The offshore canyon fishing for the boats of the Beach Haven Charter fishing Association has been very productive as long as the weather permits them to make the trip.
Captain Bob Gerkens took his boat the "Hot Tuna" out on Saturday evening to the Toms Canyon on a last minute split charter group. He set the trip up with the weather forecast good for Saturday, but deteriorating conditions after that for a few days. The group returned to dock with the flags flying for four different canyon species. Overall they had four yellowfin tuna up to 62 pounds, a wahoo, a mahi-mahi, and a catch and release of a white marlin. Captain Bob reports that angler Bob Swenson of Burlington, NJ, did the mandatory swim after catching his first white marlin. Fishing with Bob were Scott Damiano of Parsippany and Dave Swarter of Souderton, Pa. The capable mate was Bob Lefevre.
Captain John Koegler had some good trips over the past week on the "Pop's Pride." One afternoon trip on an ocean wreck resulted in six keeper sea bass along with 25 throwbacks. There were lots of pound and half bluefish in the area, and they kept seven along with one 19-inch fluke. It was unusual fishing in that most of the sea bass were over 200 yards away from the wreck's actual structure. Another day strong winds kept him from going into the ocean, and he fished the inlet. His party boated 6 keeper weakfish and released another 8. They also boated quite a few fluke, but only one was keeper sized. They rounded out their catch with six bluefish to 5-pounds. They also picked up several spot on the large fluke hooks.
Captain Carl Sheppard on the "Starfish" has been treating his parties to some exceptional fishing on the wrecks and drifting for fluke. Now that the summer is waning, he is catching larger fish. He had the Donny Moreno family out to the wrecks and in four hours they caught over 80 fish. The largest was a 4-foot silver eel, the heaviest a 6.5-pound fluke, while the triggerfish seemed to be the most fun.
Additional information on the association can be found at www.BHCFA.com or by calling 877-524-2423.
