Hit the back bay yesterday thanks to an invite from Adam. We met at the ramp at 5:30 and ran to our first spot. There were a few other boats in the area. We set our drift and began bouncing our offerings enticingly in hopes that a flounder would inhale them. The wind was against the tide early on which gave us a nice slow drift. We picked at flounder, but it was slow. Actually, to be more accurate, Tom, picked at the flounder. I caught the first dink, my only landed fish of the day. Adam got an oyster cracker, aka mother in law, then later, a small dink flounder. After a few drifts Tom pulled up a nice 19" keeper. We made a move and tried again. Tom landed another keeper at 17.25". We dropped a ton of fish too. We'd get hammered, have the fish on, then poof, gone. Or We'd get one big slam, then nothing. It was a very strange bite. They were also very picky with white being the color of choice. We were mostly using gulp on either bucktails or jigs. We tried bait here and there, but it didn't help. The other limiting factor was the abundance of snot grass. The turn of the tide didn't help either. We covered a lot of water in search of some keepers, but other than the two Tom landed, there were none for us. Talking with other guys on boats and at the ramp, it seems it was an off day all around. Maybe next time... Tight Lines!

Hit the surf today with high hopes given all the reports or striped bass and puppy drum being caught. Hit the sand shortly before six. It was chilly, but the sun was rising and warming things up. I decided not to bring my waders. I figured I'd be a tough guy and just wade out. Not my best choice on the day. Sixty degree water and fifty degree air do not a comfortable situation make. So I made it about knee deep before chickening out. I can cast pretty far, but given the nearly low tide, I was landing around the sandbar. Not being willing to wade through the gully, I just hoped for the best. Yeah, I should have brought the waders... I set up three rods and chased Idgie and Bubbalouie around while waiting for a bite. After a few minutes I noticed the rods were all bent over and slowly creeping down the beach. Never a good sign. I reeled in the first rod and it was covered in snot grass. So, I hauled them all in and just cast one back out after clearing all the snotty gunk. Rather than clam, I threw out some blood worms on a Brown Dog Bomb kingfish rig. I was rewarded with a doggie of meth. The damn thing fought like crazy. Then, once on the sand, proceeded to thrash it's tail about trying to beat me to death. I finally got the cretin under control and got the hook out. I assumed Idgie would give the shark what for, but she thought better of it. So back I tobthe waves it went. That was the only action I had all morning, besides the gobs of slimy grass. The guys on either side of me were having similar luck. And passersby gave me reports from up and down the beach of nothing but doggies being caught. Guess it just wasn't a striper sort of day. Tomorrow is another day. I got an invite to fish on a friend's boat bright and early (5am) for flounder. Hopefully we can find a few keepers. Lisa makes a killer Flounder dish. Milanese? Something like that. However it's spelled, it's awesomely delicious. Fingers crossed... Tight Lines!

Ran out with Chris in choppy conditions. Luckily his boat is a beast and pounded through the 2.5' to 4 footers. We were running some errands that will hopefully pay off later in the season. We also hit a pair of wrecks for sea bass. Suffice to say, we had the ocean to ourselves given the weather and conditions. The first wreck was in 80 feet and consisted of low lying structure. The water was 60 degrees and very clear. Which was a surprise. We dropped down jigs to start and the sea bass were willing takers. We were on as soon as the jigs hit the wreck. It was steady drop and reel. The boat lost it's spot lock due to the ripping current, waves, and increasing wind. And that quick, the bite was off. We repositioned and dropped the jigs, but not a touch. We switched to rigs and clam and the bite was back on. We pulled a ton of sea bass up with 12 nice keepers. We decided to leave them biting and finish our chores. We ran inside a ways and finished up what we came out to do. Then we set up on another wreck. This wreck was loaded with smaller sea bass and every drop was a single or double haul. Chris bagged another three keepers to add to our dinners. With the wind ever increasing we ran inside a bit more for the final deployment and then ran back to the inlet in the chop. It was a fun trip with loads of sea bass action. We hauled up at least 80 sea bass. Looking forward to seeing if our work pays off later in the summer. But for now, hoping to get out after those tasty sea bass again very soon. Tight Lines!

