“Fishing is much more than when we may return to the fin
fish. It is the great occasion ne simplicity of our forefathers.� -Herbert Hoover
Although the internet can be a problem for those who try to stay in the shadows and keep their successes and their “hot spots” to themselves, it has become a great tool for unmasking some very shady and unscrupulous characters and their dirty deeds. Call us naive, but we would not in a million years think that someone would stuff lead in a fish’s mouth or buy a fish off a boat and try to pass it off as a surf caught fish to win a contest.
Neither would we believe, if we did not receive emails from trusted sources, that some anglers on the bunker bite in the spring were dumping 40lb bass in the garbage after a weigh-in so they could go catch a bigger one for the "tournament." We have decided to use the internet to try to stop this insane slaughter in the name of competition. Let's be honest, the striped bass fishery is going down the toilet fast. If we don't take steps to prevent the slaughter of big fish, we may see a drastic decline in this fishery in the very near future. We don't have to remind you that those big bass are all females and prolific breeders.
With that in mind, we at the Surfcaster's Journal are thrilled to announce STRIPERTHON 2010, a season long , free photo contest open to any surfcaster from North Carolina to Maine and any place in between. Our goal is to encourage you to think about releasing that big breeder you are going to catch this year. We want you to take its picture and then allow it to swim and reproduce once again. With the cost of waterproof cameras coming down, they have become an indispensible part of a surfcaster's gear. And why not? Most of us enjoy looking at pictures that recall special memories long after the shutter has closed and the moment has passed. You will not only have a memory of your great catch but you will also be eligible for some fantastic prizes. We thank all of those who have supported our goal by donating prizes for our contest. Just wait until you see the list of prizes on our Blog.
How do you sign up? If you are already a subscriber to the Surfcaster’s Journal Blog prior to April 1, 2010, you are already eligible to enter pictures of your catch. That is it!! After April 1, 2010 new subscribers must register for the contest by sending an email with your name to Striperthon2010@surfcastersjournal.com . Seven days later you will be eligible to enter a picture in the contest. We urge you to read the rules for the contest that will be posted on the Blog. Please understand that we are not against taking an occasional fish home for dinner. We also like to eat striped bass as do our families. What we are against is killing these big stripers in the name of a contest and then discarding these beautiful creatures as if they were leftovers from last week’s dinner. We sincerely hope that you will join us in our effort and help make STRIPERTHON 2010 the biggest catch and release contest in the history of our sport. Sincerely Surfcaster's Journal Team
Surfcaster’s Journal ISSUE #2 Spring . 2010 Pg 12-Artist Profile Mike Sudal Pg. 18-Geared Up! Pg. 30-In the Kitchen with Rich P. -Hromin Pg. 46-Ken Baldwin Photography Pg. 61-The Rod Corner -Lou Caruso Pg. 64-Big Rock Lures Interview-Hromin Pg. 85-So Long Old Friend-V.Orlando Pg. 92-Al Bentsen Tribute To A Legend 1-Chuck Leigh Pg. 114-Al Bentsen Tribute To A Legend 2-Jason Colby Pg. 128-Al Bentsen Tribute To A Legend 3-Roger Martin Pg. 151-Angler Spotlight Janet Messineo Pg. 167-CUTTY-Zeno Hromin Pg 220-Contributors
Surfcaster's Journal is published quarterly by Surfcasting LLC. Publisher reserves the right to accept or reject any advertising submitted for publication. Surfcasting LLC and Surfcaster's Journal assume no responsibility for errors made except to republish in future issue any advertisement having an error. Use of this material without express written permission of Surfcasting LLC and Surfcaster's Journal is strictly prohibited.
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MIKE SUDAL A native of North Eastern Pennsylvania, Mike Sudal found his love for fishing and Illustration at a young age. “I remember cutting school in the third grade and drawing a diagram of a largemouth bass chasing a school of yellow perch though submerged brush. My parents were furious, but from that point on I knew I wanted to be an artist” After graduating from Ringling School of Art and Design in 2002, he began his illustration career as a news art intern at St. Petersburg Times. He soon left the Tampa Bay flats behind and returned to the Northeast as a staff artist for The Asbury Park Press, where he worked on the award winning Hook, Line & Sinker section and created pages such as The Fisherman’s Sketchbook.
In 2004 he became an infographic artist for the Associated Press, and covered various top stories including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Hurricane Katrina, The World Cup and both Summer and Winter Olympics. He has been a contributing Illustrator for Field & Stream since 2008. His other freelance clients include Boating Magazine, The Nature Conservancy, Pfizer and Syngenta to name a few. When Mike isn’t illustrating, he can be found chasing striped bass from the surf and kayak in his local waters around Harrison, N.Y., or stuck on the Long Island Expressway heading east to top secret fishing locations. His work can be seen at www.mikesudal.com, and on his blog mikesudal.blogspot.com.
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We have to be honest and tell you that we have long been fans of Olympus waterproof cameras. In recent years our trustworthy Stylus SW720 swam with us to far rocks, got pounded on sandbars and unfortunately, even dropped onto some jetty rocks. Olympus calls their cameras "shockproof." We think they should call them "idiot-proof." After all, we have managed to destroy just about any fishing related tool in the last few years. Some of this destruction was due to the harsh conditions we fish in at times and some was due to our omnipresent incompetence and clumsiness. Yet our SW720 kept on ticking and best of all, kept on clicking. If you don't mind us tooting our horn, we even managed to get some pictures that ended up on the covers of some fishing publications with that little gem of a camera. But just like other red-blooded American men, we lust for newer, faster and definitely more "megapixely" cameras. We are men and men need stuff, new and bigger stuff! So we went on a fact finding mission, trying to read as many reviews and fondle as many cameras as we could get our hands on. We ended up where we began, with a shiny new Olympus Stylus 6000 model in our shopping bag and shortly thereafter, in our surf bag. We were attracted by shockproof, waterproof and crushproof features. But what really sold us was the fact that Stylus cameras are freeze proof! You know what this means, right? We can now go cod fishing naked in the middle of a New York winter and our camera will be fine. Kidding aside, our new Stylus 6000 is designed to withstand a 5 foot drop and can be used in water up to 10 feet deep. Featuring 12 and 10 megapixels, Stylus 8000 and 600 series respectively, can capture your special fishing moments and make prints large enough and sharp enough for you to hang proudly on the wall. Sissies who wear gloves when fishing will appreciate it and this includes yours truly. This is a neat new feature on both of the Stylus models. You can use Tap Control to control key settings in the camera without removing your gloves.
Some of you will appreciate that these Stylus cameras can take video by just turning the main control knob and pressing a shutter. As proud as we were of pictures that our Stylus 6000 took during the fall run, we were not prepared for the curve that Olympus engineers would throw us on such short notice. You see, as we were burning the midnight oil trying to complete our March issue of Surfcaster's Journal, we received notice that Olympus had released a Stylus 3000 series camera. Among other great features, this model can now capture high definition (HD) video and costs less than the 8000 or 6000 models. Lucky are those of you who are in the market for a camera today. Unfortunately for us, we are already broke.
They say a pattern is a pattern until it’s broken. But can you say a pattern is in effect until it repeats itself at least once? We don't think so. But then again questions like this usually overwhelm our little brains and instead of trying to decipher the mysteries of the world, we usually go fishing. Be that as it may, we are quite confident that what happened last year in the surf will repeat again this year. We are talking about sand eels. It didn't matter where you fished. From the sandy beaches of Cape Cod, to the boulders of Montauk Point or the beachfronts of Long Island and New Jersey, wherever you went, you probably found sand eels. And lots of them! In some places they were so plentiful you'd hook one on a tin just about every other cast. Now that is thick!
TSUNAMI WEIGHTED SAND EEL But they weren’t everywhere. Those who waited for the sand eels to migrate east to west, or north to south were left with crushed egos and very little to show for their efforts. After all, sand eels, unlike peanut bunker migrate from deep to shallow waters and back and not along the beach. So if you found them, you could count on them to hold the fish in that area tide after tide. If you were inclined to wait unlit your local beach lit up with similar action...well, you are probably still waiting. Tins accounted for the majority of catches and some beach rats were concerned that with so many tins being manufactured, major beer makers would not have enough metal to manufacture their beer cans! Thankfully for them, the season ended, the fish moved on and beer flowed freely once again. Although we like tins and find them to be incredibly versatile lures, we also like to shake things up a bit. Unfortunately, if you are like us and like to rotate through the plugs in your bag during a tide, you found that game fish showed very little interest in anything other than tins, bucktails and needlefish. To add insult to injury, even our needlefish were occasionally ignored while everyone else was hooking up on tins in the dark.
TSUNAMI WEIGHTED SAND EEL Fortunately we had a little secret weapon to right this wrong. The folks from Tsunami sent us a few Weighted Sand Eel prototypes to test. They yelled at us for not reporting back our experience but we pleaded that we were too busy catching fish on them. Ahh, such is the life of a field tester. When you can't catch anything, you figure that the lures must suck because everyone else is catching. When you finally do start to hit fish, you forget that you are supposed to report back. Then again, during one stretch of the season, we forgot we had a job until our wife left a gigantic property tax bill on the desk in the amount that could feed a family of four for a year. That brought us quickly back to earth. We loved these new eels so much that we were not a surprised to hear that when they finally showed up on store shelves late in the season, they sold out quickly. For now, they are available in olive and black back in 6, 7 and 8 inch size and a 9 inch model that sports a manly 3X heavy duty hook. Look for more sizes to hit store shelves in the spring.
We were saddened to learn of the passing of legendary surfcaster Bob Pond. Not only did we admire his lures and fish them over the years with great success but we were also big admirers of what Bob meant to this sport and the surfcasting community as a whole. He was instrumental in creating public awareness of the dire state of the striped bass fishery and predicted its collapse long before it happened. He was a true legend, conservationist and a great plug maker. He will be sorely missed but his legacy will stay deeply ingrained in the fabric of our sport. For years we scoured the fishing flea markets in search of Bob's early plastic Atom 40’s. We ignored the shiny boxed sets with hefty price tags and instead bought the "used� ones for as little as a buck a piece. Often we wondered if the people who sold us these lures knew just how productive they were in fooling oversized stripers. But we said nothing while we haggled over pennies, only grinning when we reached the safety of our truck cab.
LORDSHIP LURES A-40 To this day we prefer those plastic versions to the current foam models and you will still find those used plugs in our bag when conditions are ripe. These days most of them are draped with eel skins. After all these years, they still take a licking and keep on catching. Eventually we lost our willingness to get up at the crack of dawn to scour fishing flea markets and we looked around for a similar lure to replace our aging soldiers. With the current wood craze gripping surfcasters’ minds and wallets, we thought that finding a big hunk of wood with a metal lip that would produce as well as Bob’s early creations, would be a breeze. Boy, were we wrong. While we did find a few manufacturers who made this type of lure we were not terribly impressed even after paying through the nose for some "can’t miss’” models. Don’t get us wrong, there was nothing wrong with these lures but for one reason or another we failed to "bond" with those plugs. Yes, there is a certain “ying and yang" that happens between a surfcaster and his lure. We have "mojo" lures that some people have no faith in and yet their best loved plugs don’t impress us at all. A lot of this has to do with confidence and also with being in the right place at the right time. If you have the best plug made but fail to hook anything after a dozen trips, you will start to wonder what the hype is all about.
When someone shoved a black Lordship A40 in our hands, we admit that we stuck it away in one of our plug bags and forgot about it. Then one day, when everyone was hammering the fish on a dark new moon night, we begrudgingly snapped it on our leader and made a cast. The first thing we thought of was “we should have done this before.” Large stripers began committing suicide as soon as the plug started to wiggle. It was love at first sight. The ying and yang were obviously aligned and it did not matter where we took the plug. At Cuttyhunk, the New Jersey shore or the legendary waters of Montauk Point, the Lordship A40 produced better than any other metal lip we owned. But one fateful day, we watched a friend struggle while we were hammering fish on the A40. Being a nice guy, we offered it to him to try. Then in shock, we watched him snap the lure off on his first cast. Take it from us, three things in life a surfcaster should never share: his wife, his kids and his mojo plug. Are we telling you that if you buy a Lordship A40 it will automatically become your mojo plug? Not at all but we think it’s a darn good plug to have at your disposal when chasing after oversized stripers.
