Fishing

The popularity of fly-fishing exploded in Quebec when the movie “A River Runs Through It,” starring Brad Pitt, was released in 1992.

The oysters I received 16 months ago, which barely filled a half-pint container at that point, had grown by Sept. 21 to over five inches in length in many cases. After cleaning, culling, and sorting, I had well over a bushel basket of tasty bivalves.

For those lovers of crab, it’s not too late to catch some. Good quantities can still be had over the next few weeks in various creeks, coves, and harbors, before they burrow in the mud and sand for their winter slumber.

There are plenty of bluefish by Jessup’s Neck, porgy fishing is solid in many areas, including the east side of Gardiner’s Island. Sea bass too, are mixed in the catch in the deeper water. Farther offshore, tuna — bigeye, bluefin, and yellowfin — remain plentiful, and at the Cartwright grounds south of Montauk, as well as the area near the Block Island windmills, fluke fishing has been good of late.

“Plenty of action around,” Sebastian Gorgone of Mrs. Sam's Bait and Tackle in East Hampton said of the local fishing scene. “You name it, you can probably catch it.”

Lucky enough to once again secure media credentials to cover the U.S. Open tennis tournament, I needed to do a bit of fishing myself to see who is really hooked on fishing.

“Lots of weakfish are around, plus there are porgies, blowfish, fluke, sea bass, snappers, kingfish, and even some black drum being caught,” reports Sebastian Gorgone of Mrs. Sam’s Tackle in East Hampton.

It's news that neither a commercial bayman nor those who enjoy bay scallops wanted to hear: For the fourth summer in a row, there has been a significant die-off of mature bay scallops in local waters.

For boat owners, the fact that diesel has dipped below $6 a gallon is welcome news, even if it's still expensive. As any owner of a power boat knows, fuel is just one part (actually a very small part) of the overall expense of the craft. Other expenditures like dockage, insurance, maintenance, and other factors, significantly overshadow the bill at the fuel dock.

Despite the excessive-heat warning from the National Weather Service, our intended quarry was a species that’s more recognizably caught in the bone-chilling winds and cold of winter: the iconic codfish.

“The fluke bite has really picked up over the past week or so,” Paul Apostolides said. “Nice fish up to 10 pounds have been taken.”

Fishermen can be a rather superstitious lot. Many have unusual habits or a routine that is indelibly ingrained based on past history — sometimes on fact but more likely fiction.

Thirty years later, Patty Eames says it was “a day that’s right here at the front of my brain.” She was one of many locals and luminaries who were arrested at Indian Wells Beach in Amagansett on July 28, 1992, during a storied protest that found the East Hampton Baymen’s Association in open defiance of a 1990 state ban on haulseining for striped bass off the ocean beaches.

Lobsters grow by molting. It's basically a process in which they struggle out of their old shells while simultaneously absorbing water which expands their body size. Marine scientists estimate that molting occurs about 25 times in the first five to seven years of a lobster's life. Once shedding their old shells, lobsters put on the feed bag in a big way.

Serena Vegessi Schick, who died last fall, touched many in Montauk who work on the water, having spent years in her youth and early adulthood, as well as the final few months of her life, working the deck of the Bones netting or filleting fish, untying tangles, or just patiently helping youngsters catch the first fish of their lives.

So far this year, Mother Nature has served up a curveball, as bunker showed up on schedule but dispersed rather quickly to parts unknown.

Once again, the weather gods, despite sunny skies, spoiled our plans, as a gusty 30-knot breeze from the northwest would make fishing difficult and downright uncomfortable.

On the local fishing scene, the action has generally been good in many locales, and anglers of all ages have taken part.

Want to catch a striped bass? Then Montauk is clearly the place to be right now.

I decided to try a few quick drifts for striped bass in Plum Gut last week. The bass, according to reports, have been running in great quantities there.

In baseball parlance, the fishing season is now formally in the bottom of the ninth inning. There are two outs and two strikes on the batter at the plate, or in this case a fisherman with a rod and reel in hand. For my part, I did not want to strike out by not fishing one last time before the end of the year.

The other night, I came across my first fishing logbook, started back in 1978, in which I began to inscribe my saltwater exploits when I was 15 years old. Back then I considered it a chore to take time to make notations of success or failure in my fishing excursions and wondered how it would ultimately serve me. But now I finally know.

With my boat prematurely out of the water for the season with various and costly engine issues, I have to find other vessels to fish on. Many friends have already hauled out their crafts, so I’m resigned to fishing on open boats, and that’s just fine with me. Two weeks ago, I took passage on the Peconic Star 3 out of Greenport for blackfish. It is skippered by the ever-youthful Capt. Speedy Hubert, he of the age of 84. Spry and energetic as ever, he anchored us up on a wreck off Horton’s Point in Long Island Sound. I had not fished that area in probably over 35 years. It was nice to be back.

Rick Pickering, the owner of Ship Ashore Marina in Sag Harbor, broke the bad news: “The turbocharger on the engine of your boat needs to be rebuilt, or we can get you a new one.”

After a few weeks of incessant gusty winds, the weather gods who rule from the clouds high above finally provided anglers with a much-welcomed reprieve for several extended days of very fishable conditions, a rare occurrence by November marine weather standards.

I was determined to find out for myself if the dire prediction of another terrible scallop season was in fact true.

Saturday’s marine forecast looked promising for a change. The bushel of green crabs that I bought two weeks ago would finally be put to good use for a few hours of blackfishing in and around the Plum Island area.

As the gusty east winds finally abated last week after a four-day blow, the opening of blackfish season was eagerly welcomed by a multitude of anglers.

A three-day blow over the holiday weekend put a severe damper on things for those intent to wet a line.

Sadly, I’ve not been fishing on my boat in well over a month, and my 30-foot Nova Scotia-built craft is high and dry on land while it receives a new stern deck.