Article by Larry Jock
With most of the focus on the White Marlin Open last week, there wasn’t a whole lot of other action offshore, but in the bays and on ocean structure, the flattie bite just keeps rolling along.
White Marlin Open
A big congratulations goes out to the crew on the “Fish Whistle” out of Indian River who took home a check for $55,460 for their 1st place finish in the Winner Take All - Heaviest Tuna Division for boats under 36-feet. Stephen Schwing reeled in the 58 1/2 lb. yellowfin after hooking it on a trolled ballyhoo in the Wilmington Canyon on the 4th day of the tournament. It’s a good thing they made the last minute decision to get into the category. The $1,000 gamble really paid off for some great guys!
Marlin
Outside of the tournament, there’s not a lot to report. The tournament saw a load of white marlin hooked (961) but only one made the qualifying weight of 70 lbs. Most of the white marlin are still being caught deep outside the canyons in 1,000 to 1,500 fathoms. There were 39 blue marlin hooked in the tournament, but none hit the 500 lb. mark needed to qualify.
Tuna
Tuna... what tuna? When the chunking bite died around the Hot Dog, we stopped seeing any meaningful catches of yellowfin tuna, and it continued that way last week. Bert at Hook’em & Cook’em said that outside of the “Fish Whistle” catch, nothing else showed up at Indian River Marina.
Dolphin
We are starting to see increased action for anglers catching dolphin in the canyons. Good numbers of mahi are being hooked with some big bulls thrown in the mix by anglers trolling ballyhoo or lures in the Baltimore, Poor Man’s and Washington Canyons.
Tilefish
Bert also reported seeing an increase in the number of boats returning with both blueline and golden tilefish. Most of the boats he is seeing are returning from trips deep in the Baltimore Canyon.
Flounder
Flounder fishing in the Indian River Inlet continues to be scattered, with fish being caught both from the rocks and from boats. Anglers having the best luck are fishing with live spot, Gulp! artificial baits or with big minnows.
The headboat, “Capt. Bob” out of Indian River had several good days of flounder fishing on ocean structure, especially on Sunday, with several anglers catching their limit with a few sea bass sprinkled in for good measure. The key was getting a good drift.
Joe Morris at Lewes Harbour Marina said that flounder continue to be found on ocean structure as well as in the Delaware Bay. Reef 8, the Star Site, yielded many flatties last week. The slower moving parts of either the ebb or flood tides were the most productive. Presentation was the key, and as long as the drift allowed offerings to stay in the strike zone, baits got bit. Bucktails or short leadered bottom rigs tipped with squid and shiners, smelts or Gulp! were effective. Live spot also worked well.
Anglers on the “Grizzly” had a great day on Saturday, returning with 27 keeper flounder in the box with fish weighing up to 6 lbs. The “Top Fin” had 13 flounder on Saturday and topped it off with 42 bluefish. Mid-week, the “Katydid” captured 23 flatties in the morning and followed that up with another 20 during the afternoon. The “Katydid” hit the 600 keeper mark of the season with 29 flounder caught on Saturday.
Ocean structure also produced some really nice catches last week. The “Tranquila” put 14 nice flatties in the box while concentrating on bottom contours near “DA” Buoy. The Old Grounds, southeast of “DB” Buoy, along with reef sites 10 and 11, gave up fluke also. Anglers fishing in the Lewes Canal still managed to land some keeper flounder.
Striped Bass
Slot stripers were caught in Canary Creek on fresh cut bait or Storm Shads in addition to around the Lewes Canal Drawbridge on eels and lures.
Croakers
Bert reported that anglers fishing along the south side of the Indian River Inlet caught good numbers of 12 to 14-inch croaker on squid, clams and Fishbite bloodworms and clam strips. A few croaker were also found in the Indian River Bay.
Further north, Joe mentioned that bottom bouncers had plenty of croakers from inside and outside the Outer Wall and on the Star Site Reef. The size of the hardheads has increased with more measuring over 12-inches. Anglers were also catching spot, kingfish, puffers and numerous weakfish along with the croakers.
Bluefish
In the Delaware Bay, snapper bluefish were found under birds around the Outer Wall and on the Star Site Reef where they were munching on silversides and bay anchovies. Bottom rigs, tossed bucktails or metal rigs all did the trick.
In the Surf
As in weeks past, surfcasters are mainly finding Norfolk spot, kingfish and a lot of bluefish in the surf. Those looking for bigger fish have been kayaking cut baits from the shoreline at night and hooking into some larger sharks.
Until next week, tight lines!
