June 16-17 solo fishing, Deal Island

June 16, 2011:  Goal was to get in an evening fish to coincide with the tide change at around 9:15 pm.  The weather was particularly iffy upon arrival so I immediately opted to load up the smaller boat (14.5 ft jon boat) and fish the creek (Law’s Thorofare) behind Deal Island.  Wind blowing a steady 20-25 knts, and then the rain came.  Managed to catch 4 nice croaker (12-13) before having to flee for the dock.

June 17, 2011: Much nicer day, around 85F and with wind at 10-15 knots out of the SW.  Launched the bigger boat from Wenona, solo.  The new ramps at Wenona are awesome, and solo launching is so much easier.  Got out in the Sound at about 1pm to target a 3:45 pm high tide.  Crossed the main shipping channel to target the steep shoal on the other side, about 0.5 – 1.0 mile north of the Wenona harbor.  Bait was squid and shrimp, didn’t bother with softcrabs this time.  Started drifting starting 30 ft and ending at about 55 feet, trying out my new DRIFT SOCK.  I bought a medium sized sock just as an experiment, and ran it about 25 feet behind the boat.  Immediately started catching fish in shallow water, a bit unusual for a warm sunny day in June.  In fact, caught around 12 on my first few drifts, all in about 30-40 feet, and none in deeper water as the reports had indicated.  The sock worked reasonably well, as the wind and tide were both conspiring to push the drifting boat pretty quickly.  And then it all changed.  The wind dropped to about 5-10 and shifted to due South.  For about 2 or 3 drifts, I caught only a few small fish, quickly discarded.  Then I started catching them in 40-52 ft of water.  With the wind shift, I was able to hang on this depth for nice long drifts using the new sock.   I played this game until about 45 minutes after the tide changed, at which point I had reached my legal limit of 25 croakers.  Too tired to continue, I gladly called it a day.  The 25 fish ranged from 10.5 to 13 inches, with the average probably 11 – 12.  I threw back maybe 10 fish.  Was glad for the abundant catch but would have been happy for some bigger fish.  Hoping to get out for an evening fish sometime soon,..... The weird looking croaker above- I caught him and noticed he was missing half his dorsal fin, one of his pectoral fins, and had a lot of scarring.  Perhaps had been attacked by a bluefish earlier in life??