There is just one more week left before Labor Day and the fishing action for the captains of the Beach Haven Charter fishing Association continues to be hot and heavy. As is typical with late summer action, a wider variety of fish are showing up.
According to mate Max Goldman, the last week on the boat “Starfish” with Captains Carl Sheppard and Vic Bertotti “has been extremely action packed.” Many times, the boat is booked for two trips a day with catches of 70-90 fish a trip not uncommon. Making up the bulk of the catch have been black sea bass, fluke, weakfish, and the ever-present sea robins. One interesting trip caught a goodly amount of kingfish and weakfish which was a bit of a surprise to all.
On one trip Captain Carl had a group out who caught over 40 fish including sea bass, robins, blowfish, and a triggerfish. The sea bass ran up to 18-inches. Another trip produced all of the above plus some bluefish and a blacktip shark.
Captain Gary Dugan has been making regular trips on the “Irish Jig” fishing inshore reefs and structure. He reports he is averaging 4-5 keepers on each trip.
Captain Brett Taylor of Real Reaction Sportfishing reports that before the remnants of Laura came up, he had Joe Tocyloski, his son Steve, and friends Scott Boyer and Eric Boyer on a 5-hour ocean trip. They worked a bunch of different spots, but the fish were very tough on the bite. Despite that they eked out 4 keepers to 7-pounds as Eric landed a solid 27-inch fluke on a bucktail.