Fish Report 1/31/25
Going Toggin
Then Going Tuna Fishing! (Tuna trip info way below.)(and now forecast has become less attractive – but soon!)
Thoughts on tautog..
Two Tog Trips:
Sunday & Monday – 2/2 & 2/3/2025 Toggin from 6:00 to 4:30 – 14 Sells Out – $225.00 – ((This report is going out late because I spent all day working on 2025 OC Reef Foundation Charts. (Have a couple really good large reefs available for naming plus lots of pipe bundles (Coral Condos) and parking stop reef units (Tog Cabins) from our major deployments last spring))
Anna will not be available for tog reservations until Saturday morning. (I do tuna reservations by email..) Mate Joe has very-very few whites at a reasonable fee – green crabs are provided free and plentiful (caught good fish on greens last trip) – rigs too if needed.
I fish a three fish limit with one female (same as I had before tog had any regs..) Some clients skunked every trip so far. Last week one terrible bite/one decent bite then another terrible bite until the current got moving. It’s a hard winter fishery – even when it was great it was hard. Now it’s much harder still.
Reservations For Tog Trips:
Anna is a one person operation. She will not be working until Sat AM.
…She might be slammed when I hit send. (or maybe not!) If she cannot pick up, Leave her a message. She has a method to her madness..
Reservations at 443-235-5577 – She has other jobs too. The line closes at 8pm and reopens at 8am. She won’t take reservations for trips that are not announced.
If you want a spot call the reservation line at 443-235-5577.. Emailing me is no good (unless after hours night before a trip) her service handles reservations. I’ll have no idea what spots have been sold. I do check email for questions; check FaceBook messenger too..
Boat Regs: 3 Tog @ 16 Inches – only one can be a female. (Maryland is 4 of any sex @ 16in – we’re fishing the boat rule.) Release of all sizes encouraged. Keep a few for dinner? Sure. Load the neighbors up? Not so good for the fishery’s future. Very rare when opportunity for limits presents..
Funny too, 3 tog at 16 inches was my boat rule from 1992 to 2003..
Weather Cancellations Happen – I Make Every Attempt To Let Clients Sleep In If The Weather’s Not Going Our Way.
Always try to leave a half hour early if all are aboard.
Pretty rare to be in on time..
Bait is provided on all trips: green crabs for tog. (Whites are available from crew for a reasonable cost.)
Our Tog Pool Is By Length: A Tog That’s Been Released Counts The Same As One In The Boat.
No Live Tog Leave The Boat – Dead & Bled – Period. (I Believe The Live Tog Black Market Hurt This Fishery ..But Nowhere Near As Much As Bad Sea Bass Regulation)
Agreed With Or Not, My Boat’s Regulations Observed – 3 Tog @ 16 Inches or better – only one can be a female.
Does the thought of not keeping a state legal limit gives you pain? Then you will not like tog fishing with me.. Shoot, I may have some clients skunked every trip all winter. Seriously.
Togging is a most unkind fishery – especially for the novice. Then, I’ve also seen beginners bowed-up steady while incredibly skilled anglers suffer in hubris.
But when it is kind?
As Tommy said, “The tug is the drug.. Bully Bob says, “They’re Delmarva Grouper.”
14 Anglers Sells Out so anglers can move to the bite. Boat has 20 well marked spots. If someone’s in a spot? No mugging. If it’s open? Have at it. If in between two good friends? Well… But they’d better be good friends!
Green crabs provided. Mates usually have whites for a reasonable fee. You’re welcome to BYO crabs for bait too. Anglers are further restricted than state regs would have – Boat Regs are 3 fish (not 4) only one can be a female. For some this is painful. If that’s you? Then you’re the angler most likely to catch all females!
If fishing the stern area waterproof boots are advised in fall & especially winter!
Shoes & sneakers will ruin your day.
It’ll be chilly in the AM too! Cabin is heated.
Tuna:
On Jan 22nd I had the best tuna fishing in my life (albeit mine has been a life spent reef fishing..) Still, after departing in 15 degree air temps we caught 12 for 14 in Poorman’s canyon where air temps neared forty owing the ocean’s warmth.
On the 25th several boats went offshore too but further south. They also had excellent fishing. One skipper had 9 in an hour. Another lost one estimated at 80 inches along with numerous unders….
Sea surface temps look good.
My turn?
Hope So!
Depart 2:30 am Tuesday morning 2/4/25. Return when we return. After dark-thirty most likely. Bit chilly? Sure, but it’s surprising how nice it can be in the deep with no wind & 50+ degree water though.. Crazy long run in my boat. Will start trolling in 51 degree water or so. Will have extra propane and handwarmers aboard. BYO gloves/boots etc.
This is trolling – not chunking. First on the rod and following order will be pulled from our daily reef raffle tix – $20 to play because there will be no fish pool.
