I am putting a lot of stock in the potential for productivity in this October’s fishing in Southern New England, and so should you. Spring is great as it ushers in the dawn of a new season. Summer’s warm waters draw in a variety of species – some exotic and many traditional. Fall –most specifically October – is a time of the greatest variety and potential in my book. Darn nearly all species are on the table from the lowly winter flounder to cooler-filling porgies, and frustratingly exciting false albacore to some of the largest striped bass of the season. Hell, for those with capable boats, even tuna fishing can be downright excellent in the tenth month. But, as I’ve said many times before, it’s the blackfish that focuses my attention in October; more on that later.
The early part of October signals the last opportunity to pull and inshore slam of striped bass, bluefish, and albies (or bonito, chub mackerel, Spanish mackerel, etc.) Stripers and blues will be here well into December in many places, but as the month creeps along, unless the weather is calm and stays warm, the latter grouping starts to vacate local waters making for more difficult prospects. Not to say that it can’t happen on Halloween, but your odds of doing so are many, many times greater in the first half of the month than the second.
So, to take advantage of this diminishing opportunity, it pays to always be rigged and ready. At least two rods should be within reach – one with a small spook and one with an epoxy-type lure – with a third option of soft plastic a good idea if your boat affords the space. When you come upon a school of feeding fish, even if ID’ing them is an easy prospect, it pays to throw different offerings as each species tends to favor certain lures on any given day if a slam is your goal. Light tackle is my favorite way to target these fish, with medium to medium-heavy spinning rods of 7 feet being more than up to the task. A 3000 or 4000-size reel is a good match; spool it up with 20-pound braid and a top shot of 20-pound fluorocarbon and you’re good to go.
That rod rigged with an epoxy jig can serve double duty between feeds to score a couple of bonus black sea bass or porgies, and it is what I keep in hand while prospecting. If no fish are showing on the surface and we are scanning for activity, I drop the jig down to the bottom and work it back up. A few times I have connected with a large striped bass on the jig down deep, and on a few rare occasions a hefty blackfish jumped on my jig, much to the surprise of the day’s crew!
And with that, we move on to blackfish.
There is something about pursuing blackfish/tautog that consumes me in the fall. Spring blackfishing is fun and I look forward to it, and in the summer – where available – it’s cool to add a few to a day’s catch – but fall is where it’s at. The cold, crisp air; the technical yet simple methods to catch them; the frustrating prospect of becoming “good” at catching them with even the slightest level of consistency; and the smell (and taste) of crab that never leaves my hands this time of year. It’s all there and more and it’s why I consider myself to be a full-fledged togaholic!
By the time you read this, I have most certainly already secured myself an ample supply of bait. I’ll spend time flipping rocks in the local tidal pools around low tide in search of Asian crabs. Along the way, I’ll add some greenies to the mix, perhaps a few hermits if I’m lucky as well. I also run a set of traps off some select jetties near my home. I tend to them like a mother to a newborn baby, checking them each day, rebaiting as needed, and pulling them when an impending storm is on the horizon. Some days I add but a few volunteers to the cause, but it’s the days when my traps are stuffed with several hundred gurgling, angry, ill-tempered crabs that make the memories of the lean sets vanish in an instant. Sure, I could buy my crabs, and some years I go this route for the bulk of my bait, but like netting bunker for striped bass, or digging earthworms for trout, I find great satisfaction in putting in the blood, sweat, and tears associated with acquiring the bait myself that will eventually lead to harvested fish. I am never without a supply of crabs, ready to go at a moment’s notice, and neither should you if you hope to be a serious fall togger.
Green crabs are the most common blackfish bait, and for good reason. They are easy to acquire (either bought or trapped), they work quite well, and in some ways, you’re kind of doing the ecosystem a good service by harvesting them as they are a non-native species to our local waters. Legend has it that they first arrived along the Northeast coast of the United States sometime in the 1800’s, arriving (as has been the case so many times before and since) in the ballast of seafaring ships. I can only imagine what local rocks looked like before their arrival and what was the primary forage of Tautoga onitis. Mussels? Clams? Shrimp? Worms? There are plenty of options, all of which still make viable blackfish bait, but crabs are king in modern blackfishing.
The Asian crabs are another non-native species, supposedly arriving in local waters by way of those very same globe-trotting ships that brought us the European green crabs from the Baltic Sea. This time around, however, it’s a more modern invasion as the first confirmed existence stateside took place in 1988 in New Jersey. Some anglers swear by the Asians in shallow water and greens as they go deep; each day is different, and this is why I like to have both on hand whenever possible.
I do find myself beginning each trip with greens in deeper water and Asians shallow, but some days I simply go on my gut. One thing I have found is that Asian crabs since they’re smaller baits to begin with, work better with smaller jigs. There are places where I employ jigs as small as 3/8 ounce, and Asian crabs are less likely to cover the point of the hooks used in these smaller jigs and less likely to foul a hookset. Green crabs, especially when cut in half and the legs trimmed off, can be used on small jigs, but the less fuss and mess of starting with a smaller bait has never hindered my catch rate regarding quantity or quality, and some of my biggest blackfish have been caught on the smallest of baits. I’m not an “elephants eat peanuts” methodologist or anything, I simply feel that the blackfish is opportunistic when it comes to feeding, and small jigs and lighter weights lend themselves to small bait.