Inshore Tuna
Bluefin fishing on the Cape slowed a bit this week from the white-hot bite last week that seemed to coincide with the new moon. Captain Eric Stewart of the Hook Up in Orleans, MA, managed 2 knockdowns on a trip this week, landing one of them while trolling splash bars east of Chatham. Stellwagen Bank continues to give up some larger tuna, but with calm water conditions, fish have been skittish. By all accounts, surface activity has been fizzling out by about 9:00 am.
The Shore Catch crew continues to find good schools of bluefin tuna off the Jersey Coast. Jigging has been accounting for the catches with Stingo PBJ, Jersey Jay Tonno and hammered diamond jigs getting most of the bites.
The lumps off Cape May, the 28-Mile Wreck, the Cigar and the 750-Square all gave up yellowfin this past week for anglers trolling with spreader bars and naked and skirted ballyhoo.
Canyons
Yellowfin tuna numbers continue to be decent, but the vast majority of fish are still in that 20- to 25-pound range. A few better yellowfin have been coming from deep water well off the shelf, fish in the 60- to 80-pound range. Good reports came from a number of Canyons this week. Down south Spencer and Carteret gave up tuna and billfish. Up north, Fish Tails had fish, Atlantis did as well.
No matter where you go mahi seem to be all over the place, hovering under just about every pot or piece of debris. When the yellowfin seem elusive, anglers have been pitching killies on light tackle to floating objects to get some mahi in the fish box.
Most bites have come on the troll, and the overnights have been on the slow side, except for one report from a boat fishing in the deep off Carteret that managed a mess of yellowfin chunking just before first light. Other than that, mainly sharks caught at night and one.
OTW contributor Jon Pilcher had a good night in the canyons himself last week. He stuck to trolling well after the sun set and was rewarded with a 250-pound bigeye tuna. After that, he set out some swordfish baits and managed a broadbill as well! This was off the edge between the Fish Tails and Atlantis.
The canyon waters are hot, temperature wise, and anglers are having very little trouble finding that cobalt-blue Gulf-Stream water. This has also brought some exotic species into the mix such as wahoo and blue marlin. Another OTW contributor Larry Backman caught a 100-pound billfish this past week, and he wasn’t exactly sure what the pedigree of the fish was. Though he was able to rule out white marlin, there is a chance the fish is either a juvenile blue marlin or a roundscale spearfish (a.k.a. hatchet marlin). The only way to know for sure is to check the distance of the vent from the anal fin. Either way, a 100-pound billfish in the Northeast is a great fish, no matter what species.