11/1-amazing afternoon at Montauk-best yet?

[mikesopals]

All I can say is wow!!! Didnt get out until 1:30 and the SW wind was really blowing and my expectations were low. Immediately found fish at shag-all blues so we swithed to small thin wire leaders and clousers-caught a few. Next school of fish was all ablies, hundreds of them charging us from all sides, with huge 20ft cirlces of brown in the water-which was pure rainbait. Quick rod switch to floating/intermediate lines with rainbait flies. Followed school after school to outer shag, and eventually ended up at the point. Conditions moved from marginal to perfect, with about 1 hr with virtually no wind. Drifted about 100yd off the north bar and went thru school after school of fish-some all stripers, some pure blues, and albies mixed in everywhere. Didnt see more than 2 or 3 boats all day. Total for 3-4 hrs was around 20 fish, with some real bruisers mixed in- had an albie that weighed 13-14lbs on an old boga, a 36 inch striper-plus a ton of shorts, and countless blues.
Easily the best day of the year, if you exclude a few offshore Thresher and Mako experiences!!! I couldnt have been more wrong about the albies----tons of them still around. It also looked like the turtle cove surf crowd was into fish, with hundreds of people shoulder to shoulder.
What an unexpected afternoon. Ended at North Bar, water like glass, watching stripers swirling on the surface for 100-200yds into the sunset. What a way to end the year.
Mike G

[CaptSuperfly]

congrats. that's a fantastic way to end the season. I'm keeping the boat out there for two more weeks but this weekend looks like a blow out.

I feel a couple of sick days coming on.. cough cough.

[fmw]

Hopefully everyone has their boats safely tied to the dock as it looks to get real nasty in the next day or so! Unfortunately, it will probably screw things up for a bit. Hopefully, though even if the bay anchovies and albies leave it will kick start the next phase of the fall run as the peanut bunker start to migrate. When I was out on Tuesday I saw a bunch of gannets circling high above at one point. Hopefully a sign of things to come.

[MarkZ]

Wow Mike, that's fantastic. I was thinking about going but stopped at Shinnecock for a complete blanking instead. What a mistake!--124-3

[Lov2Fish]

Good report Mikesopals, sounds like a great day!!

[FirstCast]

Glad to hear there are still some albies around. I'd like to get one more shot at them. --127-3-

[JGH]

Wow. Each year's patterns surprise me. I hope to get one more day in.

[PhilDKreal]

Glad to hear there are still some albies around. I'd like to get one more shot at them. --127-3-

Nice pics Steve! Is that your son?

Keep in touch brother!

[FirstCast]

Yup - that's my big guy (he's 13 & already a great angler) My little guy is 9 & he's coming along more slowly - but he'll come around :)

[Perch]

I was there a week ago today, and all hell broke loose on the outgoing. Huge shoals of albies that stayed up forever and ate like bluefish. Hooked 16 and landed 12. Most of fleet shrink wrapped, so it was just me, Blinken, Hull, Reagan, French, Dixon and several other hard corers. I couldn’t leave, but finally broke away with about 30 minutes of daylight and fish still blitzing. Then I found about an acre of frothing bass half a mile north of the point and stayed with them till pitch dark. I paid for it, though, by breaking prop and skeg guard at Niantic. Gotta stay way west of the bridge. (At least I only broke the skeg guard--kind of like getting false teeth knocked out by a hokey puck the way my brother did.) I was there this Monday, and no albies. Storm pushed them all out, so the pressure is off. Tons of bass, but all schoolies. Huge flights of white-winged scoters. And gannets starting to stage. A good albie year, but I wish someone would explain to me why I never saw one albie at Petty’s Bight, the Sluice, Thames, or Bartlett’s. And very few at Gardiners or Shag.

[ANeary]

Perch, I was at a beach very close to the mouth of the Thames Sunday and had a couple nice pods of Albies come by us. they didn't stay long and I wasn't able to hook up but they were there. I was wading.

[Perch]

The one place I didn't try Mon.