Fisherman's Wharf Fishing Report May 12, 2004

Good weather has allowed us to get away from the docks now for seven days in a row for the first time this year. Almost all of our angling effort has been anchor fishing over shipwrecks and reefs. Sea Bass and TauTog have been the main course on the menu.

While the fishing can best be described as slow, we have still been seeing some very nice fish and I have actually seen the first limit catches of 25 keeper sized Sea Bass so far this past week. But believe me this fishing is far from good. I have seen a lot more folks walk away with just a handful or so of fish by day’s end than with a limit.

Water temperatures remain for the most part very cold. The lower Bay has been around 56 degrees or a little better, and the ocean temps where we have been fishing have been around 52 to 54 degrees. I have even seen a few cold spots with surface temps as low as 49. Bottom temperature reportedly is only 39 to 40 degrees in 100 ft. of water, which is exceptionally cold for this time of the year. Just one feel of your bait, or of a fish, that you catch will make you believe that this temperature is correct. Warm weather forecasted for the remainder of the week should cause these numbers to rise.

Fishing overall has seen nothing but improvement and promises more of the same. There are numerous reports of decent sized Flounder being landed inshore as well as Stripers, Bluefish, and Drum. I even have confirmed reports of the First Sea Trout of the year being taken by hook and line.

Congratulations have go out this week to Brinleigh Parsons. Her father, Capt. H.D. decided to take the family and some friends out on a little fun trip Friday evening and Brinleigh landed a 34-pound Striper. Even though this was not the first Stiper that Brinleigh has ever landed it sure was her biggest! Congratulations again Brinleigh on an outstanding catch!

There were other big Stripers caught over the weekend and the biggest one brought to the docks so far this year in Lewes goes to the six pack charter boat "Miss Kirsten" with Capt. Vince Keagy at the healm. This beast of a fish weighing in at over 42 lbs. was landed during Saturday’s Northeast winds just a few miles from the inlet in Lewes. Now that’s a Keeper.

While fishing on the headboat has been somewhat slow so far this spring we have still have had our moments. Several citation sized Bass have been landed over the past couple of weeks and we continue to see quite a few keeper Tau tog. We are now starting to see more throwback Bass mixed in with our catch and I think that this is a sign these fish are on the move. It really seems as though the big numbers of Sea Bass that we have been accustomed to the last few springs are just not here yet. Hopefully the water temperature is the key and these fish will be showing better in the weeks to come.

We will continue to fish for Sea Bass daily and I would venture to say almost all of our fishing would be on the anchor. As the water warms and more fish start to show, we should be able to catch fish on the drift but as of this writing not much has been caught on the open bottom and drifting has been out of the question.

Our night fishing will resume this weekend starting May 14th. Sailing on Friday’s and Saturday’s at 6:00 p.m. and returning to the docks around 1:00 am. We will be fishing for Drumfish and Stripers up in the Delaware Bay. Capt. H.D. has already been running some fun trips to the grounds just to "scope things out" and has caught both. It was on one of these trips, that Brinleigh caught her big Striper.

If you would like more information on trips sailing out of the Wharf or you would like to book a charter, please check out our website or give us a call at (302) 645 TUNA.


Until next time Happy Fishing!
Capt. Rick Yakimowicz
fishing@fishlewes.com
Keen Lady IV