On the Water: Hurry and fish before summer ends
By the time you read this it will be August.
Hard to believe how quickly the time goes.
Speaking of going, the flounder action has been going south a little bit over the past week. The fish continue to be spread out along the ocean approaches much less densely than a few weeks ago. This, of course, means that you have to cover some turf to be able to put together a catch. Another complicating factor is that there seem to be more throwbacks (“throwback” refers to a fish that doesn’t meet the minimum size length so you have to “throw them back.” Thanks for the question!)
Still, though, despite the fact that some boats haven’t seen a flounder over the past week some folks are still managing a catch. Capt. Rick Yakimowicz on the all-day headboat out of Fisherman’s Wharf in Lewes said that he has had fairly steady flounder fishing over the past week, though conditions have sometimes made things tough.
“There have been times this week that it’s been painfully slow,” the savvy skipper said. “With the sweltering summer heat and lack of wind to keep the boat drifting it can be tough.”
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Conditions weren’t bad enough to not have some anglers rack up some impressive catches. Capt. Rick passed along that fishermen Marc Levinrad and Jeff Scurti teamed up on a five-day marathon session to land over 50 keepers between them, with several fish in the 3-5-pound range. Father and son duo Roger and Nick Farr from Haymarket, Virginia, fished two days and boated 14 keepers with fish up to 4 pounds.
Capt. Rick also revealed that the most successful anglers on his trips are still utilizing an “aggressive jigging” approach. By keeping your bucktail laced with either a Gulp! bait or pennant of cut bait from a sea robin or dogfish shark bouncing up and down on the bottom the flounder can be tempted to strike.
The best flounder action continues to come from the shipping approaches in the Atlantic Ocean. Sadly, despite the fact that some fish can be caught by those willing to pay the cost in lost tackle to reef sites, large swaths of the Delaware Bay that played host to summer flounder are now barren. That goes for many other of the fish species as well, with a real scarcity of bottom fish that are summer staples such as hardheads. Even bunker have been in scarce supply.
Tuna, however, have not been, and some good catches have still been coming to folks chunking along the 20-fathom lumps. Capt. Carey Evans on the Lewes charterboat Grizzly passed along a good catch of eight yellowfins from a recent trip to Masseys. If you can time the trip to a weekday instead of the more crowded weekends that’s certainly the way to go!
It really is August, complete with the sounds of crying seagulls and crying children on the boardwalk, and the crowd around the arcades. But harken closely — soon; very soon, under the backdrop of the August cicadas you can hear a whisper of the first katydid’s call, telling us summer’s gone. So fish while you can! Good luck and good fishing.
Comments, questions or reports to captjackrodgers@comcast.net