... seems devoid of sea life right now.

Yesterday afternoon trolled from Skunk Bay to Pilot Point with only 1 small shaker. No flounder, no nuthin.

Anyone else have any luck?

Granted, the fishing might have been better in the morning with an outgoing tide, but the fog didn't break til about 11:00.

So today, change the oil in the big boat and put it away, and start preparing the Springer Boat for the CR.

It was slow all week. My brother went out Thursday and fished for a few hours with nothing to show for it. I'm not too surprised though. PNP got a TON of pressure for 3-4 weeks in a row. A couple of the weekend days,we counted at least 60 boats. I wonder if it affected the fishing?

I was out in the fog at PNP yesterday as well. VERY slow. We fished it hard and my dad managed to get a nice nine pounder. Our only solid bite for the day. Out of all the boats there, only saw one other fish caught. Talked to a guy at the Kingston launch that fished Appletree and Jeff Head. Said he didn't see a single fish caught out of ~30 boats. Sounds like we were very lucky to get our fish.

SQ,

Been slow all over... strange year!

Fished the Beach Tavern Derby yesterday and released the 3rd place fish- a whompin 5#'r. Who would have ever thought a 5# fish would have been in contention?

Largest fish worth $900 was a monster at 8.3#!

Where are the fish this year?

We were out this weekend and didn't see or hear of a fish anywhere near PT. We've averaged less than 1 fish per trip this winter... First time that's ever happened. We always used to get at least one each time. Plus, the number of shakers is pretty low, too.

I'm wondering if the smolt releases were down for this year's cohort?

Area 9 has plenty of Blackies right now...just got to know where to find the candlefish and the blackmouth are right behind them. Went out yesterday and spent 4 hours trolling the 90 - 180 ft. standard stuff and then after the beers kicked in we found ourselves in 74ft of water...uh, oh too shallow..so we pulled up the riggers to 70 and 60 feet and spanked our first fish. 9lbs with scuffed gillplate. Spent another 2 hours screwing around in the shallow stuff and hit one 26" and another about 8-9lbs. I used to slay fish in the same area in March and they were always eating candlefish in there...same thing going on right now.

The fish are there, just not in their usual hiding spots, folks. I used to flat out slay blackmouth when I had my Glasply, now I'm a river junkie, but I still love the saltwater and it was great to get out on such a beautiful day. Showing a rookie friend of mine how to fish and run his new boat and he is hooked for life now, heh heh

My e-mail is down so please don't ask for specifics, just do your homework and figure out where the major candlefish spawning grounds are in area 9 and stay SHALLOW. Good luck...

Justin

That's good to know Kid Sauk. The last couple of trips have been a bust for me in 8-2, including Sunday.

thanks for the tip Justin

Try the SW corner of Possession Bar at the horseshoe. Plenty of fish there 90-140 feet down and NO BOATS! I don't know where everyone is but we limited by 10 yesterday with fish up to 10.5 lbs.

HEY KID,

Speaking of the IRS, I ran into Marion the other day. Hurry up and get yer email runnin.

Cig

Hey Cigar, e-mails back up. Had my SMTP...etc etc screwed up because I forgot the "A" in COMCAST ooops

BTW, Cigar, speaking of Marion....we got those blackies in the exact same spot he hit his mid-high teener years ago. Shallow water in flounder central Sh!tloads of candlefish in there....next time I'm gonna jig too!