Hooking a big fish surprisingly close to shore.

Conventional wisdom says that in order to hook-up with really big fish off the south shore of Long Island you need to go out to the “canyons” or the edge of the continental shelf, which is 90-100 miles offshore.

Rich and Geoffrey discuss tactics.

But we discovered to our delight that there are big fish within 20 miles of the south fork of eastern Long Island, including Bluefin tuna and really big sharks.

We set out for a trip with our local shark-fishing expert Rich Iaccarino from Center Moriches running on "Two Docs" out of Hampton Bays. The trip started with trolling for bait outside the Shinnecock inlet, and we hooked up with a “slammer blue” shortly after dropping an umbrella rig 15 minutes into the trip. We added some bunker into the live-well, and headed out to sea.

Preparing the bait.

The first step was to set up the chum slick – a 5 gallon bucket with bluefish and bunker parts design to attract sharks using their amazingly keen sense of smell in the water. 

The line set-up consisted of three shark rigs, spaced about 30 yards apart and supported by red, white and blue balloons in honor of the fourth of July weekend. Rich told us we would most likely find blue sharks, short-fin mako sharks or thresher sharks.

After drifting in a nearly non-existent wind, we saw one of the balloons start to move. It wasn’t a hard strike like a tuna, but a much slower hook-up.

Rob tries his hand with the fish on.

We weren’t sure what we had on the line for quite a while, until the fish “showed color” near the surface, but it felt like we had a truck on the other end of the line as we began the fight. This was the start of a nearly two and half-hour battle with what turned out to be a thresher shark.

Thresher sharks have one of the most dangerous tails in the ocean. It has evolved a deadly hunting tactic to kill its prey with its tail. Using whip-like motion know as “tail smacking” it can stun or kill its prey, including bluefish and smaller tuna.

As the fish got closer to the boat, “the dance” started: forward, back, circle right, circle left in order to keep the fish behind and to the side of the boat, avoiding the props and a chance to cut the line. Fast and accurate driving from our skipper kept the fish behind the boat and out of harm’s way. 

A pleasant distraction during the fight was a school of Atltantic Bluefin tuna that shot up behind the boat chasing bait with great vigor, the closest to shore ever we had seen this species!

 

Persistence paid off as we boated the fish, which tipped the scale at 320 pounds at the Oakland’s Marina scale later that afternoon. An epic battle indeed, and a trip we’ll be discussing for the foreseeable future. 

 

Largemouth Bass on the Bite in NYC

Some of the best fresh water fishing in New York City is located in an unassuming park on Staten Island name Silver Lake. The park was originally created as Staten Island's response to Manhattan's Central Park and Brooklyn's Prospect Park.

The lake in its current form was created in 1917 when water was piped in to fill it from the Ashokan Reservoir in Ulster County, NY. The original Silver Lake was a spring-fed body of water formed at the end of the ice age, and now makes up the southern basin of the reservoir at the site. The lake was originally called Fresh Pond, but by the middle of the 19th Century the name Silver Lake had come into use.

The striking thing about this lake and the surrounding park in comparison to Central Park or Prospect Park is the lack of people and abundance of wildlife, including ducks, geese and plenty of fish. The lake bottom is rock and the water is very clear. We started the day throwing lures but then switched to night crawlers and quickly hooked up with some sunfish and small bass.

But the real fun started when we spotted some large bass near the east side of the lake. The period of the spawn is one of the hardest times to catch bass, as when they are on their nest they are not feeding.

What they are doing is defending their nursery. So we tried throwing some soft plastics using a basic "Texas Rig" - piercing the hook point into the nose of worm and moving it back laying the hook to the side of worm to keep it straight and weed-free.

It took some time a patience to sight-fish the bass and eventually put the bait near the fish enough times to cause to strike. This happened at an amazing speed and the payout was well worth the effort.

As is the case in all NYC parks the fishing is catch-and-release, which we did, but only after a few quick snap shots of the fish.

Blue Fin Tuna at the Coimbra Wreck

At 3:00 AM on a foggy morning back in 1942 the 423' British tanker Coimbra was plying the waters about 60 miles south of Long Island when a German U-Boat torpedo slammed into her. This unlucky ship was just the second eastern seaboard victim of the WW II battle of the North Atlantic.

Today the Coimbra still lies in the three sections she was blown into. Her bow is facing east, mid section is leaning to port and her stern rests on its side. The wreck is located 64 miles southeast of Jones inlet in 180-190 feet of water. And it has become an artificial reef that is a magnet for bait fish and blue fin tuna.

Upon arriving at the wreck site you can see a sheen from the oil that the ship is still leaking. But it is the Blue Fin Tuna action that is the main attraction. Trolling or dropping bait seems to work equally well at this location. 

It was ballyhoo with a new skirt that attracted the attention of this Blue Fin on the right one morning in July. 

And dropping bait is effective - large squid work really well, as evidenced by this 
160 lbs.monster taken at the wreck. 

This fish took over two hours to land, "showing color" after the fierce first hour, then coming and going back down over a dozen times before it was landed.

A memorable spot indeed!
 

Six weeks and counting - until the opening of the NYS stripped bass season on 4/15/93.

42" Striped Bass taken 5/10/12

Some amazing spring bass action on the "Two Docs III" out of Hampton Bays, NY. The better part of the day was spent hunting for bunker in the Peconic Bay.

Windy conditions made it impossible to find the schools of bunkerin the bay, so we headed up the Peconic River near Riverhead, NY and found the bunker.

Later that day we dropped a live bunker in the Shinnecock inlet and thought we had snagged on the bottom when this monster turned up. Hope this is a good omen for the coming season.

Interesting lesson in catching rainbow trout today at Evergreen Lake - located about 30 miles west of Denver in the foothills of the Rockies with my nephew.

After deciding against the really expensive local trout fishing outfitter - Blue Quill Anglers -  we opted for a walk around this scenic lake and met an angler who employed hand tied streamers along with "Rainbow Tough Bubble" to get down 15-20' deep about 30 feet off shore to where the fish were sitting.

Amazing to see this technique land a fish on nearly every cast. He was happy to share his approach with several of us who were having no luck, turning our afternoon into a great outing.

The Striped Bass are Back!

An old salt fisherman from the east end of Long Island once told me a sure sign that the striped bass are back is when the dandelions start to bloom. I saw a bunch of them in Central Park this morning.

So hopes springs eternal that this season will be much better than last for the striped bass - and I think I will head down to the East River with some blood worms this weekend, to try my luck behind Gracie Mansion. Here's to a great 2012 season!