Inshore Bite

Posted on June 12th, 2021

Check the vid for Father’s Day gear available at Atlantic Tackle.

The wind was blowing today folks…..hard.  And this morning it was that cool, misty rain…it sucked.  By the time this afternoon rolled around however, it was sunny and warm and the water in the back bay was pretty clean so even though I didn’t get any ocean fishing reports I did get a couple from the guys that had a good inshore bite.

Captain John Prather of Ocean City Guide Service had a nice day today with some keeper flounder for his groups and even a keeper sized rockfish that was caught at the route 50 bridge.

Captain Jason Mumford of Lucky Break has been having some great luck with the flounder and now that the water has cleaned up a little it should stay that way.  Captain Jason put his guys on three nice keepers this afternoon.

We are starting to see a few more bluefish in the Ocean City Inlet and route 50 bridge area with some fish as big as 35″.  Captain Wayne Blanks of Bayside Guide Service found this bluefish for an angler on this afternoon’s trip.

Anglers on the Miss Ocean City had a good day of flounder fishing with some keeper sized fish coming over the rail for anglers on all trips today.

Clean water conditions help bowfishing odds too and today Captain Marc Spagnola of Dusk to Dawn Bowfishing took full advantage of it by putting his shooters on the meat.

Blake Gunther found a couple of keeper flounder today while fishing the rocks around Martha’s Landing and the commercial harbor.

From the desk of Captain Monty Hawkins:

Plenty of reef building work going on in this nasty weather. Got an email from the big boss at Gillis Gilkerson asking about pyramid molds and did I have any.. 

“Why sure we do! Yes Sir!”

He seemed to like the idea of using wash-out from big cement jobs—what would have been cleaned out of a truck onto a spill pile and making use of it. 

Mate Vic ran a bunch of molds out to em. Foreman on one job, a fisherman, was especially jazzed about it. Said it would save the company money because they wouldn’t have to truck away the spill pile when it grew too large.

Glad to have em on board. 

Then Nico checked in. Wanted to pick up the St. Croix rod and Ambassador reel he’d won in last Sunday’s Benelli Reef Raffle drawing. This is the guy who won our grand prize drawing for 2020 and donated it straight back! 

..so he gets home and buys $200.00 more of raffle tix! 

That’s getting it done right there! 

Need to raise about $35K more for a project with two tugboats we’ll sink at the Queen reef in honor of Richard Arnold & his Wife. They’ve been strong supporters since the late 1990s.. 

To bolster the weekly drawings Walter Moore donated a ticket on my boat. Haven’t set a schedule for when just yet, but some Sunday soon we’ll see who’s coming fishing with me. Ticket is for a round trip fare only. One way trips, (especially popular with mothers of teenage boys and wayward husbands,) have to be negotiated separately. 

We also got a bunch of ‘stocking stuffers’ from Tackle Rep Ben (and multi-talented tog slayer) & Atlantic Tackle. While there I bought a sweet Shimano Trevala rod – looks about perfect for sea bass/fluke. I paired it with a Diawa 15H Saltist. Loaded with 30 or 40lb braid I anticipate it will be a hard combo to beat in the ‘off the shelf’ division. We’ll give that rig away Sunday, July 4th..

Had to put that ‘division’ split in there because mate Brian is building one of his custom rods for our Sunday raffles. I expect we’ll see it come mid-September or so. 

For this Sunday’s drawing, June 13th & as promised, first place will be a complete porthole off the Campedore, a WWII German war prize MD sank at the Queen Reef on the mid 1990s. At the time of its sinking the yacht was said to have been used by Hitler himself. Probably could be substantiated if you had a mind. It’s just a cool porthole! 

Second & third place is a t-shirt every week. Know anyone who wants to sweeten the weekly drawings? You have my email! Haven’t had a dinner in two years, let’s make it a great raffle! 

I haven’t checked in with Bear Concrete lately, but Atlantic Concrete in Dagsboro had a dozen pyramids to add to the stockpile. Walter and Vic picked em up. Will start taking two on my fishing trips every day plus our blocks. I prefer to take closer to 50 pyramids in one shot – build a nice reef set in one trip – but it’s high summer and unlikely to be scheduled soon. 

Tomorrow before lunch we’ll pour a couple — do some backyard reef building. Email if you’d like to help. Just one or two more folks will be plenty. 

Hopefully we’ll be back to fishing after that! 

Stay tuned for the Hardy Boys mystery “The Case of the Missing Pyramid Molds..” Turns out well as all the Hardy Boys stories did. Would turn out fantastic if we could bring Kinsley Construction on as a pyramid builder. I hear tell they’ve a LOT of lost concrete among their dozens of cement trucks.. 

I honestly believe we could put white marlin back atop the Jackspot again if we recreated our once vast marine & estuarine   hardbottoms.

Let’s Build Some Reef! 

Cheers!

Monty