Last weekend was somewhat of a surprise as the croaker fishing fell off and the flounder action improved. I was out on Friday and Saturday fishing from Cedar Creek Marina with Mike Pizzolato on his boat, 7th Heaven. On Friday we tried for flounder and did not have a single fish. Then we switched over to croaker and had all we wanted plus three short flounder. We went back to flounder fishing and once again caught nothing.

On Saturday, Mike brought along his neighbors, Joe Smith and his two sons, Derrick and Braden. Figuring we would catch them plenty of croaker, we headed back to the site of the previous day’s success only to find the croaker all but gone. In our search for action we fished from Site 4 to Site 8 in water as shallow as 20 feet out to more than 50 feet. We caught something almost everywhere we went, but very few anywhere. It was a far cry from what we had experienced only the day before.

Back at Lewes Harbour Marina, where I had Joe Morris clean our catch, I saw Capt. Pete Haines from the Top Fin drop eight big flounder on the cleaning table. The fish came from Site 10, and before the weekend was over several other boats would make good catches from the same area. The bottom around B Buoy and the Old Grounds also produced keeper flounder plus more keeper sea bass. Not to be left out, reef sites 6 and 7 had a decent number of flounder as well.

The early part of the week produced bad weather and rough seas, so most boats stayed at the dock. One of the large head boats from Fisherman’s Wharf did try to fish on Tuesday. They anchored up at the Old Grounds where one happy angler had a 10-pound flounder. Apparently, most of the people on board were not quite so happy with the rough conditions, and the boat came in early.

This weekend the weather looks good, so anglers should be able to get out and see if the flounder fishing holds up and the croaker bite turns back on. I plan to fish inside the walls where the full-moon current won’t be as hard to overcome as it will in deeper water. The stronger current will make fishing the Old Grounds and B Buoy a bit of a challenge. It may be a good idea to try Site 10 before heading off to deeper water.

Live spot continue to produce flounder and rockfish out of Indian River Inlet. Squid and minnow combinations also produce flounder while black Bombers and Purple Demon MirrOlures have accounted for rockfish at night.

The back bays have been loaded with croaker and spot. Most are small, but still fun to catch on light tackle.

Blues to 4 pounds, though most are smaller, run through the inlet on incoming currents. They can be caught from boats or from shore. Fly fishermen with a few feathers to spare can have a great time with these fish.

Offshore fishing continues to be very good for marlin and dolphin with more wahoo showing up every day. Last weekend, two bigeye tuna were brought into Hook ‘Em and Cook ‘Em along with a few yellowfin and plenty of dolphin. Dolphin have been reported inside the Buoy Line under anything that floats. Marlin were in as close as 50 fathoms where my son Roger and his friends were covered up with whites on Sunday. On a good day, experienced crews are releasing 15 to 20 whites. We have not had this type of fishing in 30 years.

Flounder quota
Last week the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council raised the total allowable landings for summer flounder to 33.9 million pounds. To say this is good news is a considerable understatement. Exactly how good the news is has yet to be determined.

State fisheries managers won’t be able to determine exactly how this increase will translate into flounder regulations until the Marine Recreational Fisheries Statistical Survey (MRFSS) is complete at the end of the year.

This is an extremely bad survey that was supposed to be replaced this year, but it is still in place and still being used to determine how many fish recreational anglers catch.

As an example of how bad it is, I was interviewed last Saturday and when the interviewer found out I did not catch any fish (I was running the boat) he threw away my report.

He did the same with Mike’s report, and he was fishing. The data collected only from successful fishermen will skew the results and show a much higher catch rate than if unsuccessful anglers are included.

All we can do is hold our breath and hope the MRFSS results won’t be too bad and we can relax the flounder regulations in 2011.