Reports
- 160 lb Bluefin and 7 Yellowfins on the Hooked Up II today
- Tuna Fishing Report for August 1st-5th
- Outfished by Center Consoles But Still a Great Day
- Blue Fin Tuna Fishing Report
- Updated report on the Hooked UP II
- Tuna report on the Hooked Up II
- 25 Yellowfin, TRIED for Bluefin, Marlin-Big Eye on 55 Hooked Up II
- A very detailed report on new world class jigging-popping tackle on the 55 Hooked Up II
- My thoughts on spinners versus conventionals for jigging those 80-175 lb. Bluefins
- August 24, 2008 Report for the past few days.
7/19/2008 We found inshore bluefin in the 100 lb range and no boats within 10 miles of us
2008-07-19
We were targeting slob bluefins in the 150-200 lb range as we were fishing the Mid-Atlantic Tuna Tournament the last few days. We did not want to go thru the light leader thing again and lose a big fish with money on the line so we pretty much trolled although we did try chunking with sardines for a few hours at the end of the day but far away from the well known lumps everyone has been fishing lately to the South. We basically ran much farther to the North than we have been fishing this summer to date to avoid the boat traffic. There are some nice sized bluefins in the 55-57 inch range closer to the ports of Ocean City, NJ points North but not in the substantial numbers that are down to the South along the 20 line. We caught them on trolling wwwwwwback on islander-ballyhoo combo's and a couple chunking also. We only had a few but they were there and we if we would have been able to be there at daybreak I really believe we would have slammed them, but with a 7:30 am lines in the water tournament rules, I think it hurt our chances somewhat. We did boat one 56 inches and 96 lbs and let a few others go alive and healthy on circle hooks using 130 mono leader with 32 lbs of drag which resulted in about a 15 minute fight while trolling. The chunked fish were all on 50 lb floro with sardines. Not red hot by any means and over all nowhere near our 20 fish days down south on jigs of the last few weeks but still some pretty decent bluefin fishing. On Friday's trip we fished further offshore way above the tip of the Elephant Trunk and pounded the 30 fathom line on the temperature break with nothing to show except one Mahi-Mahi. Thursday's trip produced the best as we stayed more inshore and worked the 20-30 fathom lumps almost 20 miles north of the popular southern locations and marked tuna on many, many lumps with the majority being a little smaller than what we have seen to the south lately where we did catch tuna in the 100 lb range on Thurday trip but these were not the size we were looking for while tournament fishing. We only saw one boat within 10 miles of us the last couple of days and we covered a whole lot of territory trolling. None of the lumps we fished have names and you have to explore a good bit and when you find the sand eels on the bottom, the bluefin should be too far away. For those interested we were no where near the 750 Square, Cigar or 28 Mile Wreck.
Capt. John