Porgies In May

[Bluefish]

once upon a time late May at Scotland was super mixed bag fishing: Porgy,seaBass,Ling, whiting and blackfish all together. back then Scotland was a big red lightship , line up the ships beacon tower on some part of the Highlands and some other marker on one of the golfballs and that was was how you knew you were on your spot. very different world than today.

[porgylber]

Originally Posted by bulletbob

Thats correct, and I could never really figure that out.. We do see big ones, but usually on deep water wrecks as the fish move offshore, or a few mixed in with average size fish in summer/fall..
The east end of LI has clouds of big porgies, and they are caught by guys in 14 footers, or even just standing on rocky shorelines.. Whats really weird is they are mostly on the LI side, and not so much on the conn side... bob

Very true. The largest porgies that I’ve ever caught inshore, were from Greenport, Long Island. All were monster sized, the size of which we normally only see offshore from NJ. Although having said this, there were days late last summer and early fall where larger porgies were caught in NJ waters.

Truth be told, I actually prefer to catch them a little smaller. I find that a 10 or 11 inch porgy on light tackle, actually puts up a better battle than a 14 or 15 inch specimen. Plus, the smaller guys taste better on the table! The meat is sweeter, with out the larger blood line that the bigger fish have.

[reason162]

Last year was a freak season for large porgies in the western sound...we weren't keeping any under 16" by end of June, and a few over 17 were caught. My friend jigged up an 18+ in Sept!

[bulletbob]

Originally Posted by porgylber

Very true. The largest porgies that I’ve ever caught inshore, were from Greenport, Long Island. All were monster sized, the size of which we normally only see offshore from NJ. Although having said this, there were days late last summer and early fall where larger porgies were caught in NJ waters.

Truth be told, I actually prefer to catch them a little smaller. I find that a 10 or 11 inch porgy on light tackle, actually puts up a better battle than a 14 or 15 inch specimen. Plus, the smaller guys taste better on the table! The meat is sweeter, with out the larger blood line that the bigger fish have.

Years ago, the big porgies were pretty rare in NJ.. We would catch "sand porgies" in the rivers and bays in Aug-Oct, but a 10 incher was big.. The small ones were much sweeter for certain.. We never missed them much because tog and sea bass were year round, and no bag or size limits.. Any good size porgies caught in the rocky areas off Sea Bright/Deal/Elberon were a bonus..

Personally, I think there is less competition for food and living space these days in their habitat, and they are very well adapted , and have rebounded nicely... bob

[Jigman13]

They're delicious raw, too!

[teddysclaw]

Originally Posted by bulletbob

Why not wait a few weeks .. By June the fish are dispersed throughout the Sound better, and you only need to go as far as City Island for Porgies...
Actually ,why not just fish for Sea Bass and Ling in May, and target the Porgies when they are in NJ waters nice and solid?... bob

I heard our seabass season is going to be shortened this year, so I was unsure if we would be able to target them in May or not. I didn't know that Porgy wouldn't be open in NJ this year. Thought they were opening it year round starting this spring, my bad. NJ is kind of in limbo with regards to regulations, so with a tentative target date of May 20th, I didnt' want to book a charter, and end up only being able to fish for ling. Thanks for the info guys, looks like I'll hit up the porgies in the Sound. And thanks for the recommendation on the boats Capt Lou,but thats way too far of a drive for us.

[Angler Paul]

Originally Posted by teddysclaw

I heard our seabass season is going to be shortened this year, so I was unsure if we would be able to target them in May or not. I didn't know that Porgy wouldn't be open in NJ this year. Thought they were opening it year round starting this spring, my bad. NJ is kind of in limbo with regards to regulations, so with a tentative target date of May 20th, I didnt' want to book a charter, and end up only being able to fish for ling. Thanks for the info guys, looks like I'll hit up the porgies in the Sound. And thanks for the recommendation on the boats Capt Lou,but thats way too far of a drive for us.

Porgies will be open year-round as soon as the NJMFC votes to do that, most likely at their meeting on 3/15. We are also likely to be able to liberalize our sea bass regulations but we will have to wait and see if the ASMFC accepts our methodology at their meeting on 3/20. All this and more was explained in my post "Important Fluke and Sea Bass Regulation Update".
Paul Haertel
JCAA Board Member/Past President

[Reel Class]

The last few years porgy fishing during the summer here in NJ has been pretty good. We tend to catch the 9-12" pretty consistently through October with some bigger ones mixed in. Last year we saw our biggest porgies in October when seabass reopened fishing wrecks in 80-120' - we had several porgies over 4#.

I also fished LI Sound twice last year with friends, once in May out of the City Island area and the other time in late August just before Labor Day out of Mystic, CT. The porgy fishing on the LI side in May is pretty good - the fish are everywhere but they seem to be not as concentrated as they get here. We can literally anchor the boat up on readings here in NJ and pound on them; there it's very different as you have to find some, drop chum, and get them going. The size on the LI side was pretty similar to what we see in NJ, but there are some true slab porgies mixed in. The trip to Mystic was a 2 drop trip, one of those was a few miles N of Montauk in the sound and we caught monster seabass with some average porgies on one spot, then on the other, we fished the Race up on the CT side, and had more jumbo seabass with more 11-14" porgies caught.

My point is this: If you want porgies early, say before July, I'd fish LI sound or Peconic bay. Those fish are there basically from May till the end of the summer. Our fishery gets going here just after July 4th, and it's almost just as good, so if you want to wait, you should. Best of luck!