Outdoors
Dave Sartwell
August 04, 2008 11:16 pm I throttled the Yamaha back and brought the boat to a stop. My friends dropped their lines over the side before I could even turn off the engine. There is no quarter given in this group. It's every man for himself. We had turned left coming out of Gloucester Harbor and driven some 26 miles at 120 degrees. Watching the chart and my GPS closely, we found the flat with a depth of about 265 feet that was surrounded by much deeper water. To the west the water was about 350 feet deep and to the east it dropped off quickly to over 525 feet. It seems no matter what fish we are going after and no matter where we are fishing, the secret always seems to be finding structure. The other mitigating circumstance is the 70-degree, 15-minute line. No nets can be set east of that line which means there are a lot more fish available to rod and reel fishermen. Now, it takes a bit to get out that far, but the ride is well worth the effort if you want to catch some really big ground fish. The wind was light, but enough to drift us across the surface at a fairly good clip. Because of that, we had to use 20-ounce weights to keep our rigs bouncing on the bottom. I was using a cod rig with two hooks and bright pink plastic minnows attached to them. On these hooks I sewed on some big chunks of clam. My friends were using somewhat similar rigs, with the common denominator being cutup clams. My friend Doc slammed into a nice fish almost as soon as he got to the bottom. He reeled and reeled, and then he reeled some more. It's a long haul to bring a fish up from the bottom. It is about a football field long. Finally he brought his fish to the surface. The first haddock of the day came over the rail. It is surprising how fat these fish are right now. This 24-inch beauty had a bulging belly and was in terrific shape. We dropped it into the bait well and went back to fishing. Doc caught the next fish as well. "They are just bumping it," came the advice from Doc. "Set the hook at the least bit of irregular feel." Following his advice I set the hook on the next tiny bump and felt the struggle at the other end. The Penn reel spun as I whirled the handle as fast as I could. Again, a really nice haddock came over the rail. The fishing slowed and I looked at the GPS. We had drifted off the flat and into deeper water. We had gone a lot farther than I had thought. I fired up the engine and returned to where we started. By this time the wind had subsided and the sea flattened out. We switched from 20-ounce weights to 12-ounce leads. As soon as we started fishing again we got hits. This time Doc reeled up a big cusk. Minutes later, my friend Steve brought in a haddock. My next hit was a serious bang. I set the hook and started reeling. This fish struggled all the way to the surface. We were rewarded with a huge 28-inch cusk. The fillets off this beauty would feed four for dinner. Over the next four hours we just drifted and fished, swapped stories of hunting and fishing adventures, ate lunch and fished some more. Our arms grew tired from reeling fish up from the depths. Unlike our last trip out when we saw lots of whales, only one showed up to entertain us. Off to the east, a huge school of football tuna slashed up the surface, chasing baitfish that were trying to escape their voracious attackers. At about 2:30 p.m. we rolled up our reels for the last time, washed down the boat, stored our gear and headed on in. Steering just north of the sun, we soon saw the purple haze that was the coast. Another great day on the ocean. Groaner The secret of fishing at the groaner outside Gloucester Harbor is to know when the seafood industry carts its waste out there and dumps it on the bottom. Once the waste hits the bottom, it scatters out a bit and all of the oils therein drift out to sea with the tide and currents. The fish come for miles to feast on this man-made largess. There is no unusual bump, bottom formation or blending of currents that brings them there. It's just waste dumped into the ocean at this particular spot. The concentration of fish presents fishermen with an opportunity to catch the large ones that come to the feed trough. Most folks anchor up and chum like crazy. Most fish prefer the fresher chum than that stuff on the bottom. Try fishing at different depths for best results. A free-lined fresh mackerel can be just the ticket on most days. Other than this man-made occurrence, the striper fishing has been very slow. Although there are still fish around, catching them can be a bit of a challenge. The boys fishing the flats in Essex, Ipswich and Newburyport are all reporting in that they are having to fish hard for a few takers. Night fishing with eels seems to be the best way. Shoreline fishing is slow as well. Again, night fishing seems to offer the best bet fishing opportunities. Try the islands and the rock formations off Manchester and around Salem Harbor. Again, fresh mackerel during the day and eels at night are probably the best bet.
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