Fish Report 9/10/17
Catching Cbass & Flounder
Lots Of Room
Posted: A Collection of (some) Bad Catch Estimates
Have lots of room in coming days. Irma's economic impact stretches waaaayyyy up the beach -- but the ocean will be fine for fishing!
If you know anyone with pallets of unsalable block, I know a fishy place or two we can store them. Forever. Will pay for trucking.
If you have a few blocks in the backyard taking up space and just making snake reef, bring em. We'll toss em overboard with the rest
Boat is open to reservations through September 21 -- then sea bass close. MIGHT go some more in late September. Will depend on what our flounder are doing.. (or the mahi.. or the goldens.. or, or, or.. Or the Maintenance!)
We Remain In Summer 'We'll Fish For What's Biting Trips' .. Might be flounder, might be sea bass, might be a mix. (Mostly Sea Bass!) If you absolutely have to have one and not the other, don't reserve!
Sailing Daily - Weather Permitting - Whether Sea Bass or Flounder Bite Better On Any Given Day Has Been Wildly Unpredictable! Saturday's 6:30 to 3:30 - $125.00 – Otherwise 7 to 3 at $110.00..
Reservations Required at 410 520 2076 - LEAVE YOUR BEST POSSIBLE CONTACT NUMBER - Weather Cancelations Are Common - I Make Every Attempt To Let Clients Sleep In If The Weather's Not Going Our Way..
Be a half hour early! We always leave early!
..except when someone shows up right on time.
Clients arriving late will see the west end of an east bound boat. With a limited number of reserved spots, I do not refund because you over-slept or had a flat..
Bonine Is Cheap Insurance! Crystalized Ginger Works OK For Some. "Natural Dramamine" Does NOT! It's Simple To Prevent Motion Sickness, Difficult To Cure. If You Suffer Mal-de-Mer In A Car You Should Experiment On Shorter Half-Day Trips First! (Wockenfuss Candies sells crystalized ginger locally at the White Marlin Mall location (also the post office most OCRF mail goes through) - We usually have some aboard. Chewable Meclizine is a good pharmaceutical, chewable Bonine's a "less drowsy" meclizine pill; prescription Scopolamine Patches are the gold standard.)
Bring A Cooler With Ice For Your Fish – A 48 Quart Is Fine For A Few People.
No Galley! BYO Sandwiches & Soft Drinks. A few beers in cans is fine. (bottles break at bad times)
If You Won't Measure & Count Your Fish The State Will Provide A Man With A Gun To Do It For You. We Measure & Count — ALWAYS — No Exceptions!
Please Support the Ocean City Reef Foundation!
We're Nowhere Near Reef Building's True Potential.
2017 Reef Raffle!! Benelli USA has donated another spectacular shotgun! A Benelli Super Black Eagle II, 25th Anniversary Limited Edition, 12ga 28" in Black Cerakote.. Tix are $10.00 - available aboard and/or email if you want me to mail you some. If you want to sell some, could REALLY use the help...
On August 27th I wrote, "We'll have deployed over 19,000 blocks by my next report.." Didn't quite make it. We'll get there Tuesday, Sept. 12th..
18,977 Reef Blocks deployed at numerous sites: TNC's Restoration Reef 278 - Doug Ake's Reef 3,300 - St. Ann's 1,888 - Al Giles/OC RUST Reef 1,426 - Eagle Scout Reef 954 - Sue's Block Drop 446 - Nichols' Concrete 1122 - Capt. Bob's Block Drop 691 - Benelli Reef 418 - Capt. Bob's Reef 664 - Wolf & Daughters Reef 210
Mark Wagner, Dave Herbst, Steve Choi, (Hurricane) Murray Adams, Ben Boyd, & (one lucky dagoned mate) Wes Pollitt with part of a recent catch..
Greetings All,
Have had some OK fishing of late, including some clients with limits of flounder & Wes's 27 inch dandy; also guys in double-digits on sea bass.
It's still a tough call whether we're flounder or sea bass fishing. Both species live & spawn on the same habitat. Sometimes one's chewing better than the other.
Some days the fishing's, ehh.. Other times, nice fishing.
My crew & I give it all we've got everyday.
Owing to hurricane anxiety, I think, we have some crazy light crowds coming up. With mostly ultra-long period ground swells in the forecast, sea heights are exaggerated from what you'll perceive. When there's 5 foot waves with a six-second period, (period being the distance between peaks,) that's ROUGH. When those same 5 foot waves are spread out to 10 or more seconds - especially 15 - the ocean seems quite calm unless you're in very shallow water. . .
Guys up in New Jersey are suffering a dual closure - Sea Bass & Summer Flounder (called Fluke in those parts.)
This has brought a LOT of new voices & anger to the "Opposed To Fishery Management" scene.
Good on em.
The always & forever exuberance of youth, or youthful endeavor, often fails to account history while quickly calculated plans are energized & swell with new participants.
A group I've been posting to in FaceBook is the NJFFFR (New Jersey Fishermen Fight For Fisherman's Rights.) Lots of angry energy there..
If Maryland were in a similar regulatory situation--both sea bass & flounder closed, and we have been very close indeed--I'd be fighting for solvency: fighting to preserve all I've worked for all my life.
And am.
It could happen here in a few months, or in a year. The trend is ominous. MRIP is like six hurricanes coming across the Atlantic just below Bermuda. With unstoppable bad catch estimates coming in greater frequency, Maryland's "Emergency Closure" klaxon may soon ring as well -- perhaps coastwide.
What's got NJ by the throat is never more than one MRIP catch estimate from affecting our own regulations in similar fashion. Not even 50 miles away, assertions of catch no one believes are now the norm and absolutely rule recreational fishing's regulation.
So I cobbled together a BUNCH of excerpts from various pieces over the years--mostly focused on NJ--that a few of these angry anglers might see how NJ's catch estimates have been so foul, so wrong, as to put them, and much of the coast, in their situation today --- CLOSED.
Accused again & again & again of overfishing, management has no option but to tighten regulation. The law demands managers address any instance of overharvest seen in the "best available scientific information" -- whether anyone believes that incriminating information seems to not matter one bit.
Where NJ's fishery regulators went "out of compliance" on flounder/fluke this year was 100% political -- but the REASON they had to do it was 100% MRIP Recreational Catch Estimates.
Here's an interesting article from the Bay Journal with my comment.. https://www.facebook.com/frank.bonanno1/posts/10214479359844925?comment_id=10214501077027841¬if_t=like¬if_id=1505036860778156
We have entered an era in management where we are treating the Private Boat angler---the guy who works his butt off 5 days a week so he can fish one day; or takes a couple weeks off to fish different tournaments; maybe he's lot better off and can afford infinite fishing days, pretty rare that---we're treating those Private Boat guys as though they're far more potent than all commercial trawl & trap, plus party & charters boats.
What?
Seriously -- the very voices who helped bring Magnuson Stevens into being, the law which threw out foreign factory trawlers in 1976; those private boat guys were really just wolves in sheep's clothing.
Certainly seems so in the nation's "Best Available Scientific Information."
According to NOAA, small plastic boats routinely outfish everyone who earns their livelihood at sea.
I think 'catch restriction' has done all it can. We'll never be without regulation, but moving ahead from here will require the other things I always write about. Biology & Ecology are the true forces in restoration. We must bring them to bear.
Regards,
Monty
Capt. Monty Hawkins