Although smaller fish are generally reeled in by one angler, larger bluefin fight unlike anything I’ve ever known. On my trips we’ve had full rounds of anglers fighting fish – even three rounds! An angler reels until they can’t and then switch off to the next angler who is already in a shoulder harness/belt.
This way we keep a fresh angler cranking until a tuna is harpooned..
Six anglers sells out at $400.00..
THIS is a trip where we might well pull the skunk’s tail..
But if not?!?
Oyyyyy….
Email me for tuna reservations. mhawkins@morningstarfishing.com
Cheers All,
Monty
Thoughts on tog & the fishing’s history off the MD coast.
In the mid 1970s there was a huge hypoxia event off NJ’s coast from NY’s human waste. Overnutrified ocean water caused an enormous algae bloom. As algae died and decayed, much – way too much – oxygen was used. It was real bad. A huge swath of ocean went dead as happens annually off the Mississippi delta annually even today. Fish moved south big time – or died w/o oxygen. A textbook ‘jubilee’ – sea bass fishing became unreal south of DE shipping lanes – and that from guys who were accustomed to catching lots of cbass.
When sea bass got slim in 83 we found tog (likely also moved south from that oxygen event) in incredible number. Two partyboats could anchor side by side in July – even on one anchor sliding on & off the piece(!) and pummel them. That’s when I could catch tog every drop on an 8 ounce diamond jig..
Took 2.5 years, but, with no regulation at all, we wiped em out off all the pieces we knew.
From then until 2003 I tried to leave them alone.
Around the same time – early 80s really – sea trout in our back bays nose dived. Anglers quickly discovered tautog had been right at their feet where they’d cast bucktails to trout all those years. It was NOT unusual to see DD tog as the fishery became known.
Sure didn’t last, but back bay jumbos were caught.
As sea bass regulation took hold offshore (my own in 1992, the state & fed’s in 1997) it created a super population of sea bass – no one targeted tog. We’d throw back huge tog and load coolers with sea bass.
Now we have a lot more inshore habitat – and regulation that seems to be improving things. Most for hire boats here regulate tighter still in our own fashion.
MD DNR haul seine surveys (young of the year surveys) saw a jump in tautog a few years after the 16 inch limit was put in place. At first it was thought a spike in spawning success, but it never declined..
I lobbied hard for the 16 inch limit. If it were up to me we’d have gone up a half inch more every two years. Think what that would be like over a ten year span. Spawning production would be unreal..
What we’re going to see now (are seeing,) however, is another huge decline in sea bass as the MD wind area’s spawning burst has hit today’s size limit caused stasis — spawning production in cbass leapt incredibly as the wind area recolonized in 2016 when some 525 sq miles of ocean again had under 9 inch sea bass spawning. That has now been minimized since 2021 as larger fish occupy every reef from Kelly’s Reef (2 miles out) and off. Large male cbass will not allow small females to switch to male (via pheromones? – certainly bull/harem behavior found everywhere in the animal world.) Those cbass that do switch to male while small (under 11 inches) are likely blinded or run off as in every bull/harem complex – they may not have horns, but larger male cbass will spine small spawning competitors with their dorsal fins (personal comms from Dr Gary Shepherd observed in an aquarium.) With only 12/13 inch and larger fish allowed to spawn, roughly 80% of our sea bass are pulled from region’s spawning stock. The obvious occurs – spawning production declines as fish behave as though their habitat is full.
It’s going to get much worse.
Believe this – when sea bass are abundant and legally landed? Tog pressure drops quickly.
Owing MRIP’s ineptitude, fluke too will see a decline – are – as trawl’s 49% increase in quota awarded in 2018 continues to wear away at available fish.
Though I have been trying hard to correct MRFSS then MRIP since 1998 – I’ve not made true progress since 2003 when party/charter data was corrected (mostly!)
In 2018 commercial trawl got their big 49% fluke raise and com sea bass was increased 69% too. These increases were because MRIP shows Private Boats (and Not At All Party Charter!) catching incredibly many more fish than they actually do.
Some readers have seen what an unfished tog population looks like on a newly discovered reef vs post recreational effort.
We need MRIP repaired so that management can have success with sea bass & summer flounder. It’s happening – a start at least – but at federal fisheries speed.
Real slow.
It’ll take a decade but tog will quietly come back strong once sea bass are allowed to spawn young again..
And – should we also be succesful in getting new permits to build new artificial reefs in between state lines and also work further offshore? In that case future anglers may well wonder why we ever thought targeting tog was a hard thing..
I’ve written several letters concerning MRIP of late. It’s an unending battle.
Cheers,
Monty
******** great forecast for NY/NJ Bight – west at 5-10 knots, increasing to 10-15 in the afternoon.
Tight Lines 