FishTales

Just when I thought I was done, a keeper bass pulled me back in

NOVEMBER 21, 2009

You can get just so much from a good thing

You can linger too long in your dreams

Say goodbye to the “Oldies But Goodies”

Cause the good ole days weren’t always good

And tomorrow ain’t as bad as it seems

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, keeping the faith

–Billy Joel

I’d been fishing on my own for two days, ever since Big Bob Wilsusen and my son Daniel left the beach following a lightening round of surfcasting on Thursday. I had a few small fish and but I was starting to worry that we had reached the end of the 2009 surfcasting season. Fish were being caught, but mostly rats. The fish were  still feeding on sand eels. No sign of big bait. Very few blues were caught.  On Friday, I  saw lots of short bass and only one keeper come up at Atlantic Ave. in the late afternoon. I had two short stripers myself, one right in front of Treasure Island Drive. The one at dusk,  on Truck Beach, was close to keeper-size: maybe 26-1/2 inches. My rough estimate was that for every 10 fish caught, nine were shorts and only one was a 28-inch or larger keeper. Anglers were dragging their lures slowly along the sandbars, sometimes dredging up skates and even small fluke. What was going on, I wondered?

Saturday morning, I searched from Truck Beach east of Napeague Lane all the way west to Georgia. I saw zilch. I stopped to cast a bit here and there, but I couldn’t raise a fish.  Things were dull as dirt. The weather was fine–near perfect, in fact. Water temperatures had cooled to somewhere around 57 degrees F.  A chilly NNW breeze kept the sky clear and plenty of sunshine raised air temperatures to the mid-50s by midday. A blazing orange sunrise at 645am competed for the natural beauty crown with a killer pink-and-gray sunset at 5pm the night before. It was a great day to be on the beach fishing, except for one important detail: where were the fish? I was beginning to think they had all moved west.

Who’s Zoomin’ Who?

At Atlantic Ave. around 7am,  one surfcaster leaving the beach volunteered: “You missed them. It’s all over now. At dawn, fish were jumping and lots of quality fish were taken off the beach.” A few minutes later, another angler offered a different view: “I’ve been here all morning and I have yet to see a fish of any sort caught.” At Harvey’s Tackle Shop, I relayed both stories and asked: “who was lying?” Said Sam Doughty: “they both were”. Too weird. I was starting to loose faith.  It seemed like my Saturday afternoon run was likely to be my last of the season. Perhaps the Napeague Lane Massacre of 11/12/09 was the season climax. Tick Tock. I thought I heard the Fat Lady clearing her throat in the wings.

After lunch, I rode the beach east to Napeague State Park where at least 40 surfcasters were into a slow but steady bite of small fish, punctuated every now and then by a keeper bass. I joined in, throwing an A17 Diamond jig with a green tube followed by  a green-feathered teaser. I got one small bass. Then I remembered the slightly heavier, A27 diamond jig that Sam Doughty recommended I buy at Harvey’s Tackle Shop a few hours earlier.

Faith-Based Fishing

Two casts after tieing on that lure, I got a no-nonsense hit a mere 2o yards beyond the sandbar where I stood. My rod bent more than any time in the last two weeks. Line tore off my reel as my drag protested. It was fairly certain I had a quality fish on and it didn’t take long to beach it. My fish was a 31-inch fatty that had been munching on sand eels.

The bite died shortly thereafter and I left the beach before dark to prep for dinner. The bass was oven roasted in white wine, lemon and olive oil, perfumed with basil, thyme and capers. Tono contributed risotto with chicory and carrots. I lit a fire and cranked up some Puccini. Natalie baked a few chocolate fudge cookies for dessert and the night was complete. I was ready to rise early and take one more shot in the morning.

My faith was restored.

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 21st, 2009 at 9:30 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.