The Mid-Atlantic Sportsman: Mid-Atlantic Fishing Report!

Offshore Ocean:

Bluefin fishing is still very good on all the popular inshore spots off of NJ, DE and MD. Trolling skirted ballyhoos, spreader bars, daisy chains and cedar plugs is a popular way to catch these bluefins. Some boats have also switched over to chunking and are finding good success on these big tuna.

There was a great yellowfin and bigeye bite in the Washington and Norfolk Canyons this past week. Trolling, jigging and chunking are producing both Yellowfins and Bigeyes.

Mahi Mahi and white marlin are also being caught with increasing regularity. Wahoo reports have also picked up in the past week. This is a fun time to be offshore with the big variety of fish available to catch. Boats are also catching tiles when they decide to deep drop for them.

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Inshore Ocean:

The Delaware tog season opened back up this past week. Anglers fishing the inshore wrecks should be scoring on a mix of sea bass, tog, trigger fish and flounder.

Deep water flounder fishing are reporting good action on big flatties tight to structure. Big bucktails with gulp and strip bait is a popular way to fish for these big flounder.

Inshore shark fishing is still very good. While this is mostly all catch and release this can be a fun way to catch big, strong, drag pulling fish. Expect to catch browns, duskies, spinners and the occasional hammer head while inshore sharking.

Chesapeake Bay:

Live lining for stripers continues to be very good in the upper and middle sections of the Chesapeake.

The lower end of the bay has been reporting slow striper fishing, but there have been a good amount of big speckled trout and even some big redfish caught.

Bottom fishing for croakers, spot, white perch and kingfish continues to be good up and down the bay.

Bluefish have begun to show up in force. These blues will often tear up the live spot being live lined for stripers. They can be caught trolling, and chunking.

Spanish mackerel should show up anyday now in the lower bay.

Crabbing is still up and down all over the bay. Some areas are better than others, but it is still slow compared to where it should be this time of the season. Hopefully with this break in the rain the salinity levels go back up in the rivers and this helps the crabbing.

Delaware Bay:

Flounder fishing has started to improve in the DE Bay. Cut bait and gulp fished on flounder rigs is producing the most fish.

Croakers, spot and kingfish are still all over the bay. While many of these fish are too small to keep there are some nicer fish around.

Big sharks are still all over the bay. These are fun to catch but all browns, duskies and sand tigers must be released.

Delaware Bay crabbing has been slow as well.

The crabbing in the back bays of NJ and DE has been good.

Freshwater:

We have reached the dog days of summer in terms of fresh water fishing. Many ponds are filled with lily pads and weeds making fishing more difficult, however using surface lures and weedless baits can still draw lots of strikes and catch good numbers of bass, pickerals and even crappies.

If you have any pictures or reports send them to dtmasportsman@yahoo.com so I can post them up!

Tight Lines,

Dave