The Fishing Line: And the fishing is easy…

Here we are in the first weeks of August, and the weather, fishing and crabbing are as good as Frank (Frank’s Boats) has seen them for this time of year.
The flounder fishing is still high in numbers, but not a lot of keepers being caught. Boats will catch anywhere from ten to thirty fish in a four hour trip, and if they are lucky, they will have a keeper or two in the mix.
Minnows, gulp and spearing (in that order) are the baits to use. Crabbing has been good to very good, especially for this time of year. Boats are bringing in anywhere from two dozen to four dozen crabs or more in a half day outing.
For every keeper crab in your basket, you will probably release five to ten small ones, so just imagine the action you and your family will have!
Stripers are being caught during the day using eels or chunking with clams or bunker. Casting and retrieving poppers at dusk and dawn are also producing stripers.
Kingfish are in the surf and have been caught mostly on bloodworms and fish bites.
Frank recommendsIf taking the kids crabbing. There are two ways to crab, one is with handlines and the other is with traps. He recommends handlines because they are less expensive, and more interactive and fun; however, young children might be better off with traps.
Some customers will bring chicken along for bait, which is ok, but Frank’s Boats recommends using bunker. If you are using chicken, be sure to have at least one piece of bunker over at all times, because it is an oily fish and helps to draw the crabs in to the other baits.
Captain Ray is still finding some stripers along the inlet rocks and the back bay for fly and spin anglers.
In the back, Smack-it-Jr popping plugs have produced the best for plug anglers and spearing type flies are working for the fly anglers.
Along the beachfront the fluke action has been very good using 1/4 ounce jig heads and gulp 4 inch mullet with one 4 hour trip catching 92 fluke.
Fly anglers were doing equally as well using lime green jiggie and clouser flies with sinking line along the bottom. One young angler using very light tackle had a big thrill hooking and catching a Cow Nose Ray that pulled drag all over the place.
Over at Grassy Sound Marina there are still lots of flounder being caught in the Grassy Sound area and Hereford Inlet. The larger fish seem to be moving toward the inlet.
Sea bass, kingfish, trigger-fish, and the occasional croaker are also being caught.
Joe Scull, Millville, caught approx 60 flounder mostly during outgoing tide with one 19-inch flounder at the top of the tide near the Stone Harbor toll bridge using minnows. He reports the flounder were caught on the top hook of the hi-lo rigs.
Five-year-old Victoria Haitz, Medford, caught 2 flounder on her first boat trip. She also caught 4 keeper crabs.
Jim Mooers, Grassy Sound Marina, caught a 60-pound yellowfin tuna fishing the tip of the Baltimore Canyon on the Hands Off using ballyhoo. Hundreds of finback whales were seen on the trip. (Hey, Jim, where are the pictures?)
Sterling Harbor reports flounder are being caught at the Cape May Reef, Wildwood Reef, Reef Site 11 and the Old Grounds. And also near the Inlets, the mouth of the Delaware Bay and the Rips. Croakers are showing up near the mouth of the Delaware Bay.
Schoolie stripers can be caught in the back-bays near bridges, docks and sod banks with surface poppers, soft plastics or clam bait, mainly in the early mornings or evenings.
Tuna are scattered from the Spencer Canyon south and there was a solid tuna bite north of the Spencer all the way to the Hudson Canyon. Both blue and white marlin are being caught on a regular basis at the Canyons.
Capt. Bob McCormick released an estimated 400-pound blue marlin from the Spencer Canyon and also released a bull shark while trolling on his boat “Happy Our.”
Save Barnegat Bay! Critical Hearing Aug. 12. Overdevelopment, polluted runoff and destruction of natural habitats are killing one of the most valuable and unique estuaries of New Jersey. Proposed legislation will create laws that limit pollutants impacting the Bay; help correct past mistakes and help limit future degradation from new sources: Reduce Fertilizer pollution (S1411/A2290); protect healthy soils (S1410/A2501); clean up polluted runoff (S1815/A2577); make sure new development helps clean up the Bay, not add to its destruction (S1856/A2606)
There are 3 things you can do: Call NJ Legislators and the Governor, attend the hearing Thursday, Aug. 12, Call Ocean County Freeholders 732-244-2121 or SBruno@co.ocean.nj.us If they pass legislation to save Barnegat Bay maybe someone will look into the growing problems in our back-bays.
Send your fish stories and photos to cmiller@cmcherald.com. All photos submitted appear online at SeeMyBigFish.com.