With Thanksgiving Day behind us, I would still like to remind all of those who enjoy the outdoors – be it fishing, hunting or just a walk in the woods or along the beach – just how thankful they should be to live in the Cape Region. In spite of the crowded roads and new developments, we still have places like Cape Henlopen State Park and Redden State Forest. We have plenty of freshwater ponds where there are lots of fish, and miles of beach where surf fishing is enjoyed by many, even when the fishing is less than stellar.
The agencies we have to thank for all of this are the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control, the Delaware Forest Service and the Division of Parks and Recreation. They maintain the land and water for our pleasure, and they deserve our thanks.
Flounder, scup, black sea bass
I attended the recent meeting of the Advisory Council on Summer Flounder, Scup and Black Sea Bass. It ran from 3:30 until 6:30 p.m. It was virtual.
The idea was to gather input from the advisors to present to the Mid-Atlantic Council when they meet in December to decide on recreational fishing regulations for 2026 and 2027. That’s right, when the Mid-Atlantic Council meets in December, whatever they decide, we will be stuck with for the next two years.
First up was summer flounder. The biomass of summer flounder has not grown much over the past few years, but on the other hand, we have not overfished the stock during that time. The general consensus seemed to be the current regulations should stand, with states allowed to use conservation equivalency as we do in Delaware, Maryland and Virginia. My comment supported that idea.
Scup was up next. There seems to be an abundance of scup in waters to our north. We call them porgies down here, and I recall back in the 1940s when my grandfather would go fishing with his friends from work, they would return from Delaware Bay with lard cans full of porgies. In the 1950s, when I was old enough to go fishing in Delaware Bay, the porgies were gone, and we were catching croaker with a very few trout mixed in the catch. I have not seen nor heard of a porgy down here until the last year or two, so I must conclude their stock is expanding.
That was the report from all the advisory council members from New Jersey. They wanted the bag limit to move back to 60, which is where it was before the council moved it down to 50. They said they need to have more scup to catch to make up for the lack of other fish, especially in the summer.
I did not comment on scup.
Black sea bass was next, and with all the indicators showing a massive biomass and one of the big problems being discard mortality, I thought for sure we would see a liberalization of regulations.
Well, it seems the Scientific and Statistical Committee could not decide between 75% and 80% of something. If they went with 80%, the regulations would remain status quo. If they went with 75%, we would go with more fish for recreational anglers. The argument for status quo is if we decimate the biomass, we will be destroying the future fishing. The argument for 75% was there are so many fish out there, giving a few more now is not going to destroy the future.
My idea was to help with release mortality by reducing the size limit to 12 inches and raising the bag limit to 20 fish to give anglers more fish to take home.
I stayed to the end, but I don’t think the council made any firm decision.
Leaving the final decision to the Mid-Atlantic Council scares the heck out of me.
Fishing report
When the weather gives us a break, the fishing is really good.
Last Friday for example, the boat Swordfish, out of Indian River Marina, ran to the canyons and returned with a 316-pound swordfish. The same day saw boats with limits of tog and limits of sea bass.
Bad Wind Charters fished for sea bass last Friday and found them fussy. Boxing only 20, they headed to a flounder location and boxed a boat limit to 8 pounds.
Dave Quigley fished the Del-Jersey-Land Reef Nov. 15, for just three hours to land a three-man limit of sea bass plus eight bluefish. He went out to Site 11 Nov. 21, and found only spiney dogfish. He picked up and moved on out to Del-Jersey-Land and boxed 25 to 30 sea bass all over 14 inches, two porgies and a 2.1-pound triggerfish.
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Eric Burnley is a Delaware native who has fished and hunted the state from an early age. Since 1978 he has written countless articles about hunting and fishing in Delaware and elsewhere along the Atlantic Coast. He has been the regional editor for several publications and was the founding editor of the Mid-Atlantic Fisherman magazine. Eric is the author of three books: Surf Fishing the Atlantic Coast, The Ultimate Guide to Striped Bass Fishing and Fishing Saltwater Baits. He and his wife Barbara live near Milton, Delaware. Eric can be reached at Eburnle@aol.com.
