Article by Rick Willman
Hi folks! I hope everyone had a great Holiday weekend! The waters had a makeover, at least for the weekend. The surface was painted with boats of all sizes, styles, and colors. There was a whole lot of fishing going on, but it seems there was not nearly enough catching going on.
We had a few flatties brought in to be weighed, but just not the numbers we all would hope for. Maybe the amount of boat traffic really put a damper on things. For those folks scoring some flounder, the preferred baits continued to be a minnow/squid combo, frozen shiners, Gulp! and smelt.
If you are fishing the Gulp!, you may want to try threading the bait onto a jighead and bouncing it off the bottom. You can also use a bucktail jig to accomplish this. I think some of the best advice I could give is to find a drop-off or slough where there is little or no boat traffic and give that area an honest try. The fish seem to be really scattered about in the Rehoboth and Indian River Bays.
Bluefish continue to invade the Inlet and back bays. If you see the birds working, try to get as close to the area as possible without going into the school of fish. Throw a shiny spoon or a small bucktail, with or without meat, and you should be in for some fun times.
Ocean fishing has also been a bit slow as the tog have not realized the season is open again and they are supposed to be eating green crabs and sand fleas. Guys anchoring up on structure are reporting some light bites and a few tog, but not the activity expected. Sea bass and flounder action has been best between the DB Buoy and DA Buoy, with the better being near DA Buoy.
Offshore action has been full of hit or miss tuna activity at Massey’s Canyon and the Hambone, Hot Dog and Sausages areas. Yellowfin action has been in the Poor Man’s and Baltimore Canyons. Dolphin have been picked up at all locations, including a few being trolled up just east of the Delaware Lightship.
A few of the week’s weigh-ins included Shane Weist and his dad, Bill, trolling the Hambone to quickly score a 57 lb. bluefin on the ”Five4Fighting”. John Faren scored a 9 lb. 4 oz. flattie while drifting the Old Grounds. Mike Smith fooled a 4 lb. 12 oz. flounder in the Indian River Inlet using Gulp!. David Moses fished the surf at 3R’s Road early in the morning to score some flounder and bluefish. Richard Cordy scored a 5 lb. 9 oz. flattie fishing the Old Grounds. Ron Hildenbrand nailed a 3 lb. 8 oz. flounder from the back bay. Lori Nickler tricked a 2 lb. 13 oz. flattie. Jack Steward fished Massey’s Landing to score an 8 lb. 9 oz. bluefish on a Rick’s Chicken/minnow combo.
On the boat “Black Dog”, Tony Dambro and Bill Kommer trolled the Hot Dog to score dolphin weighing up to 20 lbs.
Time is running out to get signed up for the Rick’s Bait & Tackle/Sea Side Gas & Grill Inshore Tournament. The contest runs from July 17 through July 24 at 4:00 PM. The tournament includes flounder, bluefish, sea bass and croaker. A prize of $200 is awarded to the heaviest fish in each category. The entry fee is $25 per person and deadline is 10 PM on July 16th. On the evening of July 24th, when prizes are awarded, we will have a blast as the well-known blues band, “Pork Roll Project” will be performing at Sea Side Gas & Grill. Don’t miss out on all the fun!
From Bill’s Sport Shop in Lewes, we heard that Tom Flickenger fished east of the Hot Dog and went 4 for 7 on sharks. The party kept a 110 lb. mako, and released 2 hammerheads and a thresher. Tim King was fishing the back bay of the Indian River and caught 3 keeper flounder up to 5 lbs. on minnows. Chuck Nagle caught 3 flounder up to 20-inches at Massey's Landing on a Gulp! Natural Eel. Tom Bailor, with his brother Frank and son Mike, caught their limit of 2 bushels of nice fat crabs using a trot line with chicken necks near Gull Point, where crabbing is excellent!
Walt and Sharon Donaldson fished an artificial reef at Site #11 on their boat, the "No Rulez". Using clams for bait, they caught some nice keeper size black sea bass. Dawn Olah and Brian Palmer from Baltimore fished the Cape Henlopen Pier with minnows and came away with 2 keeper flounder up to 22-inches with close to a dozen throwbacks. Steve Johnson from Lebanon, PA caught a 3.25 lb., 21-inch flounder at Cape Henlopen Pier using squid.
On Friday, Charlie Helmer of the “Tranquila” had a sea bass trip to Site 11 and caught fish pretty steadily with 6 keepers, along with a 22-inch flounder. On Saturday, the crew went to the Baltimore Canyon and found some life in 70 fathoms, on the East Wall of the notch. We caught a 50 lb. yellowfin, a 20 lb. dolphin, a 5 lb. dolphin and raised a white marlin. According to Charlie, fishing is heating up and should be a good year offshore.
