Anglers enjoy saltwater fireworks as action heats up
It’s July, primetime for grabbing that ol’ fishin’ pole and heading out for some angling action on the salt. From Chesapeake Bay rockfish to Atlantic Ocean yellowfin tuna, saltwater fishermen will find plenty of opportunities to hook up with their gamefish of choice.
If you’re inclined to target Chesapeake rockfish, aka striped bass, you’ll find they’re still cooperating. Back in April I headed out from the Solomons on the Bay’s Western Shore during the trophy season where the limit was one fish over 35 inches per angler. All five of the fishermen scored limits on that trip with my largest rockfish measuring in at just over 42 inches. Last week I made my second Chesapeake fishing foray, this time from the Kent Narrows area on the Bay’s Eastern Shore. Accompanied by three other outdoor writers, I boarded the charter boat Mallard at the docks of the Kentmorr Marina.
There we met Captain Troy Ruth and his eighteenyear-old son Tucker who served as mate that day. We planned to leave the dock at 6:00 a.m. but would have to wait another hour to let the remnants of Tropical Storm Cindy blow through. When the winds and waves settled down, Capt. Ruth guided his 45-foot O’Neill Jones Chesapeake Bay Deadrise out of the harbor and into the Upper Bay. I’ll also note that of the many such boats I’ve fished with, the Mallard’s interior of varnished white cedar was most impressive. Ruth, age 54, is a fourth generation captain who started out at the age of eight fishing with his grandfather. As with so many Eastern Shore watermen, their business is a generations-spanning family affair.
Ruth steered a northern course as we passed beneath the imposing twin spans of Route 50’s Bay Bridge and after a 45 minute, ten mile run from port we arrived at the Love Point buoy near the mouth of the Chester River. There the Ruths teamed up to set out the rigs spread between two patriotic planner boards adorned with American flags. Our angling adventure began in over 44 feet of 70 degree water.
We had enjoyed great success during the spring trophy season, but the rules had changed once the summer rockfish season kicked in at mid-May. Now each angler could collect a two rockfish limit with each fish required to be at least 20 inches but only one of those could exceed 28 inches in length. “The spawning run was at least two weeks early this year,” cautioned Ruth, “so lately the fishing has been hit and miss. The weather hasn’t helped either. We’ve had a lot of windy days this year.”
Ruth, who works a fulltime job in construction when he’s not on the water, advised us that we would be trolling with planer boards as opposed to live-lining or chunking. “We get bigger fish when we troll,” he explained. He also reported that the number of charter boats like his is dwindling as is the number of folks who operate them. “Fewer people are hiring charters these days,” he frowned. “All the extra fees for maintaining the boat, docking, and licenses also discourage a lot of would-be captains.”
Our first action that morning would come around 8:45 as a school of undersized rockfish lit up the fish finder screen. By ten o’clock our trolled umbrella rigs had snared at least eight rockfish, all throwbacks short of the minimum 20-inch standard, but before quitting time just after noon we had five legal rockfish in the box, the largest two stretching to 28-inches where outdoor scribe Doyle Dietz of Pottsville’s Republican Herald and I would tie in our $5 pool for the day’s largest catch. Although we didn’t all collect our limits of keepers, we still kept busy fighting undersized fish all the while enjoying a magnificent sunny day on the Chesapeake’s rolling waves. ***
IF YOU GO »
An easy drive of 90 miles or so from West Chester, it’s tough to find a place that’s not on the waterfront here in the Kent Narrows area of Maryland’s beautiful Queen Anne’s County (including the Holiday Inn Express where we stayed). Kent Narrows boasts multiple marinas and fine dining at conveniently located waterfront restaurants. We enjoyed excellent seafood dinners at the Fisherman’s Inn Crab Deck and Bridges Restaurant in Grasonville, Md., and, following our rockfish expedition, a great lunch at the Kentmorr Restaurant on the beach just a few steps from the marina. Five stars to all three eateries for both the food and the Eastern Shore ambience they provided. For more info about outdoor adventures that await you in Queen Anne’s County, check out their website at visitqueenannes.com. For more about Mallard Charters, visit their website at mallardcharters.com.
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ATLANTIC COAST REPORT »
Meanwhile, at the easternmost end of Route 50 in Ocean City, Md., offshore fishermen are enjoying good success on yellowfin tuna. I visited the docks last week and found most deep water boats unloading full coolers of these tasty fish in the 40 to 50 pound class. Dolphin are also in the mix with an occasional marlin hook-up. I’ll be headed offshore on Saturday to try my luck on tuna. Stay tuned.
Also in Ocean City, my ongoing quest to catch my first legal flounder of the year continues to be frustrated by lousy fishing luck, and it didn’t help when the minimum legal size for Maryland and Delaware fluke was raised from 16 inches to 17 inches back in April. Even undersized throwbacks have been hard to come by with a super slow start to the season. But the word is that Maryland’s back bay flounder fishing is picking up. Guess I’ll find out when I hit the bay waters later this week in hopes of finally hooking up with a few legal flatfish fillets.
On Saturday I checked in with Captain Dick Herb of Escapade Charters in Avalon for his New Jersey fishing report and learned that South Jersey fluke fishermen appear to be having much better luck than mine in Maryland. “We’ve been getting a fair number of big back bay flounder over 20 inches and we still have bluefish in the bay,” said Herb, who also serves as Chair of the New Jersey Marine Fishery Council. “Ocean water temperatures have been cold and that helps keep the fluke in the bay, especially in the skinny water. Out in the offshore ocean, tuna fishing has been hot.” Herb also cited the current New Jersey flounder regulations that set an 18 inch minimum length with a 3 fish daily limit and a season open through Sept. 5. “That’s as of now,” he added, “but things could always change.”
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MARLIN WINNER NOW A LOSER »
After being held up in court for ten months, it was determined that the $2.8 million prize for Ocean City Md.’s 2016 White Marlin Open will not be awarded to supposed winner Philip Heasley, the angler who weighed in the only qualifying white marlin during the tourney. Last August this column documented the scandalous saga surrounding Heasley’s suspect 76.5 pound catch aboard his boat Kallianassa. When suspicions about cheating surfaced, the legitimacy of the catch was questioned, especially when crew members failed to pass the tourney’s requisite polygraph tests. Something was clearly fishy here. At the conclusion of a two week trial, the court ruled that Heasley and his team had violated tournament rules by putting lines in the water prior to the official 8:30 a.m. start time on the day they caught the winning marlin. That ruling disqualified the fish, thus denying Heasley the prize money which will now be distributed among about a dozen other participating anglers. This year’s White Marlin Open is slated to run from August 7 through 11. Here’s hoping that all participants obey all the rules this time around.