Flukezilla!

First, shop news.

We have restocked the, what turned out to be, very popular “Stop Breathing My Air” sticker.  Grumpy Hisself apparently has some celebrity.  And Jenni Herrself (no relation to Grumpy Hisself) did an excellent job capturing that celebrity. 

We added a few new items to the online store.  The first two are similar.  For those who want to fish soft plastic stick baits or swim baits, but don’t want to use a jig head (because maybe you need to fish them higher in the water column), we have added Owner Beast Hooks to the site, both weighted and unweighted.  Now you have options on how to fish the Kettle Creek Shads, Sluggos, Gulp Jerk Shads, Fin-S Fish, Zoom Super Flukes and S&S Savage Shads. 

Another new item is the BKK Chimera Hooks.  They work in a similar application as the Owner Beast hooks, but instead of using a screw wire to hold the bait on, these you thread on and over a special bend in the hook.  This way of rigging works fine for all of the baits listed above, but for baits made with the super stretchy elastic plastic, like the stuff from Z-Man, this is the hook you want. 

We got in some nice, nearly indestructible (with normal use) rulers in the shop by Salty Bones.  They are 36 inches long, and a nice wide 2 ¼ inches which makes them easy to read, and easy to use.  They won’t twist up and get blown around as easily as the those tailor style measuring tapes.  And they come with pictures and short descriptions of fish on them, though we suspect most of you don’t need that.

In the shop, we just put out two new combos featuring custom built rods by Blackcloud Bob.  Check them out here:  https://www.facebook.com/reel/8136078486432643/?s=single_unit.  If you are interested in them, stop in the shop or reach out to us at the Contact Us page.  Don’t wait, because these won’t last long.

As far as the fishing report goes, it’s pretty much the same as the last report. 

The fluke fishing remains good, with the best fishing coming from the surf.  There are still some fluke in the bay, and there are fluke being caught on the nearshore reefs and wrecks, but if you want a nice fluke, the surf is the place to go.  And, in case this is your first fishing report, bucktails and Gulp! is the way to go.

There has been some sporadic bluefish catches along the beach too, and those fish are taking mullet or small pieces of cut bunker.

In the back bay, the blowfishing has been very good.  The boats are doing much better than the shore bound anglers.  Chumming with clam chum is the way to go.  Once you attract them to the boat, small bits of clam, squid or Fish Bites will catch them.

The snapper bluefish have shown up at the local docks.  Best bet to get them is to hang a spearing under a bobber with a snapper hook.  The crabbing at the docks has been good too, so you can do a combined crabbing/snapper trip, which is fun for everyone, but also a great way to teach kids the basics of fishing.

If any of that felt familiar, I will confess I cut and pasted it from the last report.  The only difference we have for this one is that the anglers fishing for blowfish are also catching spot.  They are a tasty saltwater pansfish that makes a nice snack/appetizer if you can get some bigger ones, and the smaller ones make great live baits for striped bass, big fluke, and big weakfish (assuming there are any around). 

Here are some notable catches

Our lead off picture and the one above are the same fish.  This monster was caught in the IBSP surf by Mike Wukek using Gulp!, and pulled the scale down to an impressive 9.55 pounds.  Nice fish Mike.

Not only does Ron Muccie, the nicest guy in custom plug building, make some great metal lipped swimmers and wooden poppers, but he also ties a mean teaser.  His great grandson Aiden had a blast with the bluefish on a teaser his great grandfather made him.

Ok, so everyone knows that I have fun at Ray’s expense at the end of almost every fishing report.  Jenni wanted to get in on the act for this one.  She sent me a picture of a recent fishing trip she took with Ray, and a fluke she caught.  At the time, she didn’t know Ray was in the background, doing, well, you’ll see.  Maybe this is why Ray did so poorly at the last fluke tournament.  This may also be why someone else at Grumpys, (no, not Scott.  No, Not Blackcloud.  No, not Jenni.  No, not me either…) decided to quietly throw their hat into the fluke tournament circuit.  That would be fine, but rumor has it he was trying to recruit some of Ray’s crew…