We recently had the pleasure of testing a new line of St Croix rods. The first rod that we took along on a short trip to a local jetty was a 7' Legend LSS70MMF . We were at first surprised by the small guide configuration on this rod. All Legend rods are built with a Fuji LC surf guide configuration. We have had rods built in the past with similar guides and we swear that they cast better than rods we had built with standard guides. But after arguing until we were blue in the face, we finally gave in and stopped sharing our thoughts on the subject of small guides. This Legend rod rekindled those thoughts as we walked impatiently to our secret honey hole. Our first cast took all the doubt away as the lure sailed smoothly into the inlet. We have been huge fans of St Croix rods. In fact a 7’ Premier has landed more weakfish in this honey hole than all our other rods combined. On occasion we would hook a husky striper on this rod and we'd have a real fight on our hands. On this cold October night, we thought that we might run into some stripers. We just did not expect them to be so large or numerous in this spot. Every cast with a bucktail was greeted by a striper ranging from 14 to 20 pounds. You want to talk about giving a rod an honest workout? The rod preformed flawlessly and you had the feeling you were fishing with a rod much bigger or heavier as it would whip the stripers in a hurry. Even the largest bass that took off with the current was quickly subdued by the parabolic bend in the rod. To say that we were impressed would be an understatement.
When we got home we did some research on the guide configuration and learned that it was a brainchild of Fuji's former president Omura. He was a Japanese casting champ and he developed the idea of using a small stripper guide followed by smaller ones and lots of them. This increased casting distance, improved line control and accuracy and reduced weight for a better rod balance. After reading this we were pumped to take a 10'6� Legend to the beach and give it a real workout. We, like many surf fishermen, are rod snobs who prefer to use a "custom" made, one piece rod instead of a two piece stick. As we walked over the dunes we admired the "XGrip" handle that looked and felt better in our hands than most of the rods we had built to our specifications over the years. Not only does it reduce weight and increase comfort while casting but it also reduces fatigue while fighting a fish. It only took one cast with a ten and ½ footer (LSS106MM2) to realize that St Croix Legend rods are deceivingly powerful. The lure sailed into the ocean and the line flew flawlessly through the guides. By the end of our session we were convinced that this was one of the finest factory made rods we ever had the pleasure of using. The new Legend series gets two very enthusiastic thumbs up from us.
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IN THE KITCHEN RICHARD PIETROMONACO SURFCASTER CHEF STORY-ZENO HROMIN PHOTOS-ZENO HROMIN/BILL WETZEL
Some people discover surfcasting later in life while others lose and regain interest in the sport over the years. New York's Richard Pietromonaco doesn't belong in either camp. He knew from his early days that he would be answering the call of the surf for the rest of his life. Growing up in Staten Island, New York Richard's life has always revolved around the ocean. From childhood memories of crabbing on local docks, to many trips with his dad to Cape Cod, his life always had some salt sprinkled over it. As he has grown older he scooped softshell crabs from the docks of Staten Island, caught powerful stripers from the Jersey shore, enjoyed dining on Welfleet oysters from Cape Cod and fresh flounder from Long Island waters. His dad was an avid gardener and introduced Richard to many fruit and vegetables from his garden. Surrounded all his life by these wonderful earthly foods, it's no wonder young Richard, after working in fine Italian restaurants at an early age, decided to make great food not only his passion but his profession. He graduated from the Culinary Institute of America in 1985 and dove passionately into the restaurant business.
Over the years he worked with many innovative chefs such as Larry Forgione of An American Place and Bradley Ogden of Campton Place and the Lark Creek Inn in San Francisco. In 1989 he was hired as a corporate chef for Sfuzzi, Inc., a multi unit group of Italian inspired restaurants across United States. In 1995 Richard became Chef de Cuisine at Drew Nieporent's highly acclaimed Tribeca Grill. The boy from Staten Island had done well. But just like chasing stripers, where the bigger striper is always one more cast away, his journey wasn't done. In 1997, Richard joined the Heartland Brewery as a corporate chef and partner. Over the years, he has been instrumental in guiding the growth and expansion of the Heartland Brewery which now includes seven restaurants in some of Manhattan’s busiest locations.
While the journey through the culinary world has been exciting there is one thing that makes Richard's heart rate accelerate to dangerous levels. Dreaming about being perched on a slippery Montauk rock, cloaked in darkness, looking for a strike from the mighty striper gets this world class chef's adrenaline pumping. For all the hustle and bustle of the big city lights, the sound of the angry ocean on the darkest of nights actually puts him at ease. Becoming one with nature, he is a man on a mission, casting his offering into the seas. Of course, these picturesque moments are often interrupted by angry swells that appear out of nowhere and have Rich, just like the rest of us, tumbling in the white water. No place we ever fished could chew and spit out an angler faster than Montauk’s south side, filled with slippery boulders and raging surf. Yet chef Rich finds a quiet oasis in this state of constant turbulence that surrounds him, far away from the pressures of daily life. In the winter you might find him in any of the seven Heartland Brewery locations perfecting his craft on a daily basis. However, in the summer and fall you will find his Korkers slipping over the moss covered rocks of Montauk's south side. This surfcasting chef plays as hard in the surf as he does in the kitchen. He says that the sound of the surf on a dark night relaxes him and puts him at ease.
Rich finds a quiet oasis in this state of constant turbulence that surrounds him, far away from the pressures of daily life.
Striped Bass with Basil Crust Ingredients: 4 each- 6 oz striped bass filets (skin on or off) 4 tablespoons- basil pesto 2 tablespoons- unseasoned breadcrumbs salt and pepper to taste Method: Coat each striped bass filet with the basil pesto evenly. Can be done a few hours prior to cooking to allow it to marinate. Place the marinated bass in a baking pan and dust the top with the bread crumbs lightly. Bake in a 375 degree oven until the fish is cooked through the center. Breadcrumbs should be slightly brown when done. Yield: 4 portions
Roasted Tomatoes with Fresh Thyme Ingredients: 12 ripe tomatoes- on the vine or any walnut size tomato 1 tablespoon- fresh thyme picked off the stem 2 tablespoons- extra virgin olive oil Salt and pepper to taste Method: Cut tomatoes in half and place flat side up in a baking pan Sprinkle the top of the tomatoes with the fresh thyme, salt and pepper Drizzle the extra virgin olive oil over the tomatoes Place in a pre-heated oven set at 450 degrees Bake until tomatoes begin to brown slightly and skin pulls back Remove from oven and let cook in the pan
Roasted Vegetable Couscous Ingredients: 2 cups- Israeli couscous or regular small grain couscous 4 cups- water 1 teaspoon- kosher salt 1 pinch- saffron 1- red bell pepper roasted and diced 1- yellow bell pepper roasted and diced 1 cup- green squash – small diced ¼ cup- red onion small diced 2 tablespoons- extra virgin olive oil 1 tablespoon- chopped chives Salt and fresh black pepper to taste Method: Bring the water, salt and saffron to a boil in a small sauce pot Add the couscous and mix with a spoon so there are no lumps Bring to a simmer, cover, reduce heat to low and cook for 7-9 minutes. Couscous should have a slight bite when done. In a large sauté pan add the extra virgin olive oil on medium heat for one minute Add the red and yellow pepper, the green squash, red onion, salt and pepper. Sauté on medium heat until the squash begin to soften. Add the cooked couscous and chives and mix until blended evenly. Remove from heat and keep warm.
To assemble Place the couscous in the center of the plate Arrange the roasted tomatoes around the couscous Place the cooked striped bass on top of the couscous Drizzle the aged balsamic vinegar around the plate Garnish with a sprig of fresh thyme on top of the fish
To taste some of Rich’s dishes for yourself, check out HeartlandBrewery.com
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My life started out with fishing and has come full circle. In between I've worked as a bartender, stunt man, actor and a director. But wherever I went and whatever I did, the pull of the water was always too strong to ignore. In 2006 I finally gave in and made my passion my career. Fishing is a funny thing. The first fish I ever caught wasn't very substantial but it's the fish I remember most. I was 7 years old and on a bobber and worm I caught a cockeyed goggle eye. I kid you not, a goggle eye with a crooked eye. It didn't matter, this sickly fish sparked a fire that has consumed me ever since. Only one other fish I remember as vividly: my first largemouth bass. I was 13 and caught this fish on a black and yellow Hula Popper in a bumble bee pattern. The bass weighed 4 pounds, the cutoff weight at
which a largemouth bass becomes a "respectable" largemouth bass. I carried it like a medal as I walked into my father's Rod-n-Gun club. Members of the club stopped to admire my fish and ask what I had caught it on. Then each one of them reached into his pocket and slipped me a dollar bill. Big money in those days for a 13 year old! I was so proud, the great fishermen of the Rod-n-Gun club asking me for information on matters of fishing and then being paid to boot! How does my photography fit into this picture? I would trade every fish I have ever caught to have photographs of these two moments in my life. Now when I'm guiding in Alaska or prowling the rocks of Montauk and I see someone hooked into a memorable fish I always have a camera within reach. I know to land the fish on film will land it forever.
Me and a buddy were fishing the North side of the point (Montauk), catching one and two pound schoolies on almost every cast! This went on all night. Fun but not satisfying. This guy walks up, walks into the water and makes his way to a rock about 50 yards out. Not 10 minutes go by and he's hooked into something big. 10 minutes! I'm there 3 hours and the best I can do is a 2 pound schoolie and this guy hooks up to large fish in 10 minutes! I still shake my head every time I look at this photo.
This one is all about the color and detail. A macro lens is a must in my camera bag. So much in "fishing" photography demands to be shot close up. To be able to get the textures and details so you can really feel the photo.
As long as I've been fishing (40+ years) I still think there is something magical about having 3 people hooked up at the same time. Two is cool but three! It says something about the water they are fishing, the timing, the shared experience, what kind of day they are having. Any fisherman looking at this photo can relate and it probably increases their heart rate just a little. (note-the hardest thing to do is to put down your fishing rod during a blitz and grab your camera. It takes all my strength)
I took this shot because of the emotional content. Surfcasters are often loners. They can spend hours by themselves with just the company of the sea. Seeing this man walk to the beach early in the morning, mist in the air, the lighthouse in the back ground. The shot gives me a sense of solitude and stillness.
Never got this guy's name and I wish I had. I owe him. I'm a better fisherman now because of his advice. We were side by side throwing the same lure, the same distance, the same area. He was catching 6 fish to my one. Frustrated I went to shore, put the rod down and went to the camera instead. I like this shot because you can feel his concentration and intensity. He was like this the whole time, very focused. If you look closely at the photo you will see that his lure isn't even in the water. The man is on point! (before he left he explained to me that my retrieve was too fast. S-L-O-W down, feel the lure, focus and expect a fish on every cast.) Ken Baldwin is a fly fishing guide in Alaska and published photographer. After guiding anglers all summer he treats himself to a one month trip to Montauk in the fall. You can find more about him on his website at www.dancefish.com
It’s been a long winter.
Sharpen your claws on a good book.
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Rod Review A few years back Lamiglas came out with a new line of surf rods and blanks, the Super Surf Series. Because they were so new, I felt the need to build one for myself so I could talk intelligently about the rod with inquiring customers. I chose the SSU 1321MH blank so I could compare it with the popular GSB 1321M. Although the SSU has a MH rating these rods are very similar in the way they handle different lure weights. The first thing I noticed is how light the completed rod feels. The second thing I noticed is that the SSU cannot be forced while casting. The rod loads beautifully on its own. I have been throwing ¾ oz bucktails up to 5 oz with it. However, ¾ to 1 ½ ounce lures take a little effort. This rod absolutely launches lures in the 2 ½ to 4-oz range. My rod built on the SSU 1321M blank has become my “go to” rod and the GSB my backup.
