very motivated to fish the salt much since returning from Manitoba. With some recent reports of Bonito along the Rhode Island coast, Josh and I decided to take a look today. We launched from Barn Island and began the search before 6. The plan was to head straight to Block. We had a pretty good idea of where they would be and decided to be patient and see if they would come to us for once.  There were other boats in the area, but they were all on the move while hunting and eventually faded into the distance. We were all alone…

It started slowly at first. A few birds began to congregate. A few silversides hopping across the surface and then…

The bonito were blowing up in small pods all around us. We threw a bunch of casts with Deadly Dicks into the mayhem but never got touched. After 10 minutes, we switched over to plastics and instantly had blow ups. I was throwing a pearl 5″ Houdini and Josh was using a Super Fluke. We both hooked up and were promptly cut off. We had plenty of action, but started the morning by going 0 for 5. Luckily, things improved after that… Josh boated the first one.

I  got the next one…

Things got blurry after that. There were fish blowing up all around us for close to an hour. We had numerous explosions and several more hook ups. In typical tunoid fashion, the boat looked like a crime scene when all was said and done.

Here is a short video of one of Josh’s fish:

Bonito steaks are marinating in the fridge for tomorrow’s dinner!

It’s that time of year again… The F%$#ing bluefish have moved in pretty thick, making it tough to get a good drift in. There are still bass here, we are seeing them on the Humminbird holding tight to the bottom. Our average of 10 quality bass a day is now down to 2 or 3. The good news is that there is still plenty of bait around…

Monday’s charter was with Chris and his dad, Tony. We managed only one good sized bass in the boat. Here are a couple of pics…

Yesterday, I had the crew from Bookfishingtrips.com again. I warned them of the fishing conditions but they wanted to give it a shot anyways. They were valiant in their fight against the bluefish and were eventually rewarded with 3 bass. None of them were worthy of taking the camera out in the nasty conditions we had…

Better days are ahead!

I guess the end result is all that really matters when the sun sets on Niantic Bay. I had the guys from Bookfishingtrips.com out again today. To say we got off to a slow start was an understatement. I haven’t been skunked (No, I don’t count bluefish) in over 7 years. By 8:30 we STILL hadn’t put a fish in the boat and I was getting a bit worried. The guys had a few chances but never got any of them to the boat. Around 8, we ran back inside for a fresh round of porgy. Luckily, they were cooperating and we were back out in short order. A new reef, a different tide and some lively baits, thing HAD to improve… Boy, did they!

In the next 2 hours, the guys put a dozen fish in the boat. There were a couple that went 44 and 43″ and the rest were all the cookie cutter 40 to 41″ range with a couple just under that. The bluefish were present but managable all morning, I only lost 8 hooks today… Did I mention how much I hate bluefish????

Here is some video of the guys:

Here are a few pictures from the mornings action:

Today’s charter had to cancel at the last minute, I hope you get well soon Larry! With today being my day off from CT Outfitters as well, I figured it would be a great day to get my son out on the boat. I agreed to let him sleep in till 5 but that was it… It felt weird driving down to the boat in broad daylight!

The fog was pretty thick on the water, so we stayed local. We had a tide change around 8 or so, so things didn’t really start happening for a while. That gave us time to poke around and load up on big scup. The first spot we tried has been hot lately but we only managed one in the boat and dropped another. BJ had the first of the morning…

We hammered away at the reef for a while, but it just wasn’t happening, so we moved on… The next reef was much better. We fished in about 30 feet and were marking a decent pile of fish on the front side of the hill. We either hooked up or had hits on just about every drift for the rest of the morning. BJ ended up with a few nice fish as did I…

I had a no show this morning, so I used the time to fish some new areas on my own. I headed a bit farther east than normal. There was plenty of bait, I had no trouble getting my legal limit of ten. I fished structure from 12 to as deep as 40 and found fish throughout. There were no huge concentrations of fish but the action was consistent, enough so that I will definitely be spending some more time with my charters in these areas. I fished from 5:30 till about 9:30 and put 6 fish in the boat. Overall, they were smaller than what we’ve been averaging but I was more than happy with the new spots.