The Fishing Line: Hot August Nights

It’s all good on the water right now. Fish are coming in from every favorite spot: bay, beachfront, docks, rips, and reefs.
Captain Mike on the Cape Queen has had some exciting trips. He took John Eastman and sons Elliott and Andre, Dan Eastman, Tom Vaccara, and Rich Barton out for a 6-hour Inshore Shark trip. They had fun battling and releasing 4 sharks ranging in size from 125 to 275 pounds. Next morning Tom Abode and group went for a 6-hour combo bottom fishing, inshore trolling trip. They caught and threw back over 100 sea bass and were able to get 2 Mahi up 5 pounds. Mathew Abode, 11, from Stewartville, had his first ever Mahi. He and his brother Tommy also caught small bluefish and some Frigate mackerel. The trip with Bryan Hargett and party brought back a mixed bag of bluefish, weakies, kingfish and some short flounder.
Sterling Harbor had good reports from the Wildwood Reef late in the week. Bill Stewart and crew of Swedesboro, had a good catch of flounder with fish up to 5 pounds. Fluke catches have also been reported from the Cape May Reef, Reef Site 11 and the Old Grounds. Suzanne and Ken Smith Philadelphia, PA and Scott Pierce of Drexel Hill, PA reported 15 keeper flounder up to 6 pounds while drifting Reef Site 11.
Offshore fishing has been great with white marlin, yellowfin and Bluefin, and mahi-mahi being caught in and around the canyons while trolling, jigging and chunking. There was a good big-eye tuna bite in the Wilmington Canyon late in the week. Ken Freeman and crew of Upper Black Eddy, Pa., had four bluefin tuna to 90 pounds while chunking sardines at the Hambone and Jamie Neill of Rio Grande, landed his first ever bluefin tuna while jigging at Massey Canyon. Joe Cannon of Boyertown, Pa., reported a big white marlin caught while trolling the Wilmington Canyon.
Over at Grassy Sound Marina black drum and sheepshead are being caught in the back, and some nice bluefish are coming off the pier. Croakers and loads of short flounder with some nice ones reaching 6 pounds are coming in. Jake Andre, 8, N. Wildwood, had a 25 inch, 5 pound, 8 ounce flounder on minnows & squid behind North Wildwood, bottom of the outgoing. Bob March, Mullica Hill, managed to pull a 34.5 inch striper from the Grassy Sound Pier using bunker at dead low tide.
For fly anglers like Captain Ray, Tide Runner, Cape May, schoolie size stripers seem to be the only show in town as bluefish seem nowhere to be found and weakfish tend to be small. With the warm days it’s best to fish low light either predawn, sunset or at night. Ray saw an influx of better size stripers, more in the 22 to 25 inch range. He managed one nice 31 incher that was released. Floating line, using a Steroid Gurgler produced best with chartreuse/white clouser flies coming in second. For the spin anglers popping plugs worked just as well.
Looking for a day trip? The Royal Flush is sailing three trips a day and catching flounder, weak fish, king fish, snapper blues, croakers and trigger fish and the 4-hour Starlight has been catching a good mix finding kingfish, blues, weakfish, flounder and on some trips, croakers.
NEWS: Recognizing the popularity of spearfishing and that “spear gun hunters” routinely harvest fish that equal or exceed current marine state records, the NJDEP Division of Fish and Wildlife created a new Spearfishing category in the State Record Fish Program. The spearfishing category will recognize spear fishers who have obtained a level of proficiency that allows them to harvest exceptional specimens. For more information www.njfishandwildlife.com/news/2014/recfish-spearfishing.htm
CALENDAR: Mid-Atlantic 500,000, Cape May, Aug. 17-22, www.midatlantic500000.com for details.
The Fishing Line runs year round so keep sending your reports and pictures to cmiller@cmcherald.com. Column and pictures (many which do not make it into the print edition) are posted online at www.capemaycountyherald.com and on Facebook. Check out www.epektales.com for info on Miller’s book, “Counting the Fish in the Sea: the Story of the NEAMAP Trawls.”