The SSU 1201M blank has become quite popular and I have been building a lot of them for customers. They outcast their counterpart, the GSB 1201M, feel more flexible and have great backbone while handling big fish. To date, every one of the people I have built them for have raved about them. As a matter of fact, the young man that caught the winning fish of 42 pounds in the Montauk Classic caught that fish on a custom rod built on the SSU 1201M blank. He said the rod handled the fish like a champ. The SSU 1201L is a good bucktailing and light plug rod while the SSU 1201MH is good around structure and bridge pilings.
I will say that if you want to realize the full potential of these blanks go with a custom built rod if your wallet allows. I noticed a difference between the factory rod and the custom built on the SSU 1201M blank. The custom was more responsive while casting and sensitive to the touch while retrieving lighter lures and bucktails. One huge word of caution, these rods are still graphite. With today's braided lines, these rods will break if not treated properly. That means you can’t use 50 pound test line, lock down the drag and think you can hoist a teen size bass up on the jetty. Ain’t gonna happen !!!!
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An Interview with Russ Paoline
lures Words and photos by Zeno Hromin.
Recently we had the pleasure of sitting down with Russ “Big Rock� Paoline, maker of Big Rock lures. We have long admired his creations and although we've known Russ for many years, he still scares the crap out of us. Never has a nickname fit the person so well. However, during the interview, we realized that he really is only a teddy bear with giant arms, a humongous neck and scary tattoos. In spite of this, we still left his plug cave in a hurry badly in need of a bathroom. By now you probably realize that we are just joking. Russ is a dear friend and someone for whom we have a lot of respect and admiration (even though he threatened us with bodily harm if we didn't write something nice about him.)
SJ When and where did you start surfcasting? I remember that I was just a little kid when I started. This was almost 40 years ago. Maybe at the age 5 or 6, my dad and a friend of his took me tossing bait for bass and blues. I caught a 6lb bluefish that day and was hooked. I started to get more serious in my early teens spending more and more time at the beach here in New Jersey, where I was born and raised and still reside today. SJ What is behind the Big Rock name? We hope is not something you had to pass through... That started as a kid. I was built like a boulder and used to get into a lot of fights. My friends said my head was as hard as a rock……..and now at 6’1” and 290lbs, it seems to fit. It is kind of funny but that is how I build my plugs: big, solid and tough.
SJ Why did you start to build your own lures? After having graduated to artificial lures in the surf, I discovered wooden plugs. I bought a used Gibbs Danny for $2 and caught a ton of fish on it. That plug took a beating and was in horrible shape. One cool fall day, lots of bass and blues were in the wash at Island Beach State Park in New Jersey and I was trying my best to catch fish on that crippled, water logged plug. I noticed a fellow who was fishing near me. He was fishing a smaller plug than I was and he was doing a number on the bass. I thought the plug was plastic because I didn’t see any swivels or grommets. He noticed the attention I was paying to his plug and said to me that it was a “ Lefty “ plug and that it was completely sealed with epoxy. He said that it would catch fish when nothing else would. He was kind enough to let me examine the plug. I think he was tired of catching fish and needed a break anyway as he was out-fishing me 10 to 1. I remember standing there staring at this plug, not understanding how it could be made of wood.
I thanked the old timer for letting me see it and half heartedly went back to casting, all the while watching him bail fish 25yds in front of him. I couldn’t buy a strike but kept on fishing anyway for another 2 hours. I finally managed to get a bluefish to bite the mangled Danny. It was water logged and the lip was so bent up it could barely swim. While unhooking it, the front hook fell off. I shook my head and felt defeat as I cut the leader and held the plug in my hand. I was debating breaking off the other hook and tossing it to its final resting place in the briny blue when the old timer walked up to me and asked what I was doing. I told him of the pending funeral for my beloved Danny. He told me not to toss it. He wanted to use it for a decoration in his trophy room. I thought it was a fitting end for a retired
warrior, so I handed it to him. The man's face lit up and he smiled and said I was a good kid. He grabbed his rusty old pliers and cut his plug from his leader and handed it to me. I looked at him in amazement and accepted the plug. He just said: “Use it well son.� I thanked him profusely and shook his hand and watched him walk up over the dune and away. I stared at that plug for a while, a beautiful white swimmer. It had seen many fish that day. That plug saw many more fish as well, and I would see the man who gave it to me from time to time, usually as he was leaving, I would wave and start after him, I wanted to introduce myself to him and ask his name but was never able to time it right.
A few more weeks went by and my confidence boomed as I became more proficient at using the “Lefty” plug. I found the best ways to fish it and practiced studying the water, learning about structure and water flow. One day that fall I was alone on the beach hitting school size fish steadily all day when I got a tremendous hit. Line peeled from my Penn Squidder reel and I watched the 17lb mono fly off the spool. After some back and forth, I saw a huge, yellow eyed demon thrashing on the end of my line, the dreaded Jersey Piranha, a bluefish. I knew I was in trouble and gave the fish slack hoping it would shake the plug. It tail walked across the surface and seemed to pause for a second, looking at me, then in one move bit through my line and swam away with my most prized plug. Heartbroken I reeled in and sulked off the beach, surely I would never catch another fish……. For weeks I searched for another “Lefty” to no avail, they were scarce and next to impossible to find. Seeing how bummed out I was over this, my dad, God rest his soul, said to me, “Son, just make one, how hard could it be?” That was the beginning of years of old school learning curves, when info was not available about plug building and everything was trial and error. Big Rock Custom Lures was born…..
SJ Your extreme taper does play homage to “Lefty” style lures and old wood by Donny Musso. But your metal lips are much wider in midsection. Tell us why? I wanted a bigger profile to carry more weight yet maintain the balance and active swim motion. I fish mainly conventional reels and a 2oz plug suits me much more than a 1oz plug. I also look for rough white water and wind in my face. I seem to have the most luck during these conditions and lighter plugs end up at my feet during these times. I also like to be able to fish a metal lip when the fish are just outside the bar. Having an aerodynamic shape and the ability to cast well are important issues as well. Therefore the football shape was the only viable option to maintain a balanced swim and fishability. SJ Most of the metal lip swimmers on the market are designed to swim on the surface. Do you consider your lures strictly surface swimmers or do you use them in other ways too? No, absolutely not!! Swimming high in the water has its applications for a metal lip, but I don’t like to carry a lot of plugs and I sure don’t like changing them while the bite is on. My plugs were designed to swim up on top with a slow to moderate retrieve with a tantalizing wiggle that drives fish crazy in calmer water. But take 2 fast cranks on your reel handle and drop your tip and my plug will dig in and swim sub-surface to about a foot down. It will hold strong in the white water and inshore turbulence and you can effectively swim the plug all the way to your feet without it rolling out. I also make a special order deep swimmer that will not swim on the surface. Toss it into an inlet or a strong rip and it will dig and dive. I have used it to scrape the bottom in 10’ of water, although I’m not sure just how deep it can run.
SJ You have always been known, like many of your contemporaries in New Jersey, for using a fixed hanger for attaching the hook. We heard that you recently tried using swivels but that you went back to your original concept. What is behind all these changes? (Frankly, it makes us dizzy just typing this...) I think swivels are great and don’t adversely affect the plug as long as they are high quality and stainless steel, however swivels cannot be used with a fully epoxy sealed plug. Let me explain “ fully sealed “, the plug is turned and machined, then all the holes are filled with epoxy after wiring it, effectively returning the plug to a solid piece. The plug is then soaked with epoxy resin and allowed to cure. Now it's primed and painted and then epoxy coated again, hence fully sealed. “Epoxy sealed“ refers to turning and machining the plug, then soaking in epoxy, allowing it to run off and flow through the holes, sealing the wood but not filling the cavities, then assembling after paint with grommets and swivels. I tried using swivels last year, and they worked well, but I feel that the fully sealed models are more desired by fishermen, so I will be returning to that process and staying with it. It limits the number of plugs I can make as it takes much longer to build the filled models, but that is what got me this far.
SJ We heard it many times from surfcasters: “Those Big Rock lures are too nice to throw in the water." Pretend you are sitting on Dr. Phil's couch when we ask : "How does that make you feel ?" I build every plug I make to be fished, to bang off rocks, to get bitten by toothy critters, to lie wet in your bag for a week, and to last and give a consistent swim, trip after trip and fish after fish. I respect collectors and fully understand their passion, but the ultimate rush for me is to see and hear about fish being caught on my plugs. That won’t happen if a plug sits in a trophy case. Some have suggested to me not to paint them so elaborately or take such pains in finish quality…..sorry but that’s me. I just want everyone to know they work as well in the water as they look good in the box, SO GET OUT THERE AND FISH THEM!!
SJ We are always intrigued when we see plugs in the plug builder’s bag that are not his. It usually takes a lot more to impress a lure builder then a normal surfcaster. So, do tell us, what's in your bag that you haven't made? It really depends on where I am fishing. Here in NJ, you will find Big Ed’s 6” and 8” Bass Thumb big swimmers and Fixter Pikies and Danny's. I also like Big Ed's pencil poppers in the spring when we have big bunker. In the fall I will carry Skippy swimmers, Digger’s darters, and probably the most productive plug of this year, Big Ed’s sinking needlefish, the little thing is a bass magnet! If I were fishing Montauk, I’d use my spring NJ choices, adding Beachmaster Danny's and Juniors, as well as Super Strike Darters and Northbar Bottle darters. There is almost always a 7” loaded Redfin, a Bomber 17a, and a 7” Rebel in my bag, as well as Storm Shads, bucktails, and a few tins. I always used to carry “Lefty” plugs with me, but sadly at the time of this writing Lefty has passed away, leaving a huge void in the NJ surf fishing community. His plugs are very valuable to me on a personal level having known and befriended the man and having had the pleasure of fishing with him, I don’t want to risk losing any, so they are being retired to a place of honor in my home.
SJ We understand that just like many other custom builders, you find it hard to keep up with the demand for your plugs. Where can our readers find your lures? Right now I am 6 months behind on internet orders. Plugs can be ordered by emailing me on my website, www.bigrocklures.com. Leave your phone number and I’ll contact you as soon as I am able to fill your order. My plugs are available, but not on a steady basis, at Fisherman's Supply Co. in Pt. Pleasant, NJ. You can call Ronny at the store to check on availability. I will be at the Jersey Shore Saltwater Fishing Show put on by Shore Catch Guide Service Show and Expo on Saturday March 13th, 2010, at the Spring Lake Manor. I will also be at the Asbury Park Fishing Club Flea Market on Sunday March 14th at the Convention Center on the boardwalk in Asbury Park, NJ. I am also planning to be at the Berkeley Fishing Flea Market.
SJ What are your future plans for Big Rock Lures? I want to keep Big Rock a name that fishermen can count on and a product they will have faith in. Right now I am employed full time and can only run the business as a part time venture. God willing, I will be able to retire in seven years. Then I will increase production and look to distribute Big Rock to a bigger audience, making the plugs more available. I am currently working on a larger plug that can be made from an available steady source of materials. I am developing a popper design and possibly a needlefish. Right now I have to dedicate my time to filling the orders of the patient anglers waiting for my 5.2 Shovelhead Swimmer. I would like to send out a hearty “Thank You� to all the anglers catching fish on my plugs. They were designed for fishermen by a fisherman.