Had the pleasure of taking Sean and his crew out for some flounder fishing in the back bay today. As usual the weather apps were just a tad off. It was far colder and the wind was was howling, even though it was forecast to lay out. Yeah, that happened... Given the windy conditions and new Moon tide, I picked my spots carefully to maximize the drift and keep headaches to a minimum. Sean and crew were solid fishermen (and fisherwomen) and they worked the hell out of their flounder rigs. We worked over a variety of areas, utilizing structure, and trying to stay clear of other boats. The plan worked well. We ended up landing five keepers to 20", tossed back two shorts, and missed quite a few. We were hoping to find a few blues and or weakies, but no such luck. On the plus side, no trash fish. Overall a really fun day out on the water, despite the winds best efforts to thwart us. Looking forward to chasing flounder again soon. Tight Lines!

Well, Mike finally broke me down and got me to meet up with him at a local inlet to fish. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy fishing with Mike, he's good people! It's the inlet. I just never seem to do well there. At least not consistently. I ran to the area after school with all of my gear. I popped into Boulevard to see if there were any decent reports. The big report was that there was an abundance of snot grass. Everywhere. Yeah... this just gets better. I arrived, and began to put on my waders and boots. A guy approached me to ask if there was a better place to fish? He explained how it was windy and Grassy and he had only landed a dinky flounder all day. So I gave him a spot to try and surveyed the water. It was definitely windy, there were white caps. Yup, it just keeps getting better. So, with very little hope, I trudged down to meet up with Mike. When I arrived Mike seemed quite jubilant as he already had a nice blue on his stringer, and was just bitten off. Maybe there was hope after all. So, we waded out to our waists and cast. Mike hooked another blue, and then we were both bitten off. I gave Mike a Zman to try, and I put one on too. Blues can't readily bite through them. And they did the trick. Mike and I landed a nice blue each and added them to his stringer. Mike likes smoked bluefish. Reminded me of an old client, Ralph. We continued to fish as the sun began to set. The tide turned to head out, and terns dive bombed the water here and there picking off spearing. As I was reeling in one of my hundreds of casts, it suddenly stopped, rather close, and took off. After a spirited battle I landed a nice 21" striper. A nice change from the blues. Mike struck next with a notice 24.5" striper. Another great fight, and quick release. Thena short while later my life e was hammered again, but the hook somehow managed to come loose. It felt nice at least. A few casts later the beast struck again in the same spot. This time the hook stayed put and the battle was on. I fi ally wrangled the striper to the sand. It was a solid 31" striper. I was going to release it, but Mike said he'd love to have it over for dinner. So, onto the stringer it went. My next cast was a nice chopper blue that swam away. And then Mike got a dink bass. The sun was quite low at this point, and the tide was dropping fast. The stringer fish were running out of water so Mike went to move it into deeper water. Next thing I hear Mike in a bit of a panic. He forgot the striner wasn't attached to his sand spike, but merely looped through. When he pulled the spike up the striper saw it's opportunity to bolt. It swam right past me dragging the three blues along with it. Before we could fathom what had happened, they were gone. No smoked blues or tasty striper for Mike and his family. We laughed trying to imagine some guy flounder fishing ending up snagging that mass of fish and blue cable stringer. What a haul! We fished a bit longer. The guy just up from us landed a dink striper. The grass and current started to pick up, so we called it quits. I am happy to say, I was wrong. It was a great trip, with a good friend. We had a blast! If only the stringer hadn't swam away... Tight Lines!

