Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Fishing Aboard The Captain Al - Point Lookout, NY

I took a little fishing trip yesterday. Sadly, my uncle who was here from Florida, decided not to come along for the fun.

I went over to Point Lookout, NY with every intention of going out on the Super hawk, for the first time ever but they did not sail. Instead, I had to switch over to the Captain Al at the adjacent mooring. The Super hawk had a total of 2 fares aboard, me and another guy and the Captain Al had about 30 or 40 paying fares. Goes to show you that building a good reputation for yourself goes a long way to assure loyal customers. I usually go out on the Captain Al but wanted to try what I believed was a faster boat, the Captain Al had a terrible reputation as a slow boat, a really slow boat, but a great reputation otherwise. Much to my surprise, i found out they had gotten a new engine installed, last year, and I must admit the Captain Al is now fast, if not a speed demon among local party boats.

As usual, the Captain Al's captain got us to productive fishing grounds. Within 5 minutes of leaving the dock, we were hauling in Sea bass one after the other, most very good sized too. The sad thing was that this year, NYS DEC changed the regulations and the open season on them is not until mid June. Throughout the day, I caught at least 14 of them. I also caught one blackfish, also not in season, two dogfish (both thrown back), a skate or two and a conger eel. In addition, I caught 17  Ling, I threw two of them back because they were too small for me although there is no size limit on them. Ling are very tasty - some of the finest tasting fish the oceans have to offer, in my opinion. At first I was not getting nearly as many as others, when they had ten ling, I had two. Seems my rod was too stiff, a complaint I have not heard much lately at my age! A big hat tip to fisherman John who was next to me at the rail. After he told me that his thought on why I was not catching as many was my rod's stiffness, I decided to ask the crew to set me up with a boat pole that was lighter action than my own. I started to catch immediately and surpassed some others who had had more than me before the switch. I had one other keeper fish, a 5-6 pound bluefish. I had a ling on the hook and the bluefish took the second hook on the way up. The sudden change in action from the almost nothing slight tug of the ling, to the zig-zagging run of the blue was pretty exciting.

I cooked all the ling shortly after I got home last night. They were delicious and we have leftovers. As for the bluefish, if the rain lets up some later today, it is going on the BBQ for tonight's meal.

I have to say that the mates aboard the Captain Al, yesterday, were exceptional. They were 100% attentive to the fares and did not fish themselves. They were there to help, such as to refill you bait cup or with a gaff hook or net if you needed it, even when you did not call them over. That is truly attentive. They work mostly, if not completely, for tips and they acted accordingly. The captain was also very good, he did not spare the diesel fuel but moved from spot to spot to assure a good long day of reeling em in. I am going to estimate that the average catch of keeper fish was about 20 fish per fare. Some probably had up to 30 keepers. If you include the sea bass that had to be thrown back, double those figures. Besides the ling, sea bass, bluefish (mine was the only one), blackfish, dogfish, conger eel and skates that I caught, others also caught the same as well as a lone codfish (the pool winner and I think my blue was bigger but blues are not allowed int he pool), some winter flounder, and some porgies (scup). I think, in all, I had about 37 fish. It was a great day and the only disappointments were that my son (he had school) and my uncle were not along to enjoy it with me. My son's absence being the bigger disappointment by far.

All the best,
Glenn  B

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