Memories of our changing times

[Gerry Zagorski]

Great post.... Cut my salt water teeth on a night Bluefish trip on the Cock Robin in the late 80s in my early teens.

On the bait side, we used to fish for Stripers in the spring pretty much using Sandworms exclusively.

[Chris G]

Trying to get the pork rind off the bucktail was about as easy as getting a dried up Gulp off the hook.

Originally Posted by dales529

Lets not forget the "Gulp" of the 70's and 80's. PORK RINDS! I am sure its still used effectively today but back then it was like fish Hot Sauce (We put that S__T on everything). Either trolling nylons and spoons or bucktailing, the Pork Rinds in the jar were tipped on the lure and candy for Blues, Fluke and Weakfish.
They came with a hole in the top for the hook, a split tail and lasted all day.
I know many that used them offshore as well for Tuna and Makos

As many have stated the boat was never without a roll of surgical tubing in assorted colors for the tiger tails and banana Jigs (when it was cool to have a banana on the boat).

Spent many a day off Bay Head nailing big weaks slooow trolling.

[tunajoe]

Let's make this a simple one....back in the 80's and 90's & early 2000's when you were practically guaranteed to catch a yellowfin or longfin if you went out on a PB. Those days are sorely gone. For every great trip of tuna fishing this year on a PB, there were about 4-5 stinkers!!!

[bunker dunker]

talk about tuna.in the late 60's & 70's we could catch tuna at the Klondike.we used to catch yellowfin at the 6 mile lump.

[fish643]

Been fishing Salt Water more than 60 years and seldom reflected on it much till I saw this thread. As a boy I primarily used a Luxor Spinning Reel in the Surf (forerunner to Crack - later Van Staal); and for the most part Ocean City conventionals, then later a Penn 9M small conventional in the back bays.
Many great memories including fishing for Fluke with spreader bars in the back bays. Bait was primarily cut squid and killies. Like many of us, my father and grandfather taught me how to fish. At the time I was to young to appreciate what enjoyment this passion would lead to for the rest of my life; and would love an opportunity to relive one of my trips with them now that I am older and would appreciate it more.
Focusing on Fluke, my fondest fluke fishing memory happened many years later with my son when he was about 5 years old. I had a small aluminum boat and took him out on his first fluke trip to Paddy's Hole, behind Avalon. Long story short, I was drifting and had 2 rods out each side of the boat. I was looking down and cutting flounder belly strips, when I heard someone in a boat near me yell "look at your rod". When I did, the rod was doubled over with the tip in the water when I set the hook. I handed the rod to my son and after quite a battle for a 5 year old, he eventually got it to the boat and I netted a fluke near 7lbs. We got organized and did the drift again, sure enough the same "fire drill" with a fluke over 6lbs. Got back to Avalon Point Marina where pictures were taken ,by the Marina owner, that later wound up in the local paper.
My son could not wait to go the next day. When we got to the dock the owner asked my son if he was going to get "another big one today" ... With the enthusiasm of a young boy my son said yep, and sure enough he did....spoiled him for Fluke fishing to this day and he is now 36.
Fast forward to current times. I still love Fluke fishing the back bays, but now I jig Soft Plastics and enjoy enticing them into hitting. I have caught many bigger Fluke in the back bays since those two days over 30 years ago, but none as memorable.
Sorry for being long winded, this thread just took back to another place and time.

[NoWorries]

Originally Posted by bulletbob

I started using bucktails for fluke 40 years ago.. Really there's nothing new under the sun there.. Whole squid always worked for big fluke even decades ago.. We weren't worried about "catching keepers".. Everything was a keeper, and there were always way more than enough to go around.. However fishing pressure in NY/NJ has quadrupeled since then.
Back in the day, we used mackerel chunks/strips for whiting and ling.. Clams were never used... The Mackerel worked GREAT back then and I bet would work just as well today for ling, but few guys use it...

Weaks, was a sandworm on a 3x3 rig.. Drifted.. Deadly,, Later on we stretched the bait supply by using a sand worm with a big red plastic jelly worm.. That worked well.. If your sand worm was broken, or small and sickly, the weaks would smell it and still hit the jelly worm..

We would catch tons of cocktail size blues in the 80's using tea spoon handles, butter knife blades, pieces of car radio antennas filled with nails, and drilled for split rings and hooks.. That junk worked very well..

