The dog days of summer can drag along slowly. Low and clear water makes striper and flathead fishing tough, high temperatures have most of the big fluke have headed offshore, and everything in general seems to become much more sluggish and deliberate. However, every year on August 1st, a special thing happens, something that serves as a breath of fresh air from the routine hustle and bustle of New Jersey saltwater fishing. You're goddamn right, I'm talking about tog.
Max, Victor, and I made plans to head down to a local inlet, hopping rocks from hole to hole for these scrappy bottom dwellers. Getting up early enough to listen to the birds wake up and downing an instant coffee, we made the drive to Central Jersey to catch the tail end of the incoming tide.
Today the ocean was a perfect blue-green. East winds had stirred up the water and the sky was gray and occasionally spitting bursts of rain down on us. It just felt fishy. Tog were our primary focus, but also on our minds were bluefish, fluke, weakfish, maybe even the odd bass that stayed in Jersey instead of migrating north to New England. With these conditions and the most open a body of water can get, anything was a possibility.
Instead of using the usual green crabs, our tog bait of choice were sandfleas, raked ourselves by hand from the surf zone not 20 yards from where we were tog fishing. After about 10 minutes of raking, I made a drop into a deep hole with a rig. A few seconds later, that signature tautog crunch reverberated up my braided line into the rod. Letting it take the bait for what felt like eternity, I set the hook. My rod bents over into a hula hoop and after the brutal, dirty, tug of war match that pits you against the line shredding boulders these fish call home that characterizes a tog fight, I flipped this fish up. An inch or two short of keeper size, I unhooked her and tossed her back.
I've said it before and will continue to say so, the average tog is pound for pound one of the hardest fighting fish out there. They don't take blistering long runs like an albie. Instead, they are slow and meticulous, using that big broomtail to dive under the rocks and cut your line. They know the terrain and will pit you against it.
Slowly but surely, Max, Victor, and I began to build the bite. We found a few holes and soon, started picking away at tog. All were short, but all scrapped better than short fish had any business of being. I'll take tog over fluke any day.
Several hours, 3 buckets of sandfleas, and countless short fish later, we began wondering where the big fish were. We witnessed several other anglers pull keepers out of the rocks throughout the day but we had no such luck.
Throughout the day, we witnessed several schools of bay anchovies and silversides on the prowl. However, as the wind picked up and the currents shifted to the outgoing tide, seagulls and gannets began seeing them as well. Looking up against the beach, a massive school of bait had been pushed up against the shore, larger fish boiling and crashing through, frothing white water while flocks of birds dove on them from above. An angler casting a metal towards the school sets the hook and his rod doubles over with a burst of drag. A minute later, a silver shape breaks the surface. The blues were here. Soon, an angler down at the beach hooked up on a popper.
I tied on a Mirrodean and started running towards the beach. Don't run on a wet jetty in Crocs. I soon ate shit and fell into a hole in the jetty, banging up my ribs and knee and getting the wind knocked out of me. After taking a couple minutes to recuperate, I was back on my feet again. By this time, the fish had gone total apeshit, pushing bait right up against the beach and splashing around on the surface. A cast with a Mirrodean, and a fish eats it right on the surface. After a few runs, I drag my 1st bluefish of the year onto the sand, bloody, angry, and spitting up fistfuls of silversides.
Soon, the birds and bait moved further out, concentrating on the tip of the jetty. From there on, it was lights out. I was casting Mirrodeans, Max and Victor were throwing metals, the blues were eating them both. No matter how I fished it, fast, slow, twitches, steady retrieve, there were 3-4 hungry bluefish fighting to eat it every cast.
Max and I broke out the pencil poppers, which is when all hell really broke loose. Almost every single cast, a bluefish or five would charge and smack it around. Most of them were too small to get hooked, or connected but then would get off, but we didn't care. An hour or two later, with heavy shoulders and sore arms, I had a loud smack that took my pencil under the surface. Connected and pissed off, this fish runs towards me as I reel as fast as I can to pick up slack, then runs back out. I drag this fish up onto the rocks, which ended up being my personal best bluefish, released to continue gorging on anchovies and hopefully later this fall, mullet and eventually bunker.
Always remember, follow the birds, follow the bait. Be patient, but have fun along the way. You can learn important life lessons waiting for a blitz.
Cheers, fishy people.