Ran the Brynnie-B II around the back bays this morning with Justin and Amy onboard. The forecast wasn't great, but we figured we'd try to beat the rain and see what we could find. We had a nice assortment of baits; salted shad and mackeral, minnows, Zman's, and Gulp. We each dropped a rod down and waited to see what might come out to play. My first creek of choice had a wicked eddy toward the top end, and was quite a bit more shallow than expected. The wind was blowing across the creek which made the drifts a bit wonky. I finally ended up deploying the trolling motor to compensate. We made four drifts down the creek with everyone getting a hit here and there, but no hook ups. We moved out into the ICW and drifted in various depths from 6' to 26' or more. On our first drift I felt like we were in water that was much to deep for this time of the year. But then again, the water was reading 66 degrees. Suddenly Justin got hammered and he pulled in a spike weakie. It was a start. On the next three drifts it was the same, each ending with Justin catching a spike weakie. I adjusted the drift a bit, and Justin still got his little weakie, but he also nailed a nice 18.5" flounder. Next drift he got hammered by a 22" flounder. Both flounder came while drifting up a steep slope, from 20' of water to about 6'. We dialed the drift in, but only got another spike weakie and small blue. I moved the drift out into deeper water and worked over an area that is usually productive. Amy hauled in a nice 22" weakie and then a bigger blue. Justin got another snapper blues. Once the tide died out I deployed the trolling motor again. About that time some rain moved in and we decided to move. We made a short run to another area and tried a few drifts. I landed a dink flounder and missed another. Amy landed a 17.5" flounder right after. On subsequent drifts we got some half hearted hits, and both Justin and Amy got some epic snags. We called it a day after Justin's. It was a really fun morning. I had planned on hitting the surf too, but the weather pretty much shut that plan down. Not to mention there was an ASAC tournament today too. There have been some really solid reports of stripers and drum in the surf, so that is definitely on the hit list. And from the sound of it, the Delaware Bay drum fishing is beginning to light up. And then there are the pictures and reports of the bigger weakfish that have been missing for far too long popping up. I may need to bust out the Korkers... Tight Lines!

This is a tale of two trips. One along the shore of the Delaware Bay, the other on the ocean side. We hit the Bay side last night based on some killer reports of large stripers being caught on bait and plugs. So, Idgie, Bubbalouie and I met up with John and Trevor. We set up a rod each with chunks of bunker and cast them out with high hopes. You couldn't have asked for a better night. It was comfortable with a slight westerly breeze. The sky was clear with loads of stars, a few meteors blaIng past, and even two satellites cruising past. Despite the gorgeous conditions, our baits went untouched for most of the night. About the time we thought we'd run out of sandy real-estate, the encroaching flood tide turned. We hoped the fishing lull would change with the tide. Instead The trash fish turned on. I landed a big doggie and then a skate. That was it for the night. Woke up at 6am this morning with hopes for better fishing. Gathered the gear back up and raced over to my spot along the shore and met up with Chris. Chris beat me there by thirty minutes. He was smarter than me and stayed in last night. He already had two rods set up and had just released a doggie. I set up three rods to try out a variety of baits; bunker, fresh clam, and salted clam. It was a really nice morning with a light breeze and small surf. I set the rods out and we waited. I noticed the guy fishing two hundred yards or so south of us landed a decent striper. About that time my bunker rod got assaulted by a doggie and the rig broke off. Shortly after the rod with the salted clam bent over screaming! I snatched it up and battled the beast as it took off down the beach. I managed to get it under my one rod, but it somehow wrapped up both of Chris's lines. I finally wrangled it into shallow water and leadered it onto the beach. We unhooked her and did a quick photo shoot and then walked her out into the wash to get her revived and released. She was about 44 inches. We spent the next ten minutes untangling the mess the bass made of Chris's lines and then got reset. Chris had to leave shortly after for some work related duties. Lisa popped down to hang out with the dogs and I. The bite pretty much stopped after the morning excitement. I managed a doggie and a skate afterward. I stayed until noon hoping the bite would pick up on the dropping tide. Didn't happen. The ospreys put on a spectacular show at least, pinwheeling and diving and carrying off the occasional bunker. The terns joined in picking off unsuspecting baitfish in the surf. So, two very different outcomes, but a great time overall. Time spent fishing is never wasted... Tight Lines!