Flounder, we never bought bait when I lived in union beach.. We would walk the shore at low tide, dig clams, bloods, tapes, pick mussels, whatever.. Crack a few mussels. or clams, and 2 pounders started flying into the boat... year after year, anywhere in the bay. until they got decimated by draggers, IMHO...

We didn't fish much for stripers, there weren't any.. Well a few, but a 30 pounder made all the local papers...
We never missed them anyway.. Lots of other stuff to catch.
In May just around the Hook, you had a mixed bag of winter flounder and ling on the same rigs.. Imagine catching 1-2 pound flounder, and big fat ling, right near the beach, on a 1 handed rod with 1 0z of lead???
Or baseball bat whiting mixed with masses of ling, right between the channels off sandy hook.. Thats what we did in spring... Mackerel were everywhere as well.. As I said, we didn't fish for stripers much, but never missed them...
In those days, we didn't see that many porgies.. We caught them, but they were small.. Actually I think there are more and bigger porgies today... Didn't matter, the sea bass were everywhere, and easy to catch.. We didn't miss porgies really..

Triggers were few and far between.. I caught one on a wreck in Raritan Bay in the 80's a BIG one, maybe 18 inches or better.. Never saw one before that day.. All I remember is, it fought like hell, filleting it was akin to filleting a catchers mitt, and it was VERY good to eat...
Oh yeah eels.. eels by the hundreds, thousands, anywhere,, ANY salt or brackish creek, any salt or brackish river, any bay, anywhere all year except winter.. You COULD catch 100 on a good night, on ANY bait, just in Morgan Creek or someplace like that.. Big ones too... No more, at least from what I understand... No Croakers those days either.. We did have Spots some years, others not, Kings some years, others not, Blowfish some years, others not....
I dunno, times change, fisheries change.. I no longer live there, but when I did, I never noticed the intense every day pressure I see these days... I used to fish on week days mid summer, and any time before about 7 am, I was alone out there.. Today, there are armadas underway coming from every direction at 5 am.. No one to blame.. Just a LOT more people all after the same fish these days, and more commercial pressure as well..
We didn't need regulations 30-40 years ago, to be honest.. Sadly we do need them today... So many people out there..... bob

Yes times have changed but I disagree . Because of our changing culture less people are fishing during the year. When we had fish to catch and I mean tuna,whiting ,flounder,bluefish,sea bass, cod and others fishing was a year round thing. Now with seasons for everything catch limits and the dwindling economic times I think there are less fishermen. Boat registrations are way down since Sandy in NJ. I fish out of Manasquan inlet and have for over 30 years and Sandy Hook area before that since the 50's. Today fishing business is very different. Boats are bigger and coolers are generally NOT full of fish. And Marinas are NOT full of boat owners that fish !

[tombanjo]

Reading post after post about how much better the fishing was years ago gives me an even greater appreciation of that epic month long run of monster bluefish to 25lbs we had last year. That was a true blast from the past back to the future moment. The first day we found them (on the Golden Eagle) my jig was biten off. Grabbed another rod, same thing. Didn't want to waste time putting another jig on so I grabbed my noodle rod with 12lb test and a bait hook. Boom! OMG, what a battle! 30 mins later up comes the biggest blue I ever saw, 24lbs!

[Bison81]

Originally Posted by Gerry Zagorski

Great post.... Cut my salt water teeth on a night Bluefish trip on the Cock Robin in the late 80s in my early teens.

On the bait side, we used to fish for Stripers in the spring pretty much using Sandworms exclusively.

Me too! How about Hippy lures for snappers.

[bunker dunker]

hippies!!! what a lure.my dad would have us throwing the hippy for snappers and he would put them on live for fluke.i think it was like 73 or 74 at the pp inlet.if you used a live snapper you got a fluke.nice ones too 3-5 lbs.

[O'Connor]

Runs to trenton where we would fill our bait tanks in our trucks with herring. I kept my pen behind the Fishermans Den in Belmar. Early morning runs to the pen to "swim" a few baits off the jetty tips before work. (one time at the end of the season i bought a tank full of herring to shrewsbury rocks and caught a fluke over 5 lbs on every singe one 0f them)

surf fishing with Shedder crabs in the summer for bass. High noon in july off the beach and one bite after another when everyone though they were gone until fall.

live eels off the jetties @ night during the summer when everyone thought they were gone until fall.

I learned from some of the best striped bass fisherman the world has ever seen. I wish I paid attention more, but I was also young and single at that time and fishing took a back seat to chasing women...

can't forget ling and whiting on the along branch pier...and the overnight summertime cod trips they used to run out of belmar.

all great memories.