Aha! So the makos ARE in town...just as they should be at this time of the year. Heck, bluefish are their number one prey and they are being reported as far up as Long Island waters and probably further up than that. When the blues are in town, the makos are in town. The threshers were there before them.

Did I say that bluefish are the east coast mako's number one prey? I surely did and they surely are and I'll tell ya what - and something that every thinking fisherman should realize and do something about...when a mako wants to eat a bluefish HE HAS TO RUN IT DOWN AND KILL IT! Makos don't hide behind rocks, or in jetties, or whatever. They hunt blues where they are, in open water, and those blues run like hell when a mako is after them and I sure hope that there isn't any doubt in anybody's mind about that. And what's the best way to immitate a fleeing (maybe wounded) bluefish? Trolling, of course.

Sure, little makos are caught by tuna and mahi trollers and such, but that is a simple matter of the lures/baits that they are trolling are too small to interest a bigger mako. Start trolling blues and bluefish-like lures and you'll hammer the makos and the threshers because you'll cover more water, cover wrecks and bottom structure and temp breaks more precisely and thoroughly, be able to "hover" in areas with lots of bait, and a lot more.

Power chumming is a combination of both chumming and trolling and bait and switch fishing.

I repeat, trolling is far superior to chumming when it comes to thresher sharks. We have proven that over and over on the west coast and these are the very same fish as those on the east coast. You'll catch a few chumming in both places and you'll catch a whole lot more trolling in both places. It's the species and its habits that matter - NOT where it swims.

Some of you have learned the how's and why's of shark trolling and have had great success with it back there and some big tournaments have been won doing it. (Of course, not too many of those tournament winners are going to let on how they are doing it, so they can keep the competition to a minimum. You might be shocked to find out who these guys were!)

If you want to catch blue sharks and dog fish you don't need to read my shark books. If you want to ONLY catch the game sharks, the makos and threshers, and a LOT more of them than you are catching now, and catch each one of them on the right size gear for the fish, you should read them.

'Course, I wrote 'em, so naturally, I think that! But it's true! And this is my annual effort to get people to read my shark books and start trying the new, very effective, and more-fun-for-most methods in them. So, 'nuff said.