Mostly Porgies and Blues....
Capt. Sal Tardella
August 25, 2011
Norwalk Islands - Saltwater Fishing Report
Wednesday's trip (Aug 17) was with Steve Rooney of Norwalk and four of his young children, including twin boys. The kids had a great time with porgies and small bluefish.
Gordon Smith of Redding sailed with us on Thursday morning–with yet another set of twins and their two siblings–with the oldest child only 7 years old. The children's mom is Gordon's daughter, Tracy, and her family lives in Long Island. This was the kids' first fishing trip, and they enjoyed a nice catch of porgies and blues after learning how to use a spinning rod. The largest of the scup measured 15″, and six were kept for the table.
On Friday morning we left the dock at 11:30 with Ken Ly of Stamford, Jason Canulla of Westport, and Henry Taylor, who was visiting from Raleigh, N.C. All the boys got into bluefish on the surface in the middle of the Sound, after which we did some jigging that brought in larger blues around 7 pounds–and we were all surprised when a 22″ fluke came over the rail, too. As the trip wound down, we fished for porgies along the shoreline, and every one we brought in was a keeper. The fluke and three porgies were taken home for a barbecue dinner.
The weather was perfect on Saturday, and we sailed at 7:30am with two very distinguished gentlemen and three teen-aged boys. Joseph Califano of Westport was taking out his son-in-law, Dr. Kevin Becker of Guilford, an oncologist at Yale-New Haven Hospital. The boys were all grandsons of Califano–Jack and Pete Califano of Maryland and Brian Byars of Virginia. Mr. Califano currently heads the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, an organization that he founded in 1992. He has authored 12 books and has devoted himself to decades of civil service, including being Secretary of Health, Education & Welfare from 1977-1979 in the Jimmy Carter administration. Before that Mr. Califano had been appointed Special Assistant to the Secretary and Deputy Secretary of Defense and was President Lyndon Johnson's top domestic aide–among many other noble accomplishments. And now to the fishing report! The group had wonderful success with porgies–all keepers–most of which were thrown back–as well as bluefish caught on jigs and surface plugs. The blues were in the 4-7 pound range.
With the threat of bad weather hanging over our heads we crossed our fingers and set out at 8am Sunday morning. Aboard were Stamford residents–Stewart Campbell and his young son, Spencer, and Paul Callahan and his young son, Colin. The kids–who are cousins–had a rollicking good time bringing in porgies up to 17″, and everyone enjoyed jigging up bluefish 2-4 pounds on bucktails and light tackle; most of the catch was released. One of the boys also reeled in a nice fluke which was just 1/2″ shy of being a keeper. We got back to our dock while thunder was booming, but the rain never amounted to much.
We left the dock at 7:00am Wednesday with LarryDwyer, a resident of the Garden State, along with his grandson, Steve, and two of Steve's buddies. It was slow going at the start of the trip, but by the time we pulled into the dock we had a boatload of porgies with some bluefish in the mix. Everyone had a great time.
On Thursday our passengers were Robin Killoran of West Salem CT and his friend, Jim. We began using fishing tube & worm and brought in schoolie bass, spending the rest of the trip with porgies and bluefish and getting back to our marina just as the thunder and rainfall began.
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