Capt_Gene_Kelly
08-04-2009, 10:52 AM
8/4/09
I’m a day late with this thanks to a last minute decision to leave on an early trip. And, I’m not anal enough to get up at
3:00 am to write this.
Overall fishing is pretty good, with the best of it the striped bass. If you want to catch big bass, August is THE time to
do it. The fall run is great, but for the last several years the most consistent fishing for big bass has been in August.
Everything works, but for the big guys the big tube or live bait is the preferred method. The parachutes and umbrellas
will catch their share, but also the smaller fish.
The porgies are working especially well for the stripers, but it has at least one of the charterboat guys a little PO’d. Over
the weekend he watched a guy in a small boat hooking up on bait just about every drift, which is fine. What wasn’t too
cool was watching the guy culling up, reaching into his cooler to “release” a smaller fish each time he caught a larger
one. Then the fish would backstroke it’s way down tide.
Fluke fishing is still steady, but lots and lots of shorts, with few keepers in between. I haven’t seen any of the charter
boats coming back with fluke on their all day trips. After catching their limits of bass, it seems like most are switching
over to the seabass instead.
Offshore the shark fishing remains steady with more smaller makos showing up. One charterboat had three of the
“toenail clipper’ variety on Friday. I did hear of the first “Shark Dummy” on Saturday, so it is not a sure thing.
Star Island has it’s Mako Mania tournament this weekend. It will be interesting to see how many boats sign up for it,
since all of the earlier contests were much smaller than in previous years.
Locally, some bluefins have been sighted east of the Butterfish Hole and inside the 750 line. But virtually nobody is
fishing for them except maybe a half hour or so before setting up a shark slick.
Further offshore the yellowfin bite has slowed down quite a bit, at least going by Sunday’s results when a lot of boats
caught none, and the few that caught fish all had to measure them.
If you would like to get these reports sent to you directly, drop me a line at captaingene@montauksportfishing.com and
I’ll put you on the list.
Capt Gene Kelly - Montauk Sportfishing
I’m a day late with this thanks to a last minute decision to leave on an early trip. And, I’m not anal enough to get up at
3:00 am to write this.
Overall fishing is pretty good, with the best of it the striped bass. If you want to catch big bass, August is THE time to
do it. The fall run is great, but for the last several years the most consistent fishing for big bass has been in August.
Everything works, but for the big guys the big tube or live bait is the preferred method. The parachutes and umbrellas
will catch their share, but also the smaller fish.
The porgies are working especially well for the stripers, but it has at least one of the charterboat guys a little PO’d. Over
the weekend he watched a guy in a small boat hooking up on bait just about every drift, which is fine. What wasn’t too
cool was watching the guy culling up, reaching into his cooler to “release” a smaller fish each time he caught a larger
one. Then the fish would backstroke it’s way down tide.
Fluke fishing is still steady, but lots and lots of shorts, with few keepers in between. I haven’t seen any of the charter
boats coming back with fluke on their all day trips. After catching their limits of bass, it seems like most are switching
over to the seabass instead.
Offshore the shark fishing remains steady with more smaller makos showing up. One charterboat had three of the
“toenail clipper’ variety on Friday. I did hear of the first “Shark Dummy” on Saturday, so it is not a sure thing.
Star Island has it’s Mako Mania tournament this weekend. It will be interesting to see how many boats sign up for it,
since all of the earlier contests were much smaller than in previous years.
Locally, some bluefins have been sighted east of the Butterfish Hole and inside the 750 line. But virtually nobody is
fishing for them except maybe a half hour or so before setting up a shark slick.
Further offshore the yellowfin bite has slowed down quite a bit, at least going by Sunday’s results when a lot of boats
caught none, and the few that caught fish all had to measure them.
If you would like to get these reports sent to you directly, drop me a line at captaingene@montauksportfishing.com and
I’ll put you on the list.
Capt Gene Kelly - Montauk Sportfishing