The Fishing Line: June’s Jewels, A Wide Array

Father’s Day has come and gone, graduations over, and vacations have begun; just in time to get in on some great fishing.
Grassy Sound Marina reports a Grand Slam on homemade bucktail and herring at slack tide. Chip Gruff, Anglesea, and Steve Wunder, Court House, had a 7 pound flounder, striper, bluefish, and weakie behind Stone Harbor. Now that’s a fun day.
The Caterbone Crew, Lititz, Pa., caught 6 keepers to 21 inches near the Stone Harbor toll bridge on minnows, outgoing tide and Tom Luke, Philadelphia, caught 3 keepers to 23 inches in Jenkins Channel. Joe Quirk, Philadelphia, caught 2 keepers fishing a shallow area near the N. Wildwood bridge with minnows, outgoing tide. Joe Hughes, Pittsgrove, caught 2 keepers on artificial squid fishing Hereford Inlet.
Fishing off the Grassy Sound Pier, Rich Jones, Plymouth Meeting, Pa. caught a 32 inch striper on herring and Isabella White, Woodbury, caught an 18 inch flounder, outgoing tide on squid.
Sterling Harbor reports weakfishing excellent around the jetties, Cape May Point, and Higbee Beach using pink Finesse fish, pink Zooms, and bloodworms. (Please take care of this valuable resource and release fish carefully.) There are kingfish being caught along the beach fronts and croakers at the Point. Striped bass are also around the jetties and inlets and a few are still being caught off the North Wildwood beaches. The back bay flounder fishing has been fair with drum fishing still worth the effort in the Delaware Bay. Nice sea bass being caught at the wrecks from 10 to 30 miles out.
Shark fishing has kicked in. Angler Bob “What about Bob” McCormick of Pottstown, Pa., boated a 238 pound Mako while fishing on Capt. Joe Gillen’s boat “Y-Knot” out of Wildwood. The crew also released three smaller Makos, four blue sharks, and three dusky sharks.
It was another great week of fish for fly and spin anglers with weakfish dominating the action. According to Captain Ray, chartreuse/white clouser flies fished on sinking line worked on all species and for the spin anglers, jig head with gulp mullet was very effective. While fishing in the ocean, they also caught bluefish, sea herring and a few fluke. Near the end of the week Ray started to see smaller weakfish with one trip catching over 30 which is reminiscent of the good old days. Fish were released.
Ray says the best striper action was in the back bay waters in 2 to 3 feet of water during low light hours in the evening. No keepers where caught in the back but he had good numbers and catching them on popping flies was really exciting as the fish come up and hit them like a missile. They did catch one large cow nosed ray that almost stripped out a small spin reel before they could follow after it.
Captain Dan Schafer, Stone Harbor, left the dock with Chris late one morning to scope out the backwater for sheepshead and the reliable tog spawning bit. Our first stop had double hook ups with tog in the 4 to 6 pound range before the tide turned and they dispersed. They headed to our outgoing tide areas and found fish on the low lying structure. Dan dropped down, worked the crab tipped jig through the current and hooked a giant. Bass. He’s guessing it was somewhere in the upper 30 to 40 pounds. Dan had her on for a good 3 or 4 minutes before he put a little too much pressure on the fish and she was gone but he says he discovered a new technique and a new hang for that full grown fish that he’ll definitely be hitting up in the future.
NEWS: Project P.O.R.T.S. – Promoting Oyster Restoration Through Schools, is an education and community-based oyster restoration program that helps revitalize oyster beds in the Delaware Bay. Your help is needed this Saturday, 12:30 p.m., Green Creek, arranging bags on sand flats during low tide. Be prepared to get wet and muddy; closed-toed shoes required; long pants recommended. If you can help contact Shane Godshall at 856-825-2174 or Lisa Calvo at 440-4560.
Send your reports and pictures to cmiller@cmcherald.com. Column and pictures are posted online at www.capemaycountyherald.com. Let’s go fishing!