Photo of the Day....End to a PHENOMENAL Evening

Jon Pickering hoists a good size schoolie to end a fantastic
evening of fishing.  Jon and I together landed over 100
schoolies in a few hours of fishing.  The fishing this week
has been nothing short of phenomenal.

Video of the Day.....Today's Wild Striper Blitz

Blues on the Increase

The Rebel Jumpin Minnow has been
effective for both large bluefish and
stripers this week.

We haven't seen them all year, but we are seeing them now.  The blues are back! Those massive schools of peanut bunker moving along the oceanfront have attracted a lot of attention from both stripers and bluefish this week.  This week my son Jon and I have landed some blues that have mixed in with the massive numbers of feeding stripers.  These are all good size bluefish ranging from 5 to 10 lbs. I have heard of bigger ones landed, but can not confirm this.
The blues are hitting the same stuff as the stripers. A problem comes when using a jig that is so effective on the bass.  The blues are cutting the jigs right off.  Tie on a wire leader and you turn off the stripers.  I have gone with hard plugs when the stripers and blues are mixed. The Rebel Jumpin Minnow has been a hot number although I have seen others using large poppers and catching blues on that.  The Jumpin Minnow has also been effective on stripers. Try crimping down those trebles for easier release.

Photo of the Day....A Rare RI Keeper

It was another big night of fishing along the RI oceanfront.
I landed dozens of schoolies and this one "rare" RI  keeper.
All the action was on a Cocahoe mounted to a 3/4 oz jighead.

Video of the Day.....Another Wild August Blitz!

Big Time August Blitz

Schools of peanut bunker
seem to be everywhere
along the oceanfront.  This
bait touched off a big blitz
tonight in the NE wind.

This schoolie hit a small Cocahoe that was
fish off a float.  The float and jig was really
hot tonight.

I hit one of the biggest August blitzes of stripers I have ever seen along the RI oceanfront tonight. The northeast wind brought lots of white water along with masses of peanut bunker to the shore where I was fishing. Feeding on the peanuts were tons of stripers. It was wild with so many birds diving for bait in front of me I was worried I was going to hook a bird.  At one point under the birds there were thousands of schoolies in a frenzy after the schools of small peanut bunker.
Using a float and jig (tried a small Cocahoe as well as a bucktail at the jig end) I was able to catch fish after fish.  These were all schoolies in the 18 to 25 inch range. These were bigger fish than I have been seeing along the oceanfront in the last month.  I also had two decent fish on (small keepers?).  One broke me off on a rock and the other straightened out the hook. Now, that's a good sign that some decent fish are prowling RI waters.
August is usually a dead time from shore along the RI oceanfront, but this year is different.  There's a ton of bait around and loads of schoolies. That combination has kept things hopping along the oceanfront.  In addition, pods of bonito are roaming around. It's fishing more like October rather than August. Looks like it is shaping up to be a banner fall here in RI!

The Albie Hype.....Starting Early

We are less than a month away from albie
fishing. While there may be some bonito
around right now, the albies are basically
a September fish.  Note, this is a photo from
last year.

Already I saw a report this past week about albies and bonito off the RI shoreline. Really? I can believe the bonito, but no way there are albies around now. The hype starts early every year in mid to late August, and much of those early reports of albies are fake news. One issue is that many fishermen simply don't know the difference between an albie and a bonito.  I know that some bonito have been caught already, but realize many fishermen use the words bonito and albies interchangeably and that's how this gets into a report.  In addition, many fishermen in boats see fish breaking at this time of year. They are certain they are seeing albies. Most likely they are bluefish. Still others looking for some headlines will post an old photo of an albie caught years ago and claim they caught it this year.  You've got to love social media!
Here are a few FACTS about albies that I have gathered over the years:
*They most likely will appear in big numbers along the RI shore from Sept. 10th to Sept. 15th.  They will show in Vineyard Sound in big numbers about a week earlier, so look at those reports to get an idea as to when it will happen here.
*In all the years I have been fishing, there is only one year in which I landed an albie in August, and that was at the very end of the month.  It is rare to find them around here in August.
*I can count on one hand the number of bonito I have landed from shore.  Several of those came in August while I was targeting stripers and blues. I've had better luck with bonito from the boat, but still they are rare.
*If you look back over the last 40 years, about a third of those years saw good numbers of albies, a third saw a few and a third of those years had none.
* Recent years have been very good for albies here in RI and most fishermen new to the sport think this is a sure bet.  I am guessing that between the warm water and the good amount of bait around this year, we should see good numbers of albies, but you never know.
*The start of the action will be the best.  When these fish first arrive, they will hit the shore in big numbers and they will be super active.  The first arrivals will be the easiest to catch on a variety of lures.