Posted on June 17th, 2023
We’ll have final results on the 3rd Annual Tuna and Tiaras tournament tomorrow as tournament directors count the money and finalize who won what. I can tell you that there were some really nice fish caught today and there were some major changes to yesterday’s leaderboard.
The Roncito with Captain Al Rittmyer and crew weighed the largest tuna of the tournament and one of the largest bigeye tuna that I’ve seen this year when they weighed a beauty of a 183 pounder. Thanks to Bill Pino of Squidnation and Otter Tails for the pic!
The crew of the Fish in OC charter partner Pumpin’ Hard with Captain Mike Burt and crew fired 191 pounds of tuna onto the dock at the Ocean City Fishing Center and took first place in both the Heaviest Stringer category and the daily stringer category.
Reel Chaos with Captain Anthony Matarese had a great Tuna and Tiaras with the crew.
The Wrecker with Captain Bobby Layton at the helm had a nice bigeye today as well with this nice 144 pounder caught in the Wilmington Canyon.
James Michael and his crew of Captain Bill, John Morton, John Walker and Chris Shields saw some good fishing with four 100 pound bigeye tuna from the Baltimore Canyon.
The OC Girl had some nice inshore trolling with some skippies and some Spanish mackerel.
Jordan Helsel and his crew had a good day of inshore trolling as well with blues, bonita and Spanish mackerel.
Matt Stauch was fishing on his Reel Strong out of Sunset Marina when he caught a limit of flounder up to 5 pounds on natural bottom in the ocean.
Rich Daiker and Reece Schindler had a great day with a 24″ flounder and a 9 pound bluefish at the route 50 bridge.
Owen West caught and released this big 40″ rockfish while fishing the route 50 bridge last night.
Brian Zeigler, Faith Rosenberg, Frank Biesecker, Jacob Zeigler, Grant Dohner, John Dohner, Josh Rosenberg and Lance Biesecker had a great day of fishing at the route 50 bridge landing 8 nice bluefish up to 10 pounds.
Tyler Macpherson used the Deadly Tackle Deadly Double to catch some flounder just south of the route 50 bridge.
Captain Chris Mizurak of the Angler reported some good fishing for sea bass today with a couple of flounder mixed in.
Captain Monty Hawkins of the Morning Star is seeing some pretty big sea bass and doing some great work for the OC Reef Foundation.
Perfect setup to give the fleets from several ports a serious butt whoopin this day. Weatherman said light to moderate NW winds would diminish by noon.
Did this time. Right saucy for a while then piped down. Capt Rick always called it a ‘trap’ – forecast would get you offshore then get ugly with two or three times as much wind as called for. Every couple years there’s a bad one; a wind so hard you’re not sure everyone’s coming home..
No such as that today.
Jessica from St. Mary’s County did the deed on our reef blocks today. A young reef – new: it’ll be a while before fish and growth colonize in any amount. From among dozens of spots built from my boat’s transom there are none that sidestepped this beginning phase.
Her contribution gave a mighty splash and away we went
..to find sorely uncooperative cbass!
Jayminy!
Fish stacked 35 feet
Yawn.
One takes a jig, a cut bait; minutes crawl past – piece of clam. No standout method.
Fish harder.
Pretty ones even if they are slow coming.
Hoping for that part of the day with a hot bite.
Nope.
WorkWorkWork.
Wind laid down though.
Nice ride in.
Another load of pyramids from Bear Concrete came mid-week. The boys unloaded it after fishing Friday.
After a day of basspunching, glad they had some energy..
Any concrete guys have a minute & a thought? We have two flat top barges at Jackspot that will explode with life if we can get a hundred (even a couple dozen!) pyramids on em. Wave energy/storm energy is extreme at this site. We dropped multiple block units on one barge that lays flat only to have them swept off in heavy weather. The other barge’s deck is at a sharp angle.
Time to try something fancy.
My current plan is to use multiple neodymium 130lb magnets in pyramid mold bases and pour cement on em. When well-cured we’ll lower with a rope to assure magnets are down and pyramids stuck. Hopefully growth will secure them before the magnets are spent.
Usually I don’t worry with how a pyramid lands. Never met a fish that cared either.
But for these specialized units? Sure. Magnets useless if not down.
If the idea works well I may try it on ship’s hulls as well. Those large, flat, somewhat vertical expanses could be made incredibly more productive.
Take a few blocks everyday. Sometimes I’ll ask for volunteers and load my boat with 6 or 7 tons of block. Even at that pace it takes a loooong time to build good reef.
All in time.
It was Atlantic Concrete that poured those first ones at an industrial site – got the pyramid project started in spring of 2020. Now Bear Concrete & especially Kinsley Construction are building mad reef today.
Although there have been dozens of block donors across perhaps fifteen years of effort; today York Building Products supplies multiple tractor trailer loads of reef blocks every year.
Here’s our current stats on Reef Blocks & Pyramids.
Cheers,
Monty
Block Update – As of 6/17/23 we have 39,323 Reef Blocks & 1,249 Reef Pyramids (170lb ea) deployed at numerous Army Corps permitted ocean reef sites – there are also 1,156 pyramids deployed by MD CCA at Chesapeake Bay oyster sites working to restore blue ocean water… (and, boy did those pyramid numbers rise over again in mid June!) – Counting those awaiting deployment there have been over 2,676 made since my crew and I fashioned a prototype mold in late August 2019.
Currently being targeted oceanside: at the Rambler Reef 300 Reef Blocks & 11 Pyramids – Tyler Long’s Memorial Reef 698 (+18 Reef Pyramids & a 115 ft barge!) Virginia Lee Hawkins Memorial Reef 406 Reef Blocks (+72 Reef Pyramids) – Capt. Jack Kaeufer’s/Lucas Alexander’s Reefs 1,988 Blocks (+46 Reef Pyramids) – Doug Ake’s Reef 4,174 blocks (+16 Reef Pyramids) – St. Ann’s 2,909 (+14 Reef Pyramids) – Sue’s Block Drop 1,662 (+24 Reef Pyramids) – TwoTanks Reef 1,323 (+ 15 Reef Pyramids) – Capt. Bob’s Inshore Block Drop 912 – Benelli Reef 1,552 (+ 118 Pyramids) – Capt. Bob’s Bass Grounds Reef 4,171 (+ 90 reef pyramids) – Wolf & Daughters Reef 734 – Al Berger’s Reef 1,598 (+33 Reef Pyramids) – Great Eastern Block Drop 1,528 (+25 Reef Pyramids) – Two more brand New Drops Begun at Cristina’s Blast 120 Reef Blocks & 2 Pyramids & an Unnamed Site South Side GEBD 216 Reef Blocks & 2 Pyramids – Capt Greg Hall’s Memorial Reef 242 Blocks & 2 Pyramids — And 345 Castle & Terracotta Tog Blocks, 10 Pyramids, & 16 pieces pipe 81 feet Bass Grounds Unnamed.
Rays don’t stand a chance when Captain Marc Spagnola of Dusk to Dawn Bowfishing is on the water…..not a chance.
