The captains of the Beach Haven Charter fishing Association managed to catch good numbers of fish in the past week while fishing vastly different locations.
Captain Carl Sheppard of the "Star Fish" had a good day wreck-fishing on a trip with Chris Metric as mate. At one point they had over 60 fish in less than an hour with many sea bass which would have been keepers if not for the ban. They also picked up some nice sized porgies.
Captain John Koegler took the "Pop's Pride" out to the canyon on his last canyon trip of the year. The night chunking and jigging was slow although the anglers lost two deep jigs which were bitten off after heavy strikes. The troll produced one yellowfin tuna along with 9 small tuna-like fish which were later identified as "bullet mackerel."
Captain John found some recipes in a Japanese cookbook for bullet mackerel and reports they were delicious. This was his first experience with this species.
Captain Fran Verdi has been doing some striped bass prospecting on his own in preparation for his upcoming bass charters. He reports nice action around the bottom of the tides. He has mostly been fishing the incoming tide with bass from 33-39 inches in length. Most of his fishing has been in the Great Bay area.
Captain Fran says he has some open dates for charters and also spots on his open boat trips still available in November.
For additional information on the Beach Haven Charter fishing Association please go to www.fishbeachhaven.com