Pretty Early For This

[Grasshopper]

For the past two days my father has caught no less than 7 blues and one striper surf casting luers in Cotuit!! Different spots miles apart too. Getting into stripers this time of year down that way wouldn't surprise me but bluefish!? Isn't the water too cold still for blues? I wouldn't have expected them in those parts until at least mid June.
Am I missing something?

[dlangan]

Yeah, last night I heard a similar report on some blues being there. There's a spring spot I like for bass that is a pretty long paddle (at least for me). I wasn't planning on venturing there for another week, but with these reports and the weather....

[mumichog]

I don't know if it has any connection but they've been having an epic early season bluefish run in NJ. Lot's more blues (big ones mostly) than bass so far according to reports online and a NJ fisherman I met recently.

[TomTero]

When we couldn't buy a bass in the early 80's, you could walk across the backs of the blues in CC Bay. They are just filling a niche being vacated by the stripers.

[zane grey]

Yeah, it seems way early for blues. I thought the South Cape area didn't see them until mid May. I bet the squid are in. Are the squid boats out there?

[bayside]

The squiders are squiding

[nsvencer]

I always thought that since the blues and bass compete for same basic food, that there was a cyclical up and down of both species, with one filling in for the other at their respective peak times.

Either way, crank up the BBQ or the smoker and bring on the blues. I'd rather eat them anyway!

[bdowning]

Very late April is a tad early, but not by much. You will generally see blues caught in fairly reliable numbers off the south Cape beaches by the end of the first week in May.

-bd

[e-sea-e]

well, if we see an epic bluefish run this year, so much for seeing macs around most of the year like they were last year. we saw very few blues on the north shore last year and as a result we were catching macs till mid august and then again in early september. that wont happen this year if the blues are around in force.

i feel bad for anyone planning on fishing pogies for tuna if the blues appear in epic numbers....they'll need alot of them.

dont get me wrong, I like fishing for blues. I just like feeding macs and pogies to tuna more.

[Joey Langan]

From what I understand bluefish populations are very cyclical. The last few years have been pretty dismal atleast in my experience as far as bluefish numbers. The timing seems to be about right for anouther surge....no complaints here, they're delicious.
Joe

[aws]

Originally Posted by zane grey

Yeah, it seems way early for blues. I thought the South Cape area didn't see them until mid May. I bet the squid are in. Are the squid boats out there?

I have seen the squid boats off of the Cotuit are, but have been skunked(is it still called skunked when squidding?) on my few local squid jigging outings thus far. Will head out again this evening.

[Kuskus68]

Originally Posted by Grasshopper

For the past two days my father has caught no less than 7 blues and one striper surf casting luers in Cotuit!! Different spots miles apart too. Getting into stripers this time of year down that way wouldn't surprise me but bluefish!? Isn't the water too cold still for blues? I wouldn't have expected them in those parts until at least mid June.
Am I missing something?

They show up at a local power plant here in Ct in early March!!

[ruge13]

Been mixed with Bass in BB for the past couple days. Stuff in the 30" range. Last year they came in with Early bass as well, but not in the numbers like this year.

[CMP]

After a great trip to the Keys over the last 2 weeks wherein the mahi bite went wide open (first ones on Scrap Metal since her arrival in Islamorada), sails and wahoo were plentiful if not terribly cooperative and really enjoying our first white marlin wolfpack attack into a friggin mahi spread, I'm pretty fired up to take delivery on a new boat for the Cape and get going. From these reports, I'd best get moving...

CMP

[ruge13]

And some of the new fishies are big... this one was well over 10 lbs. To put into perspective, my kayak is 23" wide...