Party-Crashing Bluefish

 Party Crashing Bluefish

    As the doldrums of summer give way to the cool breezes of fall, incredible things happen on the East Coast. Beach-buggies slowly fizzle out, and trucks with rod racks soon move in. Everywhere there is movement, as schools of mullet and bunker congregate and begin their migration, with wolf-packs of stripers on their heels coming down from the North for the Fall Run. Also more available now are is the tautog, also known as blackfish, one of my favorite bottom species that I've written about extensively. Max and I set out to a well known inlet on the Jersey shore one day, in search of tog but also to see what else was around. 

    I got there early and set up on a likely looking tog hole. Baiting my hook with half a green crab, I sent one down to the bottom. A few seconds later, that signature tog crunch reverberated up the braided line and down to the handle of the rod. I set the hook only to feel nothing on the end. I had to get my mojo back together for tog season. A few crab chunks later, and I was dialed again, slowly picking away at 10-13 inch fish almost every drop. 

    Eventually, as the tide moved in, Max arrived and we started seeing some bait activity on the ocean side of the inlet. I casted out a bucktail and gulp, hoping to score a weakfish. Soon, my gulp grubs came back ragged and tail-less, a sign of bluefish in the area. After replacing them, I made a cast to the inlet side, and immediately hooked a nice fish. After fighting it for a good minute, it popped off next to the rocks, but not before I was able to identify it as a nice cocktail bluefish. Whilst I was casting my gulp around, Max was throwing a gotcha-plug at a school of rainbait and silversides on the ocean side, managing to catch and release two nice weakfish. He filmed a video that day too once things got crazy, check it out on his YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mDTJauYxDZM

    Soon, we saw an increase in activity on the inlet side, as bluefish and bait met and created a melee underneath the lighthouse. Max and I started casting Gotcha's and bucktails out to a pack of hungry bluefish near the surface. As soon as our lures hit the water, we started getting bites and hooking up to blues. Since our objective was tautog, all we had were 7ft inshore rods instead of the usual striper plugging set-ups I usually use for blues. Paired up with 20 lb braid and a 4000 reel, I had a hell of a time fighting the bluefish, but landing them was a struggle. Soon, they also started thinning out the tackle box, biting through our lines like they were butter. Finally, I tied on a clip and a long leader of heavy monofilament so I could hoist the blues up over the rocks, which ended up making a huge difference. 

Top: Max and I doubled up on bluefish with bucktails 

Bottom: A limit of small cocktail blues that were bled and iced immediately before getting the ceviche treatment. Be sure to practice selective harvest and take only what you need. 

    And so we continued to pick off bluefish on nearly every cast until the sun began dipping down under the lighthouse and the park was closing. This was definitely a great way to kick off the fall fishing season, when I'll be planning on dabbling much more in fisheries that I typically don't partake much in. Cheers fishy people.