Reel Class Saturday 8/30 Bluefish Beatdown + Pollock, Skipjack, Bonito and Fluke!

[Reel Class]

Had Pete Albrecht and crew on today for a "bend the rods" kinda trip. Talked it over with them last night and we agreed we'd start out with bluefish, try to troll up some speedsters, then finish the day fluking.

Broke the inlet just after 7 and got out to our spot by 745 or so. (this is the first time we've fished this "area" for BLUEFISH since 2 weeks before Sandy) Got the chum in the water and chunks on the hooks and we had bluefish on in minutes. Held between 1-3 on at a time - some breakoffs, some pulled the hook, but the action was awesome and the fish were all gators of 10-15# -- it was odd though that they looked like springtime racers (long bodies big heads and nothing in their stomachs) - we never used to see them around here in August (???)... The big surprise was Pete's 20# Pollock he nailed on a bunker chunk; real fat one -- must've come off the bottom 20' or so to get the chunk but gave Pete a real good tussle on the MXL but Joe sunk the gaff in after a solid 5 minute fight.

By 10:30 the guys had enough of the bluefish and the box was full, so we got the trolling gear out and hit our bonito spot a few miles away and had a few right away on feathers and zukers, and also one nice skipjack, but that was it. Made several other passes but didn't even get another knockdown.

For the last hour or so we tried fluking inshore but the south wind was already screaming and all we caught was a few shorts and a birds.

Real good day with a great group of guys - wound up keeping about 2 dozen blues for Pete's smoker, about a half dozen bonito, the skippie, and the nice Pollock. It was also great getting back to that bluefish spot that has been so good to us and the rest of the fleet over the years and actually having my customers catching BIG summertime bluefish (we missed them last year!!) -- Thanks again for coming out today guys!!!