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SJ
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SO LONG OLD FRIEND A POEM BY VITO ORLANDO
So Long Old Friend As I watch you depart I bid you fair well With a very heavy heart No more to be seen Along The Coast Your declining numbers Are discounted by most The Majestic Striped Figure That many once adored Will become a thing of the past As your dwindling numbers go ignored Your range once expanded Before you went away Those areas of abundance Are a mere pittance today
You swam And the riv You swam thr During your
In the curls Where your eleg Will be void When you’re now
As the need Continues The same waves in Will wash your foot
You have m Who see And as their q Your decline
in the ocean vers and bays rough the inlets r plentiful days
of the waves gance was abound of your beauty where to be found
dless slaughter s out of hand n which you frolicked tprints from the sand
many enemies only green quotas increase e can be seen
As commercial catches Begin to Soar The recreational fishermen Are demanding some more Why must you keep Two fish per day For the real thrill is watching The bass swim away. There are those amongst us Who fail to read The writing on the wall As they are ruled by greed Many are to blame For your coming demise So when you are gone It should be no ones surprise It may be too late To curb the trend So I say a Tearful Good Bye To My Grand Old Friend
S U R F C A S T E R ’ S J O
APRIL 1 TO OCTOBER 31 2010 ST
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U R N A L P R E S E N T S
2010
CATCH AND RELEASE CONTEST
AL BENTSEN
A TRIBUTE TO A LEGEND
PART ONE CHUCK LEIGH
In 1948, my dad bought me my first rod and reel. It was a Montague split bamboo weakfish rod and a Penn 160 reel. Any fishing I had done before then was with a handline or dropline as we called them then. It was a fine rig for the fishing I did for sand porgies, fluke, kingfish, sea bass and blackfish. This fishing was mostly done from the local piers and jetties in Sea Gate and Coney Island in Brooklyn. Occasionally I caught beautiful little fish about seven or eight inches long that had longitudinal stripes. Not knowing what they were, I tossed them back. Around 1949, I heard about striped bass, what great game fish they were and how they could be caught on artificial lures. I also heard how big they grew! I realized that I had been catching them, small ones to be sure, but now I knew that there were bigger ones to be had. It was about that time that I started frequenting Moishe’s Tackle Shop in Coney Island, where I became acquainted with squidding tackle.
I bought my first surf rod blank, a male Calcutta, with my allowance. I also was mesmerized by the photos on the wall. The guys in those pictures were like major leaguers to me…Paul Sussman, Lou Paras, Frank Frezza…and a very young Al Bentsen. By 1950 I was catching school stripers after school on the prescribed lures: tin and pork rind and sometimes feathers. I had started acquiring a few plugs such as Pflueger Mustangs, Creek Chub Pikie Minnows, and my soon to become favorite, a Heddon Vamp Spook. Casting those with the big Calcutta wasn’t easy, but I had saved some money from summer jobs and was able to buy my first “glass” rod, a two piece Harnell 525, and soon graduated to a Penn 200 Surfmaster. I still hadn’t run into Al Bentsen on the beach…he was fishing nights and I was still fishing in daylight.
In 1951 my family moved to another house, still within Sea Gate. I soon found out that one of my new neighbors was Paul Sussman, one of my heroes from Moishe’s picture board. We became friends when Paul observed me going fishing every day. I would always show off my catch to him. Paul was in his late twenties then and he owned a car. I was fifteen and too young to drive, so Paul started taking me out for night fishing. He and Al Bentsen were friends so it wasn’t long before I met Al, who was nineteen at the time. One of my first experiences with Al happened around that time.
I was night fishing on the Steeplechase Pier in Coney Island, using a float and worm rig, when Al came walking out on the pier to see what was going on. He had been squidding the nearby jetties with no success. As we were talking, my float dipped under and I reeled up a striper of about seventeen inches, which was a keeper at that time. Al, four years my senior and someone I looked up to, said “You’re gonna throw it back, right kid?” I really wanted to keep that bass and protested “Gee Al, he’s a keeper.” “No, kid…you gotta throw him back…he’s a rat,” replied Al. So, not wanting to appear uncool to one of my heroes, I reluctantly returned the striper. We did some fishing together during the following couple of years, but since I was still too young for a license and Al hadn’t yet begun to drive, we depended on others for transportation. We never fished in large groups, so Al and I didn’t get to fish together
too often. In the fall of 1953, I turned eighteen and got my driver’s license and Al entered the Coast Guard that year. We did get to fish together during Al’s furloughs and we kept in touch by mail during his four year enlistment.
Chuck, 1952.
New York jetty fishing was never really a productive way to catch big bass. There would be short lived runs in the spring and the fall. During the summer, the western South Shore of Long Island required a lot of work for pretty minimal results with occasional bursts of action interspersed among mostly slow times. We relished our Cape trips, where good action could be had all summer. Also the fish were larger on average than those we caught in New York. We knew that bass could be caught in the back bays of Long Island but for both of us that was less appealing than the lure of the open surf. Both Al and I absolutely loved jetty fishing, even with its inherent dangers, often unfishable nights and meager rate of return. We knew that Montauk was more productive, but for fishing every night, it was too far away. And we fished every possible night. We also had the South Shore locales we fished pretty much to ourselves and were able to learn more than one might think possible about jetty fishing and to refine it for maximum results. We were also aware that Montauk drew crowds and that crowds are the enemies of successful striped bass fishing. In the fall of 1955, while on leave from the Coast Guard, Al was around for some decent big bass action in Long Beach. We had taken fish ranging up to the high thirties for several nights running in the Troy and Clayton Avenue area. It was during that period that Al tied into a couple of fish that all but stripped his reel. I was alongside him one night on the Ohio Avenue jetty in Long Beach when he hooked a fish that ran most of his line out. We were fishing metal spooled Penn Squidders. These spools possessed a line capacity that approached three hundred yards of thirty-six pound test braided nylon. Sadly, Al lost that fish after having it on for a while. The amazing thing is that while fishing alone the previous night, he hooked a large fish that behaved similarly, taking almost all his line before he dropped it.
In the early fifties, for reasons I never understood, the prevailing wisdom was that most bass left Cape Cod soon after Labor Day and it was thought that the stripers that remained were best fished for on the bottom during the day. Al put that theory to rest that fall, when he, along with Mel Clapp and George Adams traveled to Provincetown and had some phenomenal late season night action on rigged eels. They also had a daybreak blitz on a howling Northwester at Race Point when they put a couple of dozen cows on the beach with nobody else around. They had correctly calculated that a hard northwest wind would drive the bait in the area to the Race and that the bass that had been prowling the back beaches would follow. In those years and the following ones we fished the Long Beach jetties relentlessly, and pulled Cape trips whenever possible. Al and I both worked in Manhattan, so very often we would drive to work on a Friday morning with our gear packed and take off for Provincetown straight from work. The roads were less developed then, so the trip took longer than it does today and we would arrive past midnight. We headed straight for the beach with no clues as to what the state of the fishing was or had recently been, or where the bass had been hitting, if at all…..but most often we would hit fish. We fished until it was light, then sold what we had caught and rented a room or cottage. When we arose in mid-afternoon, we grabbed a bite to eat and were on the beach before dark. The second night was an all-nighter and more often than not, we did some damage. Again, off the beach in the morning, down to the wharf to sell our catch at Mickey Finkel’s Seafood Packers, a few hours of shuteye then back to New York in time for a night’s sleep before work on Monday morning. This was week in and week out, with week night fishing on L.I.’s South Shore in between.
I can’t talk about Al Bentsen without describing some of the things that contributed to his being so great a fisherman. Al was very intuitive when it came to striper fishing, but he was also extremely analytical. He not only knew when and where bass would be hitting, he knew why……and he could reason it out for you in ways that made sense. Al strongly believed that continued success in the pursuit of stripers was not accidental and that there are reasons for everything. His work/fishing ethic was outstanding. Al displayed the same responsibility toward his career at IBM that he did toward striped bass fishing. Being very athletic was an attribute that undoubtedly contributed to his success on the beach and on the rocks, as was his fearlessness.
We often took terrible risks in our efforts to catch fish, and I’ve never seen Al intimidated by rough conditions. I recall a night when Al was trapped at the end of the Lafayette Boulevard jetty in Long Beach. At best, Lafayette was a bitch of a rock pile, all broken up and partly submerged. Even on calm nights, climbing that jetty was not something for the faint of heart. On the night in question, Al had gone out on an incoming tide and when he decided to return, the rising tide had covered the rocks enough so that it was impossible. I had been fishing nearby, and I started out on Lafayette to check on Al. I reached the submerged area and could go no further, but I was able to talk with Al across the break. After considering his limited options, Al said, “I’ll hang out here and keep fishing until the tide drops a bit. Why don’t you just hit some other jetties meanwhile.” And that’s what we did. Al’s style of fishing wasn’t random, it was based on sensible conclusions….very well applied.
In my early years of fishing an older, more experienced bass fisherman once told me that when he went out for stripers he didn’t expect to catch any….but he still tried. That was an unfortunate bit of advice, and definitely not the right attitude. Fortunately, I never really wanted to believe that and the fact that I didn’t was underscored when I started fishing with Al. When Al Bentsen went fishing, he expected to catch stripers. Of course there were many times when he didn’t have any action, but he was successful far more often than most surf fishermen.
That’s an attribute common to the most successful striper fishermen. The legendary Arnold Laine, whom I knew and fished with, was an iron man when fishing, which was one of the most significant reasons for his extraordinary success. A great many fishermen, especially night fishermen, will get tired and bored when things are slow. They will fall into a routine of just going through the motions while continuing to cast and retrieve. The best and most successful fishermen are consciously fishing all the time, as opposed to automatically going through the motions. Al’s endurance enabled him to fish When I was a very young fisherman, I often effectively and diligently, all the time. had difficulty remaining awake all night. I found myself grabbing naps on the beach, I stopped actively fishing for big bass in with the result that sometimes I missed the 1970, after over twenty years of truly action. As I matured, I found it easier to intense surf fishing. All my fifties, and there keep awake and by the time I was in my were more than a few, were taken before early twenties, I could fish from dusk to the years when such fish became more dawn without a break. Al Bentsen always commonplace. Three or four of them were had great endurance, but in addition to that, taken while fishing with Al, and he was and even more importantly, he had the directly responsible for two of them. ability to remain alert even when fatigued.
“ WHEN AL BENTSEN WENT FISHING, HE EXPECTED TO CATCH STRIPERS.”
C.L. 55.2#
It was October of 1961, and I was working in construction in Provincetown. Many of the fish had already moved out, and bass action had begun to slow, so I was devoting more time to work and less to fishing. I had finished a tough day of work, and my butt was dragging, so I lied down after dinner and was getting ready to call it a night when Al walked in. “Get your ass out of bed and get down to the beach…..we got some cows last night at the Race”, Al said. I told him that there was no way…..I was just too whipped. Al persisted….. “Listen,” he said, “they didn’t hit until the high incoming, so grab a nap and come out at around eleven o’clock…I’ll see you out there.” And he left. Of course I managed to get out, pretty late, but in time for the bite. It was a bit slower than the night before, but I got four, including a 48 and a 52. Thanks, buddy. The other was in 1959. I’ve told this story before, but it’s worth repeating. Al and I were fishing together for a week and had been doing well. For several nights running I had taken fish over 45 pounds every night…..some were close, but no fifties. Then one evening, Al and I got into an argument. I can’t remember about what, but what made it unusual was that we rarely argued. The argument continued as we were fishing, until Al finally said something like, “You’re just like the rest of these assholes who piss and moan just because they’re not satisfied with what they’re catching! I hope you get a f----g 55 pounder so you’ll stop bitching and get the f--k off my back! That ended the argument and not another word was spoken until a few hours later, at about 2:00 A.M., when I slid a beautiful bass up onto the beach. Al ran down and grabbed it, dragged it up and plopped it at my feet, and said, “There’s your f-----g 55 pounder…..now maybe you’ll be happy and shut the f--k up!” In the morning, on the scale at Seafood Packers, it weighed in at 55.2. Thanks again, buddy.