Henlopen Bait & Tackle reported croaker and spot at the Henlopen State Park Pier. There were also croaker and flounder found in the Delaware Bay close to Lewes. Megen Jobs of Middletown, DE tricked a 7 lb. flattie to earn a citation.
Ron at Rattle & Reel Sporting Center on Long Neck Road informed us that the outer wall at Lewes in full of triggerfish. There are so many triggers that it’s difficult to get your bait down to the tog. Flounder in the back bays are being caught using a minnow on a bucktail or jighead. You may also want to try tipping your jig with Gulp!.
Capt. Joe Morris at Lewes Harbour Marina said that bluefins made a good showing during the week. A few boats found tuna mid-week along the inside edge of twenty fathoms from the 275 to 300 lines. Structure changes between that area and the South Paw also produced bluefins. By Saturday, there was quite a fleet working the fish. Boats on the grounds at daybreak had the best success, before traffic drove tuna down. Traditional trolled lures like cedar plugs and Green Machines accounted for numbers of bites, but when conditions permitted, ballyhoos skirted with heavy Jag lures and various other witches pulled way back tempted the biggest tuna. Drone spoons or ballyhoo towed behind a #32 planer got bit when tuna were deep.
When tuna move toward the bottom due to numerous boats driving overhead, or bright daylight, offers a good opportunity to jig for the fish. Tuna will respond with a reactive strike to Butterfly and other flutter-style jigs when they won’t take a trolled offering close to the surface. Savvy skippers cruise the area with eyes on the depth finder looking for tuna marks in the lower part of the water column. When fish are spotted, jigs are dropped to the proper depth, and often result in immediate hookups. Jigs can also be utilized to attract other bites while fighting fish hooked on the troll. Many times, there will be other tuna traveling with the one that ate a trolled bait, and pitching a jig when a fish is hooked trolling, may result in another hookup.
Dolphin were mixed in throughout the same area where bluefins were located. On Saturday, the guys on the “Port-A-Bella” returned with one bluefin and 3 mahi. “Jam-Man’s” crew put a nice bluefin in the box. The group aboard the “Reel Tease” ended up with a 65 lb. bluefin and a 15 lb. dolphin on Saturday. The “Big Herring” brought in a 70-pounder.
Ocean bottom fishermen had success with flounder while drifting around the Old Grounds. Jigging Spro Bucktails or drifting strips of cut meat, such as mackerel, were effective. Eddy Corado checked in a 5.8 lb. flattie that he caught on the “Tranquila”. Angelo Delapo decked a citation winning 7.82 pounder at Reef Site 10. In the Delaware Bay, good numbers of flounder were located in the Cape May Channel, west of Prissy Wicks Shoal. The keeper-to-throwback ratio was pretty decent. Patrons aboard the “Angler” headboat kept nice fluke on Saturday’s six-hour trip. Guys who know how to properly work the artificial structures in the bay pulled a few flatties from Reef Sites 5, 6, 7 and 8.
Flounder remain in the Lewes Canal and the shallow water along Lewes Beach. Anglers continue to sing the praises of Gulp! artificials for catching flounder. Berkley’s claim that “Gulp! outfishes all other bait”, just may be true. Joe Shaffer fished the pier at Massey’s Landing on Saturday, where he scored a pair of legal fluke. One was a whopping 7.19 lb. doormat.
The summer tautog season opened on July 1st. Toggers told of good catches along the rocks of the Outer Wall and Ice Breakers, while using sand fleas and green crabs. Blackfish also hung out on wrecks and reefs. Numerous triggerfish were mixed in with tog on hard bay structure. Sand fleas, shrimp and clams on small hooks tempted triggers. July 1st also marked the start of the slot season for striped bass, when rockfish between 20 and 26-inches may be kept from Delaware Bay and its tributaries. Slot rock were reported from the Lewes Canal by fishermen using pencil eels and clams around the drawbridge. Boaters casting RatLTraps and Bombers at the Ice Breakers landed linesiders during evening and nighttime tides. Spot and small croakers were hooked from the Cape Henlopen and Cape Shores piers by folks using bloodworms and Fishbites. Boats anchored west of the Star Site picked at a mix of spot, small croakers, kingfish and blowfish while baiting with bloodworms.
Until next week, have fun and be safe!
Rick and his wife Deb are owners of Rick’s Bait & Tackle in Long Neck, DE.
