This past Sunday’s severe storms and power outages postponed my charter from early this week until next. So, I had to take advantage of yesterday’s weather window and had my friend Paul join me for the first Montauk run of the season.
Reports from the area showed the fish spread out from the eastern to the southern spots but my latest intel said go south. So, we began drifting some of the medium range drops that produced many large fish for us last season with light tides and only a 2 oz. bucktail needed to hold bottom. As is often the pattern there were tons of small to medium size Sea Bass and we culled 3 keepers from the mix. Paul then lands a nice 22” Fluke but the action on the flatties seems to die after that.
We make a shift further south and after boating a few Ling, I get a strong thump and a few minutes later the largest Fluke of my season, a fat 8.5# fish is flopping on the deck. Unfortunately, that was the only Fluke landed here so after another hour’s effort we moved back inshore to finish the trip. Here we managed one more 20” Fluke but the quality of Sea Bass on this drift was impressive. We filled out our limit quickly with 3 last fish all in the 3.5-4# class. So, I guess today it was quality over quantity.
I will be running a local “Bass on Bass” trip tomorrow as well as my rescheduled trip next Tuesday. I have complete confidence the Montauk quantity will soon match the quality and there are several good dates still available for July, a bit fewer in August. Just give me a call if you want to get out.
Capt. Mike
516-317-5423 cell
[email]plumgut@optimum.net[/email]
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