It's been a busy last few weeks, here are the fishing reports. We haven't been sitting at the dock, so it's a long one. You might want to crack open a cold one and settle in.

5/27 - After enduring a 3-day "May Nor'easter", things finally cleared up for the Fred Verdi party. While the surface temp. cooled, the wind did a good job mixing the water column, causing the bottom temperature to rise. That also got the sea bass biting exceptionally well for the Fred Verdi party. They caught 250 sea bass on the day, with 118 keepers, with four that I weighed over 3 pounds.

5/28 - The Kirkpatrick party was down. We started on bluefish, putting 3 dozen in the box for a good start. Offshore, we found a hard current running requiring 12 oz. of lead to hold bottom at anchor. This turned the fishing off a bit from yesterday, but we still caught over 75 sea bass.

5/29 - If only the catching today had been as good as the fishing. A near perfect weather day, Sunny and 75 with just a light breeze. The bluefish didn't want to cooperate like yesterday, but the Memorial Day boat traffic sure didn't help. Offshore, we found less current, but less fish, as well. We wound up with 2 dozen fish in the box, just an ok catching day, but a great fishing day. Al made his day with this beautiful sea bass.


5/30 - Open Boat Memorial Day trip today. We found some much better fishing today, with some much better fish. We didn't quite limit out, but everyone had 18-20 fish to take home. Quality was the word of the day, keeping 2 sea bass for every 1 we threw back. Big fish were 4.1 and 3.8 pounds. A number of 3 pound fish. Here is Chris with some of the big ones.


5/31 - A bluebird day on the water today (Sunny, warm, light winds), with superb fishing to match. Limit catch of sea bass (25/person) for the Damon Leong party today.

6/2 - Not a bluebird day today, overcast, cool, damp conditions. But fishing was good. You know it is good when the gang says they are ready to go home before you call it a day. 105 keepers was the total for the 5-person Mark Zuccarello party. If you think the water is still cold for this time of year, here is proof. We've caught a couple of these sea ravens now, which are usually an offshore, deepwater catch.


6/3 - Must be coming up on the weekend with deteriorating weather. The wind/rain held off long enough for the Guy Czyzyk party to put 87 fish in the box, mostly sea bass with a handful of bluefish thrown in that we caught on the way out the inlet. The fish are starting to show signs of spawning, so I expect a slow down in the fishing in the coming weeks.

6/4 - A near limit catch for the Sutphen party today on sea bass, keeping 123 of the 125 fish they were allowed. They were throwing back anything that was close, so I'm sure if we stretched a couple it would've been a limit day. The last stop of the day on an inshore piece (inshore of the 3-mile limit) provided the catch of day (and year), and 26.1 pound striper (41") caught on a small piece of clam on a sea bass rig. Go figure. Here is Sam with this trophy catch.


6/5 - The Stan Elias charter was down, and if yesterday we caught the fish of the year, today we had the sight of the year. After catching some bluefish in the back bay, we headed out the inlet and just a few miles offshore, I saw a huge tail come out of the water in front of the boat...a whale's tail! As we all kept an eye out, the water began to boil and the whale breached less than 100 yards away! It was something most only see on TV or in books, but the gang got to experience nature today at its finest. We had to compete with a heavy wreck pressure, but we still had a good day's catch, 84 fish in the box, plus an incredible image that will long be remembered.

6/6 - Steve and Roseann Freeman brought down their 10-year old son, Shane today. The entire family is a delight to have on the boat, I do enjoy the families. After catching some bluefish in the bay, we headed offshore into some thick fog, visibility was less than an 1/8th of a mile. We had quite a few more throwback sea bass today than we've been catching, but still had 43 fish in the box at day's end. There is no doubt the sea bass are spawning now.

6/9 - Damon Leong was back with his son Chris. We fished in thick fog again, getting a limit catch of sea bass for the guys. It was a near perfect fishing day if you didn't mind the fog, at least until Chris got his finger jammed in the levelwind on the reel. He hung in there, and we got him free, and after a few minutes he was back at it.

6/12 - A couple of days weather out this week. Summer is here (2 weeks early), with temps in the 90's. A strong SW flow has developed, causing the water temp. to drop significantly in the past couple of days. Warm air and cold water continues to equal thick fog. Today was a bit better on the fishing (still no visibility until lunch time), as we had some fair fishing for Alvin, Bill, Buck and Joe. It was just a steady pick all day, with 74 keepers for the day, including a nice tog of around 5 pounds. Here's Alvin with one of the more colorful fish we've had this year.


So there you go. Sea bass fishing is fair right now, we are fighting the water temps and the spawn, so I don't expect a dramatic uptick in the sea bassing until later in the summer at this point. We are fishing anywhere between 50' and 90' depths, trying to find where a few fish will bite. Water temps are struggling to get above 60 at the surface still, and much colder on the bottom. Still, it has been a good spring. Things to look forward to in the next couple weeks is that as the water warms, sharks should begin to show up inshore. This has been one of the latest starts in years, with one of the East Coast's largest shark tourneys seeing pretty poor fishing this past week as a result of the cold water temps. I am also starting to hear of some inshore tuna making a showing, so hopefully we will have a repeat of the good fishing we had last summer on them.

For more information and reports/pics, visit my website at www.karenannii.com.