One of my friend’s best qualities was his honesty. By honesty, I don’t mean to say that Al Bentsen was always forthcoming with information about locations, methods, or whether or not he had caught fish at all. Like all successful striper fishers, he was at times forced to color the facts a bit in order to protect his source or preferably, to just say nothing. The honesty I refer to, or more accurately the lack of it, is the old fashioned bullshit and exaggeration that is, and always has been such a large part of our pursuit. Al never invented a story or a fish, or inflated a weight. The mere thought of something like that wasn’t anything that would even occur to him. As part of that, he was believing of others, often when such belief was undeserved. If that naivety could be considered a failing , then I guess Al would have to plead guilty to one of his few faults and certainly not the worst fault one could have. While on the topic, and this is probably best reserved for another article, I can’t refrain from commenting on one of the effects that BS can cause. A good friend of ours, who happened to be a competent surf fisherman, was insecure enough so that he on occasion engaged in lying. I clearly recall the phone call I received one morning in which he reported that he had just come off a certain Long Beach jetty with three large bass. A stiff Northeast wind had been blowing, and I had stayed home because I had assumed that conditions would be unfavorable enough to preclude any possibility of success. Upon hearing my friend’s story, my first thought was that I had screwed up, but since this was during the fall and daylight action was a possibility, I took off for the beach. One look at the ocean confirmed my earlier conclusion…..the surf was pounding and brown, and the jetty in question was unfishable. I knew then that I had been lied to, and I was very depressed about that as I returned home.
As it turned out, I wasn’t the only one to have received a call. Another friend, newer to surf fishing and somewhat inexperienced at the time, also headed to the spot upon hearing the news. Not recognizing the potential consequences of his actions, he ventured out on that Long Beach jetty. It wasn’t long before he was swept off the rocks. By some miracle, he wasn’t injured or killed on the rocks, and he somehow avoided drowning. When I confronted our friend with the facts and called him on his lie, he broke down. Al had also received one of the phone calls about the fictitious fish, but was wise enough to remain home. We were both shaken by the lie and its near tragic consequences.
In this age of the Internet, along with the increased popularity of catch and release, lying is more prevalent than ever before. Books have been authored that are supposedly true narratives but are based on pure fiction. Oversize bass have been reported and celebrated, when in fact some have been stuffed with weight-adding products and some not even caught by the angler claiming credit. There are more striped bass fishermen than ever before, most being so inexperienced that they are unable to distinguish fact from fiction. Thus they believe whatever they hear or read. And even among those who have advanced beyond the neophyte phase and are able to enjoy success at times, there are precious few who are equipped with the hardearned knowledge and experience that one must possess in order to distinguish a truly great fisherman from the many good ones. Al Bentsen was one of a kind‌..you won’t soon see the likes of him again.
-CHUCK LEIGH
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AL BENTSEN
A TRIBUTE TO A LEGEND
PART TWO JASON COLBY
As a young and somewhat successful surfcaster growing up on the sands of Long Beach, I kept hearing of a legend named Al Bentsen. Little did I know but in the years that I started taking sizable fish with consistency, Al was paying attention to me. One day, in the spring of 1976, I was waiting for a gillnetter to bring me some bunker at the old "Charvin Fishing Station" in Freeport and who was waiting there too, Al Bentsen! He told me that he had been following the reports of all the fish I had been taking and was glad to see I was doing well. Then he offered to take me rigged eel fishing! I couldn't believe it; to draw an analogy, it was like asking an alcoholic if he wanted to go drinking with the world’s best drinker (or something like that)... Anyway, we traded phone numbers and he said that when the cut bait thing slows down at the end of June, that is when the rigged eel fishing picks up. It was the first week of July that we got together for the first time and we agreed to meet at the West End 2 parking lot in Jones Beach at dusk. As we walked to "The Wall", Al told me stories about how he used to be able to drive right up to the jetty and not have to drag fish so far back to the parking lot. How he generally didn't want to fish with "others" because they can't keep up or can't keep quiet about "what and where." He said he knew I was lying about where I was catching all the fish I was weighing in and that was a good thing.
When we got to the rocks, I was amazed at how this "old man" could bounce across the rocks like a billy goat. (He was 45 and just recovered from a heart attack a couple of years earlier. To me that was old then and now I'm even older!) He knew where every step was the whole way out and particularly commented on how treacherous the low broken area was, two thirds the way to the end. It was just after that broken area that we started casting. When Al tied on his eel it was an ominous looking thing. The eel with two big hooks sticking out gave the message of "all business." I mean this was very serious and I instantly could tell that the bass were in trouble!
Jason Colby
It was almost fully dark and I was not a "conventional rod" person (so now I was going to have to do a lot of this by feel). In keeping with tradition I knew Al would be using conventional tackle that night so I had my Squidder reel/Harrington rod (the successor of the Harnell rod blank) combo and a few roughly rigged eels. I got my rigged eel directions from my friend Marty Gross but I had never even seen one of Marty's or one of anybody's for that matter, only some bad pictures in bad books. In the dark I could hear Bentsen casting from wherever he stood on the jetty. He put so much power into his casts that the reel was literally screaming with the strain! I tried to copy the pumping action Al was putting into his rod to make the eel swim like the real thing or perhaps even better. Earlier on the walk Al told me that he tested each eel in daylight from a dock in Freeport (that's where he lived) to make sure it swam the way he wanted it to. Let’s just say it was a pretty safe bet that if a bass saw one of Bentsen’s rigged eels she was going to try to eat it. The tide had changed from low and I was casting around the west side in the inlet for about an hour when Al called over to me and asked, "Any grabs?" When I said, “No”, he said I should come over and gaff a fish for him. After I dropped the 35 pounder at his feet he told me that the inlet side was not too good on the flood. I didn't think to ask him why he didn't tell me earlier but that was the way it was, everyone should learn from their own mistakes-"trial and error". A half hour later he got another one about the same size and said he was done, it was about 11pm and Al had to work in the morning (so did I but I wasn't an IBM executive, my fish market job actually went better when I seemed stupid from lack of sleep).
I guess since I offered to carry the fish back to the parking lot for Al, he invited me to fish again the next night. Of course I was only too happy to accept! After work, when we spoke about where to meet that evening Al said the wind was pushing too hard out of the southwest for the jetty and I was feeling sad because I thought we might not be going. I had just rigged an eel that looked much better than my previous creation, better hooks too. Al said we could fish a spot in the bay that he knew of and I could only think that he was talking about smaller fish as that is what I thought of the bay. We agreed to meet at "Field 10" and from there I followed Al in his Jeep with my Buick Skylark (my first car). I had no clue.
Jason Colby
We were driving along the road, heading in the direction of "The Big Bridge" when all of a sudden Al's Jeep swerves off to the right and down an embankment between some bushes! It was almost dark and I killed my lights as I had just seen Al do and I popped down that embankment too. From there we walked to a place Al called "The Mudbar" which was exactly that, a big mudbar that was exposed at low tide. To get to it we had to wade through some shallow water but as we went, Al warned that if you get caught out on the bar as the tide comes in you can easily get trapped. After crossing the dry mud we waded out to waist deep water to cast, Al to the left and me to the right. We weren't there for more than five minutes when Al set back with an "I'm in!" This was a much larger fish than the night before and it easily took drag against Al's Squidder. The 50 pound Micron and heavy drag did its job and soon Al had a fish in the high 40's on the bar. Landing fish here was much easier as you just needed to slide the fish into shallow water and then drag them to dry land. Soon after Al's fish, I got my first rigged eel bass. It weighed 39 pounds. During the next several nights we each had several fish over 40 pounds and one 49 pounder each but nothing over that. We had been doing such a job that I let it slip to my friend Jim and he was really itching to go himself. I couldn't have Jim fish the Mudbar because that could jeopardize my fishing with Al so I asked Jim to simply walk to a spot nearby that looked good to me and was only a half mile or so from the parking lot.
That night Al and I got skunked but Jim had several fish to 57 pounds! He said when he got to the spot I described there were bass tails sticking up out of the shallow water and it looked like the bass were blowing crabs out of the sandy bottom. He was using a Windcheater Rebel and only made four casts the whole evening. He had a runt 20 pounder on his first cast and a 41 on his second. When he was unhooking that one, he saw a massive tail come up so he quickly cast where he saw it and was nailed right away by the 57 pound behemoth but he couldn't get over how small the tail of that fish looked when he had the fish on shore. Then he saw "the really big tail" again, made a cast and hooked a freight train. This fish ran him almost completely out of line even though he was running west with the fish as fast as the terrain would allow. After a few hundred yards the line went limp and his plug came back without any hooks. Time to quit! Over that summer, Al and I were discovering new spots in the bay on an almost daily basis. Every night when we fished an area we would also fish "variations" of the spot that looked obvious, like randomly casting a couple of hundred yards this way or that. By doing this, we came up with some surprising results. For example there was a well formed rip to the northeast side of one of the bridges that looked like it would hold fish but try as we might we couldn't get a hit there. On a very calm night though we noticed a very faint, secondary rip about 50 yards to the east and we caught a few fish there almost every night for weeks at a time. That rip was impossible to see if there was any wind but that didn't matter once we knew where to cast.
Al taught me about always taking advantage of the conditions. If the wind was blowing unfavorably in the place you wanted to fish then fish somewhere else. You always learn something whether it's positive or negative and learning what not to do was often as valuable as learning the good things. Al was always looking for better tackle and when Nylon was invented he replaced his linen line. Then he replaced that with Dacron and then the Dacron for Micron (thinner and "smoother on the thumb"). When the new super braids came out in the early 90's he was one of the first to try them. He kept his Squidder until the "Penn 525 Mag" came out because he wasn't going to spend a couple of hundred dollars on a reel! After raising four kids Al was not a (financially) wealthy man. As the years went by I moved to Montauk to learn to fish a boat, Al and I got together as much as we could to fish the Jones Beach area. He never faltered from his rigged eels though I often deployed live ones. We each got our last "shore caught 50's", coincidentally on the same night which was June 18th, 1988. His was in Fire Island Inlet and mine in Shinnecock. I moved back to Al's area for a few years in 1993 and parked my boat in Seaford. Al and I used the boat as a sort of "water taxi" to take us to bay spots that we always wanted to fish but we always thought were otherwise inaccessible. There are still hundreds of good looking spots that we never got to and I hope Al is fishing them now...........
AL BENTSEN
A TRIBUTE TO A LEGEND
PART THREE ROGER MARTIN
I first met Al Bentsen in the late 1950’s. I was a kid of 18 trying to learn how to surf fish. Al was 26 and already a legend both in the NY surf and on the Cape. He fished Atlantic Beach and Long Beach a lot and I would frequently run into him in the parking areas where we took off our waders. He and his partner, Charlie, were not very talkative. They knew that I was “up to no good” as I tried to get them to give me “clues” about the sport. My biggest problem was that I knew that they used rigged eels but I had no idea how to rig them. They were not inclined to help me out! But this was not unusual for those times. I understood these guys. The average surf fisherman fished alone, kept his mouth shut and only talked to his most trusted friends. One of their club mates, Artie Handlin, ultimately showed me how to rig an eel. One dark night, I started out on one of the jetties in Atlantic Beach. Halfway out, I noticed a lone figure on the end of the jetty. He was on the right hand corner of the rocks. He sensed I was coming up behind him and he moved to the left hand corner. I thought he was going to let me fish the spot he had just vacated. When I got about thirty feet from him, he let out about 12 feet of line and swung a huge rigged eel in a big arc in front of me and through the empty space above the right hand corner where I thought I could stand. It didn’t take a genius to decode the message: “This is my jetty. Get off!” Bentsen was not about to share one of his favorite rock piles.
