We have had another decent week of fishing here at the Wharf and variety catch is what it’s all about. In the last seven days I have seen as many as six to ten species of fish on the boat on any given day and a few days more than that! The bulk of the catch is Sea Bass Croakers and Blues however we still see the occasional Flounder and even a few Trout.

We ended last week with a combination of both anchoring and drift fishing. I stayed tied to the dock on Thursday, which was only the second day dockside in over seven weeks. Nice change of pace. We were back hard at it again on Friday but as luck would have it the fish really didn’t seem to cooperate like they should. Lots of small fish, some folks scraped up a mess with mostly Bass and some would catch nothing but shorts. Saturday saw way too much North wind but for those that could take the beating at the rail the reward was plenty of small Croakers a few nice Sea Bass with some Snapper Blues and Trout in the mix. Not bad for a crappy day.

The Seas calmed on Sunday and I personally thought the fishing should have been a little better after the prior days performance but you just never know. We did continue with a great variety catch and some folks walked away with a couple of dozen or more fish including Flounder, Bass Croaks and Blues. The Day started out like we were going to see a lot of Flounder however that was not the case. We had quite a few decent flatties on a couple of drifts but then there were none. The one odd thing on Sunday was the amount of Atlantic Cutlass Fish or (ribbon fish) that were landed. We had a nice pick going with these prehistoric looking critters, all tolled we landed nine and lost one at the boat for a total of ten. That’s more than I have seen in over thirty years of headboat fishing combined! At least if your not catching much you can catch something you probably have never seen or heard of. We bailed on the Cutlass fish grounds and settled for the pick on Croakers Bass and Blues to end the day.

Monday and Tuesdays trips saw more variety catches however the Bulk of the fish that we saw were nice sized Sea Bass. Easterly winds forced us to once again rely on the anchor. I saw the best keeper ratio of Bass so far this fall in just the last couple of days, hopefully a good sign for what’s to come but I have my doubts. Some lucky hooks would land as many as a dozen and a half nice keeper Bass on both Monday and Tuesday’s trips along with an assortment of other fish making for some real interesting fishing and coolers that actually had some weight in them by days end.

As I prepare for our trip today only the Fish Gods really know what we will catch. These fish are moving around a lot now and you never really know what to expect on any given day until you bait up and drop to the bottom. I do expect to see variety catches for several more weeks and more than likely most of our time will be spent anchoring over structure bottom. The Sea Bass fishing has shown some real good signs of improvement recently and hopefully will continue to improve as the water temperature creeps down. Time will tell. The Croakers are just about everywhere and are all mixed up in sizes from just legal to as big as two pounds with an average of about 14 inches. These Croakers have been providing steady action but I have not been targeting just them. I will try to stick with mostly the Sea Bass and will settle for the variety pack when it’s available.

If you would like any more information about trips sailing out of the Wharf or you would like to book a charter or reserve a spot for one of the upcoming special trips please give us a call at (302) 645-TUNA.

Until Next Week Happy Fishing!

Capt. Rick Yakimowicz
Thelma Dale V
catchfish@verizon.net