Canyon Runner - Bad Weather and Good Sea Bassing

[Canyon Runner]

While the reports from me have been slow in coming the Canyon Runner crew has been keeping busy a couple trips a week with canyon charters who decided to switch over to inshore trips to take advantage of the good bottom fishing we have been experiencing. But before I get to the reports, how about that weather for the last three weeks of October and first two weeks of November? We cancel no less then 24 overnighters during that period and only got in 3 in those five weeks. This was without a doubt the worst fall weather we every dealt with. Now that that is over we will be focused on inshore trips for the next four weeks. Thereafter, the Canyon Runner crew will be onto to Florida where we will have use of a 54 Bertram fishing out of the Ft. Lauderdale area beginning after Christmas. We have a few dates left in January and a bunch in February. If interested please email us at njcharter@aol.com or call at 732-829-5663.

Now back to the fishing up here. We did get out a handful of times over the last few weeks starting on October 27 when we took the Dave Tolchin charter from Parlin, NJ out for a day of bottom fishing and hit wrecks in 75 feet of water. It was not a hot bite but by noon we had our limit of sea bass up to 3.5 pounds. In addition, we picked some blackfish and porgies.

On October 31 we headed out to the Sea Girt reef for a quick drop as the charter just wanted to get something to eat before heading home after yet another cancelled canyon trip. This charter had 3 canyon trips cancelled on them this year. Well, it was a good idea as all we needed was 3 hours for everyone on the boat to get there 25 Sea Bass limit.

On November 7 we took the Steve Barry charter out for Sea Bass after the fourth time in a row they had their canyon trip cancelled and again the idea paid off. While sea bass are not exactly equal in fighting ability to tuna I personally think they are far better table fare and the charter now agrees. After hitting two wrecks in 75 and 85 feet of water they had half a cooler full of sea bass, along with a few black fish and bluefish mixed in. I got a call from them during the week thanking me for convincing them to give the sea bass a shot as they hadn’t stopped eating it all week.

Finally, on November 10 we had our last canyon trip scheduled to go and the weather was right but unfortunately one of the members of the charter could not make it. As it turned out that was a good break as only one boat I know of actually caught during that weather window we had. We did again switch over to inshore and Dave Tolchin and the boys from Parlin again had a good catch in 90 feet of water this time with Sea Bass up to 4 pounds.

Starting Monday we go just about everyday until December and I promise to keep the reports up to date.