Atlantic Beach
My family moved from Brooklyn to Queens and I had to focus on getting an education, a job and a life. I shifted my fishing from the jetties to include the open beaches from Jones Inlet to Fire Island and Montauk. I no longer ran into Bentsen. I married and moved to Freeport on the south shore of Long Island. One morning in 1975, as I stood on the Long Island Railroad platform, I overheard three guys talking about the cow bass they had taken the night before. I heard one guy call another “Al.” I realized it was Bentsen. The next morning, Al was alone on the platform. I walked up to him and said, “Excuse me but you look familiar. Do you fish the beach?” That was all it took. I discovered that he lived three blocks north of me in Freeport. We commuted every morning together from that day on and my “fishing education” began. Al told me that he concentrated his fishing on the West End II jetty and on the marsh banks that are found in the back bay areas behind Jones Beach. He did not fish from the bridges. He preferred to walk the marsh banks in the bay. The rigged eel was still his weapon of choice. He wanted to catch large bass but the schools of huge bluefish that roamed the bay, drove him crazy. He would make 20 casts with a plug and not get a hit. Assuming that there were no blues around, he would put on a rigged eel and bang!! A blue would chop it up in an instant. Ultimately, Al came up with a way of dealing with the blues, but more on that later.
From 1975, when we reconnected, Al and I did not fish together very often. He preferred the jetty rocks and I had developed vertigo forcing me off the stones. He liked the quiet waters of the back bay and I loved the waves and white water of the open beaches. But we talked every day on the train and he continued to educate me. During this period, he and Jason Colby fished together. In the mid 1980’s, a moratorium was imposed on striped bass fishing. The number of bass had declined drastically and something had to be done to preserve the species. During these years, it was against the law to keep a bass. Ultimately, the fishery was reopened and the minimum size was raised to 36 inches. Al stopped fishing during the moratorium. He often expressed a reluctance to catch small fish fearing that they would not survive. I changed jobs in 1985 and commuted to work by car rather than by train. We still spoke on a daily basis. When the moratorium was lifted, he began to fish again. One night in mid June, I returned from the beach around 11:30 PM to find Al’s truck parked in my driveway. “You got a scale?” he asked. He pulled a huge bass out of the back of the truck and we struggled to weigh it. On my Chatillon hand scale, it weighed over 55 lbs. He said, “The rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.” (I think that this quote originated with Mark Twain.) The next morning, at a local bait shop, it weighed 53 ½ lbs. It was his eighth 50 pound plus bass. What did he catch it on? A rigged eel, of course. During the following years, he fished mostly between the hours of 2:00 AM and dawn. He would call me at work to report on the action. There were nights when he caught 6 or more large bass. I do not recall him keeping any fish after the moratorium was lifted except for the one I weighed. He described several mornings when hundreds of large fish were crashing in the shallows chasing bunker or sand porgies.
The rigged eel continued to be his main weapon. The following story shows the power of this technique. One day he told me that the night before he had fished the back bay near one of the bridges. Not sure if there were blues around, he opted to start off using his favorite Beachmaster Junior Atom. He landed 6 nice bass between 20 and 25 lbs but no blues. Figuring that it was safe, he switched to a rigged eel. On the first cast, he hooked and landed a 35 lb bass and on the next cast a 40 lb fish. These large stripers were probably sitting on the bottom ignoring the plug as it went by. However, when they saw the eel, they attacked. Al was asked one time what the difference was between fishing a plug and fishing an eel. He replied, “About 20 pounds.” He also told me that he usually caught more bass on his rigged eels than guys standing near him using live eels. Others have said the same thing.
June ‘88 52#
At this time, we guessed that there were less than 10 fishermen who used rigged eels on Long Island. In 1992, William “Doc” Muller asked me to talk to Al about doing a piece on rigged eels in a book Doc was planning to publish. Al agreed and wrote two chapters on rigged eels in “Secrets of Surf Fishing at Night.” It remains the definitive work on rigging and fishing eels. Unfortunately it is out of print but some libraries carry it. Many fishermen now use rigged eels because of this book. In a way, these chapters are Al’s legacy to the sport. Over the years, Al told me many stories of his days fishing the Cape and the local beaches of Long Island. No matter how often I heard these stories, the details were always the same. The size of the fish were always the same. The number he caught were the same. He did not need to embellish his stories. He did not need to remember what he had said before, because he told the truth everytime. In 1992 Al’s heart began to give him trouble again. One summer night, while bait fishing on a south shore sandy beach, he had to be taken off the beach in a buddy’s truck and taken to a local hospital. He recovered and received excellent care at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital in the ensuing years but he was never the same. He was hesitant about fishing alone for fear that he would have another heart attack and fall in the water and drown. He retired from IBM in the 1990’s and I retired a few years afterwards. We started to fish together on a regular basis. We explored the north shore bays in the early spring and caught lots of 20 lb plus bass on bunker chunks. He knew that I loved the open beach, so we started to fish the edges of the jetties at Long Beach with bunker and did pretty well. One night I had 4 bass between 25 and 30 lbs in less than a half hour. We would have landed more but Al cut his hand taking a fish off the hook. He was taking Coumadin, a powerful anti-coagulant. We could not stop the bleeding and we left them biting. This episode also prayed on his mind.
We also fished the marshes in the back bay. The police were a problem since they ticketed and sometimes towed cars parked on the grass near the bridges. My wife volunteered to drop us off at our spots and pick us up when we called on the cell phone. This worked out great for Al since we could watch out for each other. We knew that, in an emergency, help was only a phone call away. He always told my wife that she was a saint for volunteering this taxi service! He was right! Around 2002, Al turned his mind to the “bluefish problem.” These nasty razor-lips would destroy our rigged eels. He had molds for tin squids that had been made in the late 40’s. In those years, one of these tins had been used by a friend of Al’s to swim an imitation eel that was made out of pork skin. I bought ten pounds of pure block tin on eBay and we borrowed a hot pot to melt the metal. The first time we poured, we made about 40 tins. I visited local butcher shops seeking large sheets of pig skin. We would scrape and scrape the fat off the skins until they were thin and supple. Then we would cut them into pennant shapes about 15 inches long. We sewed the strips into eel shape and dyed them black. These were tied onto the tin squids with either one or two hooks. They cast well and wiggled like they were alive on the retrieve. Best of all, bluefish could not destroy them! The bass liked them too!
Al was always thinking of new techniques we could employ. He also remembered things that were successful in the “good old days” and we tried to adapt old ideas to newer times. He knew so much about the history of surf fishing. I told him that I had seen an interesting picture in Lyman and Woolners’s book “Striped Bass Fishing.” It showed various ways to rig eels. One eel appeared to have a curved metal plate connected to its head. I had never seen such a device. He told me that a friend of his showed up one summer in Provincetown with copper tubing that had been flattened on one end and bent to form a wobble plate. A screw and nut were used to attach a rigged eel to the round end of the tube. His friend called the thing “The Whistle.” The plate added weight to the eel and caused it to wiggle on a regular retrieve without the need to work the rod. He said that this rig was so successful that the hardware stores in P-Town ran out of copper tubing! We also tried to revive interest in an old plug that was popular when we were young: the Flap Tail. This plug was a sure fish catcher during the mullet runs in the 50’s and 60’s. But the mullet runs of late have been almost non-existent. When we were young the mullet would come out of the bays in late August and millions could be found in the surf line until late October. We built our own flaptail but we never had a chance to use it when there were mullet.
In 2002, Al’s son Alan passed away suddenly. He was about 40 years of age when he died. Al seemed to lose a lot of his spark after this. Starting around 2007, Al’s heart was giving him more and more problems. He was in and out of the hospital. One afternoon, as he was walking his dog, he woke up on the sidewalk. He had passed out and fallen unconscious to the ground. Thankfully, he was able to call his wife on his cell phone. He became even more hesitant to fish alone. Also he tired easily. Al was always tough. He was used to putting in hour after hour casting. Now when we went, after two hours, he would suggest that we pack it in. Last year in early 2009, his wife Fran passed away after a short illness. She had come close to death a few years earlier when she developed a serious intestinal tract problem. After her death, Al was never the same. He seemed lost without her. In the fall of 2009, Al went into the hospital again. I went to see him and inspite of the fact that he had multiple tubes and wires sticking out of him, he wanted to know if I had caught any fish recently. When I shook his hand as I was leaving, he held onto my hand as if to keep me by his side. He passed away a few weeks later on October 8, 2009. The prayer card that was given out at his funeral pictured waves breaking on a beach on a beautiful sunny day. I am sure that when he met the heavenly fisherman, he asked St. Peter how they were biting. Rest in Peace, my friend.
Alan Bentsen 49#
Al and Alan
Alan
Tommy Bentsen 39#
Al Bentsen and Frank “Freeport Frank” Speyer
Special thanks to the Bentsen Family for providing us with their cherished photographs.
Got some tall tales? We’d like to hear ‘em.
Info@surfcastersjournal.com
A N G L E R
S P O T L I G H T
janet messineo
The oldest historical reference I have found about women fishing is in John McDonald’s book “The Origins of Angling” where he cites an essay on sport fishing which was written by a nun. In 1496, Dame Juliana Berners is believed to have written “The Treatise of Fishing with an Angle.” I can’t quite comprehend that if women have been historically noted as serious anglers for over five hundred years, why we are still considered newcomers to the sport. Here we are in the 21st century and when I say that I am a surfcaster, I usually get a surprised look in response. I am often asked if I was raised in a family that fished. I was a little girl in the 50’s and in those days, in my neighborhood, it was not the norm to take a “girl” fishing. My dad would take my brother Paul deep sea fishing once a year, but no one asked me. When we vacationed at Salisbury Beach on the Massachusetts coast, my dad took Paul out to a big jetty called the Black Rocks, but no one asked me to go along. Fishing was considered a male thing and I guess that’s just the way it was back then. Since my early childhood had nothing to do with fishing, it was a slow and sometimes painful but wonderful journey. Was the pivotal moment the time when I hooked into a 16-pound bluefish at the drawbridge and thought it was a lobster pot? Or did I reach the point of no return when I met Irene Henley on the beach in her beat up 4X4 as she was headed to Cape Pogue with a sandwich and a fishing rod? Maybe the draw was the mystery of it all. Was it the wind in my face, the sand in my toes, the little shore birds that let me share the oceans edge with them? Did I just want to prove that a woman could become a fisherman when I knew the odds were not in my favor? Whatever it was that attracted me still has my attention to date.
I had a boyfriend at that time but he was not interested in fishing so I would ask any fishermen that I came in contact with if they would take me with them. I followed anyone with a rod in hand to the end of the jetties and grilled them with questions. It was frustrating because no one took me seriously. It appeared that the sport of fishing was cloaked in a veil of secrecy. I spent most of my time dreaming of fish and reading every book I could get my hands on. I gave up knitting and crocheting in the cold snowy months and I spent my evenings practicing tying knots with monofilament.
I remember the Spring when I got wind that Edgartown’s Great Pond had been opened and the striped bass had just arrived from their winter migration. The word was out that they were “SLAYING EM”. I did not have a 4-wheel drive vehicle until 1978 so the only alternative I had was to hitchhike. I remember walking toward the Great Pond and sticking my thumb out at the passing 4x4 wheel drivers. I always got a ride, sooner or later. I still have a clear memory of the fishermen lined up at the opening and big beautiful striped bass lying all over the beach. The first time I attempted this I was totally ill equipped. I had my department store two-piece rod and reel. Someone told me that the Rebel was a great lure so I had bought ONE Rebel that probably weighed 1 oz. I remember my heart pounding and my adrenaline pumping as I tried to cast my only lure into a strong SW wind. I could not understand why I could hardly get it into the water’s edge, never mind far enough to
target a striper. Looking back I can’t imagine what the guys were thinking. I remember crossing their lines and although I was casting as hard as I could I could not get any distance. I finally lost my ONE Rebel on a cast and hitched home with my head hung low. I am sure I was a nuisance. The memory of that day is one reason I never poke fun at anyone that is just learning because I understand what it is like to not have a clue. Instead of giving up, I just got more determined to catch a fish and become part of that secret small group known as “surf fishermen”.
Everyone was very closed mouthed and secretive and I could feel that they especially did not want to trust a woman. There was a handful of “How To” books and magazines on the market but it was nothing like it is today with digital photos and the overwhelming information that can be accessed from the Internet. One thing I did learn right away is that it was considered very rude to ask a fisherman where he caught his fish and that rule still holds true today. Want to hear a lie? Ask a fisherman “Where did you catch it?”
I finally asked an old friend that I had known since I was a teenager if he would take me fishing. Tim White was brave enough to let me to fish with him and at that point, I knew nothing but had a strong desire to learn. I knew that he was a “real fisherman” because he walked around town with his hip boots on. I went out and bought a pair of hip boots. We spent most of our time walking the north shore at night where the shadows, the rocks and the howl of the wind gave me the chills. I was really quite scared and everything including what lay under the surface of the ocean, seemed very spooky to me. I would never let him know how frightened I felt because he probably would not let me come with him. I used to carry a little bottle of “courage” (usually some flavor of brandy) in my wader pocket and although I don’t recommend it, it seemed to take the edge off. Tim let me tag along, but he made it very clear that everywhere we
went and every technique he taught me was not to be shared. I heard him lie one day when we were bottom fishing and someone walked by and asked him what he was using for bait and he said “mackerel” out of the corner of his mouth, I looked at him with a start because I knew he was lying! He brought me to places where the fish were (I still can’t tell) but left me to my own devices most of the time. I can remember struggling in the dark, my line in a bird’s nest. Tim would laugh at me and tell me that the only way I was going to learn, was to work the tangle out by myself. At the time I thought he was being very mean, especially when the fish were hitting and he was catching and I couldn’t get my line in the water. Now I realize he was doing me a favor. The only thing I regret it that he wanted to teach me to fish with a conventional reel and it scared me to death. The drag system on a spinning reel was already more than I could handle.
I did go fishing alone at night when no one would take me. Squibbnocket was one of my target spots. I heard rumors that it was a great place to fish but I was way out of my comfort range. I thought it was strange that I very rarely bumped into any other fisherman. I knew nothing about tides, winds or the feeding habits of fish. It was a pretty terrifying place at night and most of the time if I caught anything it was a skate or huge conger eel. I usually left the beach with my heart pounding and running back to my car and away from the boogieman. Between the fear and the intimidation I have no idea why I didn’t quit. I was working as a waitress at night and every chance I got was spent fishing from the jetties and bridges. On my nights off from work, I could be found from daybreak until dark fishing on Chappaquiddick. I had my first 4 wheel drive by then and I had learned how to cast and retrieve a plug. Bill Stone and Jack Fallon said I was the vamp of Wasque Point. I could line up with the best of them, shoulder to shoulder at the rip and catch bluefish by the truckload. Finding and catching bluefish was fairly easy in the 70’s and since no commercial license was required at that time, I was already selling my catch to restaurants and markets. Once the sun went behind the horizon, the game changed and I could not figure out how to find striped bass on my own. I was fishing on Chappy one day and I met Jack Coutinho. He said he was impressed with my casting and naturally I asked him if he would take me bass fishing. To my surprise he said “sure” and that was the beginning of a new life for me. I feel very lucky to have had the opportunity to fish with Jack because I learned so much about wind, tide, knots and gear. Catching striped bass was not all about technique though and I think Jackie seemed to have a 6th sense. He taught me what he had learned from his family and friends that came to Martha’s Vineyard from the Azores and I suspect that the
techniques he passed on to me were used for many generations. I was once again sworn to secrecy, big time. He also made me do everything myself but we became fishing partners for the next twelve years. Jackie passed away in 1991 and I still miss him. If you have ever had a “fishing buddy� that is no more, you know how I feel. That is another story for another time.
On May 6th, 1979 I caught my first 45lb striped bass. I was with Jackie and we were fishing the pond opening at Quansoo . It was one of our favorite places to fish and we caught a lot of beautiful striped bass there. It was a very big fish for that early in the season and the word spread fast. It was in the daylight hours so there were witnesses who saw that I hooked and landed the fish on my own. The rumor was that Jack was actually catching all the fish I weighed into the Striped Bass & Bluefish derby! Who was going to believe that little Janet could actually cast, hook and land a fish on her own. I was finally earning some respect from the “guys”. Now 35 years have passed and times have changed. It is wonderful to see many more women fishing the shores around the Vineyard. If I have done anything to help other women, I think it’s that I helped to break the stereotype. Not long ago, any women who dared to cross the line to do something that was traditionally performed by men would be pictured as physically large, muscle bound and masculine in demeanor. I am 5’2” (well I was before I shrunk an inch!) and weigh 100 lbs (well I was before I gained 15!). So many people have said to me “How does such a little thing like you land all those big fish!” I always reply, “It is mostly about technique, and not so much about strength.” Woman have approached me and said that they looked at me and knew that if I could do it, then they could do it too. I love that!
I am so fortunate that I live on the beautiful island of Martha’s Vineyard. I don’t think there are many places on earth that I would have had the opportunity to roam the beaches alone in the dark and feel relatively safe as I chased my passion for fishing. Fishing has become a way of life for me. It pushed me out of the restaurant business and into school to become a fish taxidermist. Twenty years ago I was honored when I was asked to become a committee member of the Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass & Bluefish Derby. I have been a charter member of the Martha’s Vineyard Surfcasters Association and now sit as President of that club. I have been writing for various sports fishing publications for over 15 years. Last year I finally became ready to become a shore guide. I hold workshops to teach surfcasting, starting from tying a knot. I also take people fishing on the beach. I love that too!
Photography by Ben Scott and Emily Drazen See more of emily’s work at edrazenphoto.com
We will remember you when we get to Hollwood... we promise.
SJ
Cuttyhunk Trip June 2009 Day 1 1 AM: Rolling, Rolling, Rolling It is just past midnight and Rob and our resident chef Tommy are shopping for food in a local Waldbaums. I am not sure what possessed them to wait until a few hours before departure to do food shopping. I was told it was Tommy's desire to buy the freshest food. A few hours later, Ray pulls in front of my house, while Rob picks up Lenny in Oceanside and we take off simultaneously on Interstate 95 towards Massachusetts. To say that excitement was high would be an understatement. After a quick breakfast in a New Bedford coffee shop, we make a pit stop at CMS Tackle shop to pick up a few items we either forgot or thought we might need. Considering that we carried with us the complete inventory of a small tackle shop and then some, we still find a few items that we either couldn’t buy locally or just didn’t think of.
8 AM: Start Your Engines We meet the rest of the crew behind Nemec Marina in New Bedford and unload our buggies at the dock where John Paul’s Sea Horse would arrive momentarily. We get our first taste of what Cuttyhunk has to offer brought right to our feet. Local sharpie Mike Veracka and his partner unload a tremendous cooler from the Sea Horse onto the dock. In it lie two gorgeous stripers that Mike and his partner caught on the island the previous night. After exchanging pleasantries with Mike and his partner, they are on their way home while we board the Sea Horse with our expectations raised much higher than any of us is willing to admit. We admire the fleet of steel fishing boats that are tied to the docks at New Bedford while Captain John Paul expertly navigates his boat out of the harbor. Seas are flat and the wind is almost nonexistent as we clear the sea wall and John opens the throttle of the Sea Horse. We are on our way to Mecca.
9 AM: Arrival in the Promised Land Arriving at Cuttyhunk is always followed by a spirited discussion about locations that look “fishy” which we haven’t fished yet, and this trip is no exception. The Canapitsit Channel, on the east end of the island and the back beaches are all places that some of us have not explored enough. By noon we unload our gear at the house we rented and launch an impromptu eel rigging session. Because of the lack of rooms at the Club, we rent a house from Bonnie. Although we all enjoyed staying at the Club over the years, we find the house to be much better suited to our needs. After all, poking eels with needles all afternoon is much better suited for private yards than on the tables of an establishment that might serve dinner on them later.
5 AM: Getting Comfy We visit the Club, which is located right across the street from our house and spend some time with our good friends Don Guimelli from Afterhours Custom Plugs and Larry Wentworth, maker of Big Fish Lures. They fill us in on the action during the week, since they arrived on Monday and have their finger on the pulse of what is happening on the island. Our friends from Long Island are there too: two excellent surfcasters and great guys to boot, Bob Jones and Frankie Bagnasco. They inform us that fishing is slow, but that did not temper our enthusiasm. After all, we just saw two 40-pound slobs in Mike’s cooler when he unloaded them from the Sea Horse. We know that the possibility of big fish is there - we just have to find them. We are antsy to go out but I know the danger of not keeping my emotions in check. Last year Tom and I arrived in Cutty and promptly took a walk to the southwest point. I wanted to show Tommy just what kind of rock formations and conditions he would experience at night. Unfortunately, Tommy developed blisters on his feet during the walk, something that he had to deal with for the remainder of our trip.
Besides, walking for a few miles on rocks is exhausting and since we already got up at an ungodly hour for a long drive, I want to conserve whatever little energy I have. We are all set for our barbecue when we realize that we are missing the most important component for making our meal, a grill! After some investigating, we find our grill at the Club and drag it over the grassy meadow to our house. After dinner, last minute preparations are done. We don our wetsuits and waders and all the gear is re-checked one last time.
8 PM: Time to Fish is Finally Here! Not being able to wait any longer, all five of us start walking on a dirt road that leads to the western end of the island. Going on a hunch would serve me well a few nights later but this night we are going on info that we obtained this morning. We scale down a steep and narrow path in a single line, watching over each other as we descend. This path dumps us in the middle of a cove where we find two fishermen already casting from their rocky perches. Bob Jones is a man who will never be mistaken for another surfcaster. Exceptionally tall, and with a unique casting style, I’ve often been able to identify Bob even on the darkest nights at Montauk Point. He is standing on one of the better rocks in this cove while his partner Frankie is perched on the Cadillac of Cuttyhunk rocks - a massive boulder, flat like a table, that could fit two casters comfortably. It is only accessible at a particular stage of the tide and only if you are willing to swim to it for the last 30 yards. Not only that, you have to swing in front of the rock and then time the swells so they lift you up in order to mount it. Not easy, even on the best of days. For some reason I lose track of my guys and find myself all alone in the next cove. I manage a small striper on a
needlefish but I decide after a half hour that this cove, although promising considering the conditions, is not worth my time this night. Maybe later in the tide I’ll come back, I say to myself, as I trek westward along the rocks.
One particular rock formation gets my attention as I walk towards the southwest point. I decide to stop and make a few casts in the area. First cast with a rigged eel is met by the unmistaken thump of a good-sized striper and after a short battle I lip a twenty-pound class striper. I have a hard time getting a giant 9/0 VMC barb out of the fish’s bony jaw and subsequently I let my guard down for a moment. Big mistake. As I double up my efforts to dislodge the hook out of its mouth, I momentarily stop paying attention to the waves. A few seconds later I find myself rolling in bubble weed, trying to regain my footing, still holding onto the striper. Bells start to ring in my head as I think of a 9/0 hook in my hand. I let go of the fish before the next set of waves has a chance to pummel me. After a mad dash for a boulder I realize I won’t make it before it hits me so I do the only “normal” thing I could. I duck underneath the wave and resurface after it washes over me. Unfortunately, in the process I manage to sprain my ankle and am grimacing in pain as I climb on a rock. This time I use my pliers to remove the hook and resume casting. I quickly find out that either that was the only fish in the area or I got extremely lucky. “Probably a little bit of both,” I think as I jump off the rock and proceed to limp westward.
Once there, I find Tommy, Rob and Lenny casting in some very fishy looking water. They hook up with a few small fish but not with any consistency. I walk right past them mumbling something like “20 lb bass around corner, rolled an ankle� and keep walking. This little exchange provides for a running gag all weekend as Tommy, who is very adept at imitating people, has guys rolling on the floor with his Z shtick, complete with a thick Croatian accent. The reason I don’t stop is because I am looking for a big rock that I have been dreaming about since last June. This perch cost me two giant fish last year and I am determined to seek revenge. By now the tide is high and for the life of me, I cannot see the rock in the darkness of a new moon. I know that it would be covered completely at high water but I am hoping that I will be able to see it as waves flow around it. After a fruitless search I am dejected and decide to walk back to the cove we started in. This time I opt for a path over the cliffs instead of on the rocks along the water. Rob, Lenny and Tommy decide to stay at the point, so after informing them of my itinerary, I leave. After a walk that seems much longer than it actually is, I reach the cove and find Frankie sitting on a boulder taking a breather. He informs me that he put in a few hours of casting from that big rock and had nothing to
show for it. I decide to give it a shot anyway, as I knew that the tide will be dropping and soon that rock will be impossible to get on. After a good dose of beating by the waves, I manage to get on it but not before losing my lucky VS hat to a wave. Even after all that work to get on this damned rock, I could not think of letting my hat drift away. I jump in the water after it, rod in hand. Now I find myself again behind the rock in about 10 feet of water. I have to push myself forward with my rod by holding onto the tip and pressing the butt of the rod into the bottom. After a few more bumps and bruises, I am on the rock and motion to Ray to join me. We both cast comfortably for what seems like hours, Ray recycling through his bag of lures and me sticking with a rigged eel. Two hours later and without any warning, my rigged eel gets slammed. Half sleeping, I instinctively set the hook hard. After a spirited battle I bring a mid 30lb-class fish onto the rock. I gave my rod to Ray and try to grab the lip with the intention of weighing the fish and releasing it. This striper has other ideas and as the wave floods the rock, the rigged eel falls out of its mouth and the large bass slides away in the foam. We watch it suspended in the water, contemplating jumping in after it. I decide that a little shove with a rod tip is all it needs, and sure enough, as soon as it feels the rod on its back, it starts to slither towards deeper water. At this point we are re-energized and both start to cast like madmen but have no bumps until dawn.
DAY 2 10 AM: Get Riggin’! Not sure who gets up first since details are starting to get blurry but I do remember that Tommy makes a hell of a breakfast. This is followed up by gear check, modifying plugs for tonight’s trip, fixing up damaged ones and rigging fresh eels. Might as well, as we brought more than five dozen big dead eels with us! The strange thing is that Ray, who is the only one who has live eels, has failed to entice a strike. Weather changes for the worse with heavy clouds and intermittent periods of fog. Our coffeemaker craps out and Ray and I, who drink coffee from the minute we get up to the minute before we go to bed, start to panic! We take the coffee machine apart but find nothing wrong. Discussion is held about possibly buying a machine in a local store. Yeah, right, like that is really an option. We get lucky, as it turns out that repeated brewing simply overheated the warming element. After a short rest, the coffee is percolating and all is right with the world again.
2 PM: Stretching Legs With our tackle all ready for a night assault, Lenny, Tommy and Rob decide to make few casts under the Club. From previous experience I know that daytime fishing is pointless this time of the year but with a heavy cloud cover, who knows. I tag along with my camera while Ray watches the action from the Club’s grounds above us. Don and Larry are making their last casts as they are scheduled to depart Cuttyhunk on the Sea Horse later in the afternoon. The casting session is as unproductive as I expected. Other than a few photos, we have nothing to show for it.
5 PM: Sausages and Thunderstorms Cloud cover is getting thicker as Tommy is preparing his signature dish, sausage pinwheels on a barbecue, with enough grilled peppers to feed half of the island. We follow Tommy like hungry puppies into the kitchen where we use large Ciabatta bread sliced in half to make the World’s Biggest Sausage and Pepper hero sandwich. Ok, it might not have been the world’s biggest, but it is the largest we’ve ever seen! I still lie awake at night sometimes, thinking about the wonderful aroma that filled the house that night. After we devoured most but not all of the sausage (we’ll get to that shortly) we are just content laying on the couches, emitting noises that you usually only hear on a National Geographic special.
8 PM: All Ready with Nowhere to Go! Loud thunderstorms outside preclude us from hitting the beach. None of us wants to wave a magic wand and tempt the God's into zapping us. So we stay in the house, waiting for the thunderstorms to clear the area. For the first time we realize we have a TV. Upon further inspection, which included following the antenna line underneath the house, we realize that we have no antenna. Or cable. Or any signal whatsoever. So there we are, staring at each other. What else are we to do, considering we have not brought a single beer with us? I dare you to find another set of 5 hardcore surf rats who leave on a four-day trip without their wives, where they must bring all their food and drinks, and yet they don’t bring a single beer. I kid you not. Not only is Cuttyhunk a “dry island” but also so are we!
The sight of Lenny pulling knee high stocking over his white Italian calf brings us to tears. Ok, they are Under Armor socks and they serve their purpose under the waders, but at the time it has us rolling on the floor in laughter. Finally around 11 o’clock, although the lightning bolts still occasionally light up the sky, the thundering stops. I keep checking the weather radar on my cell phone, our only connection to the outside world. Time to hit the road.
11 PM: They Find Them and They are Thick! We walk single file over a now muddy and flooded path. The storm dumped so much rain in a few hours that the ground could not absorb it all and puddles formed over the dirt road. It also washed off any footprints on the path, except for a single pair of fresh steps, that according to our observation are moving towards the Club. This means that some poor soul got caught in that wicked storm and was running for his life. (We would find out tomorrow that we were right on the money). We descend into the cove where I had a good fish last night and find it deserted. Ray and I swim to our rock immediately while the rest of the boys take other rocks in the cove. I am not sure how long Ray and I spent on that rock, or if we had any fish. Probably not if I couldn’t remember, but we did lose sight of the rest of the crew. It is around 3 AM when we decide to work our way east towards the Club where I had a hunch the rest of our crew was headed.
As we walk in the darkness, Ray finds an eel that is still wiggling amongst the rocks. It is a big specimen, one you rarely see used in the surf. This leads me to believe that Bob Jones was just here recently, as he is the only man that I’ve seen use such giant snakes at Cuttyhunk. Besides, the night before I saw him cast a foot long jointed Pikie. Not many guys do that either, although if you listen to most of the "experts" they will swear on their mother that they do. They’ll say something like, “hmm, yes, yes but I thought I was the only one using it!” In the meantime they will be chunking bunker as soon as you turn your back and then use giant pikies for a photo-op. As we get closer to the Club we can see the casters on the rocks, as they became silhouettes against the rising sun on the eastern horizon. They are hooking up on every cast; especially Tommy and Rob who are further out on the rocks than Lenny. Ray joins them and hooks up immediately, while I put my rod on the rocks and take a few dozen shots with my camera. Some sunrises are too pretty to miss, regardless of how good the action is. The bite peters out at daybreak as we expected, and we head back to the house after dawn.
DAY 3 6 AM: Frittata, Baby!!! As we peel off our wetsuits, someone has a brilliant idea about having breakfast first, then hitting the sack. That’s all Tommy needs to hear and in few minutes leftover sausage and peppers are getting happy in the skillet with about a dozen scrambled eggs, creating the most beautiful frittata.! The skillet goes into the oven until a nice crust forms on the top, and then it is time to eat. And eat we do, to the last bite.! Then it is time to hit the sack. Of course somebody gets up and takes a picture of all the sleeping beauties.! Now that was a scary scene.
12 PM: Just Chillin’ Groggy and tired we wake up one by one. We took a beating the last two nights, walked for miles on slippery rocks and honestly did not have much to show for it. But I thought that our luck would improve. Why? Because I’ve seen this place light up after a tide change or a wind shift. We still have very favorable conditions. Unfortunately, we only have one more night to spend fishing on these hallowed grounds.
2 PM: Cast Me a Mile. Cloud cover and dense fog have enveloped Cuttyhunk and the guys show very little interest in making a few casts. They are all pretty much content that they found fish last night. Steady action always lifts the spirits and also brings a healthy dose of self-confidence. Which in turn makes me very happy. As the one who put the trip together I worry about everyone having a good experience. Someone mentions a casting contest that was held on the grass in front of the Club few years ago. It was Rob and I against a crew of friends from RI. I am by no means a slouch when it comes to casting, but Rob blew me away. Not only me but also he did the same to the RI crew, which included some exceptional casters like Eben Horton, Steve McKenna, Brian Oakley and a few others. So an idea is floated to head for a grassy field in front of the Club and have a little friendly competition. After Bonnie’s husband finishes cutting the lawn, we start by taking some practice casts first and then taking three casts each and picking the longest one. I go first so I can get it out of the way and concentrate on taking pictures.
I’ve seen Rob cast many times and I have no expectation of winning. I am a bit surprised when Ray outcasts me by a good distance. Damn, the man made it look effortless yet his casts were long! I am not so sure anymore that Rob is going to win this thing after Ray makes his third and even longer cast. When Rob’s Yo-Zuri Surface Cruiser goes haywire and into the weeds, I am ready to anoint Ray a new winner. But Rob earns his redemption on a next cast by outgunning Ray’s best cast by a foot. Tommy and Lenny give a good effort but it seems like the three of us are in a different category than Ray and Rob. After we enlist Bonnie for a little award presentation for Rob, we head back to the house. What else to do but fire up the grill and cook.
5 PM: Oh, to be Hungry Tommy grills some of the best tasting steaks I’ve ever eaten, accompanied by fried mushrooms and mashed potatoes. It is heaven on a plate. Only one problem. We have nothing to drink but water! We all agree that we would do a disservice to these steaks if we have to wash them down with H20. Luckily, we find some ice-tea mix in the cabinet. It can’t hold a candle to the meal but the way Tommy cooks, few things would. We devour the food and start to clean up the place as we are leaving early in the morning. Fog is pretty thick and although we are only 150 yards from the water we cannot see the shoreline. We get lost in our chores when someone spots a local kid running down the road, with a rod in his hand gesturing wildly and pointing towards the water line. We take a look where he is pointing at, and as the fog lifts, we can see a flock of birds working tight to the shoreline.
6 PM: Massacre at the Club! Rob is first on the scene and hooks up immediately. I can see in the distance that Ray is unhooking a good- sized fish too while Lenny and Tommy also have bent rods. A crew of New Jersey fishermen, who just arrived at the club that morning, are running down the slope with beers in one hand and rods in another. Juvenile herring are leaping out of the water with bluefish and stripers hot on their trail. I am content just taking pictures of this wild action. I even figure out how to record a video with my D90. More by accident than anything else, I press a button and the camera starts to record. You can see this short “accidental" video on our blog. The boys bang fish all the way to dusk and then the action peters out. It is a mixture of bass up to 20 lbs and large blues. A very fine combination if you ask me. We return to the house with weary arms but with uplifted spirits.
9 PM: Last Licks I know they are all going to fish right under our house tonight. Why wouldn’t they, with all the bait in the area? I have a different idea and ask each one if they are interested in joining me, but they all decline. They walk a few hundred yards to the water and begin to bail fish almost immediately. By the end of the night every guy has caught fish in the 20’s. I, on the other hand, took a long walk through a mosquito infested path, holding two lights on just in case a coyote decides that a big, fat Croat would make a good after dinner snack. After about half an hour I reach my destination. I am taken aback by the lack of anglers. More room for me, I thought and dove into the water to cool off. After some bobbing I find the rock I want to fish from. This is easy fishing once you got on the rock, which was positioned in about 8 feet of water. Calm seas, a slow roll of the waves and great current movement in front of you. On my first 12 casts using a Super Strike yellow darter, I nail 12 stripers. (Yes, yellow works on dark nights). These are the cookie cutter variety of stripers, all between 7 and 12 lbs.
I got bored fairly quickly and switch to a rigged eel. The first few casts produce a few bumps but no hook-up. This tells me there are a lot of small fish in the area. Then something wallops my rigged eel and I know immediately that it's not another schoolie. I have a hard time steering this fish where I want it to go. I want it in front of the rock and not behind it, so the wave can help me land it. For a change, I make no mistakes, surprising myself. I grab the fish by the jaw and hold it against my body. One hand on the jaw, the rod under my armpit and a camera in the other hand trying to take a picture of a fish that I can see but the camera can’t focus on. After 5 grainy and out of focus shots I give up, remove the eel from its mouth and release it. There is no point in using my Boga, as this fish would bottom it out with ease. It didn’t matter, I got what I came to tangle with and so did my guys. I make a few more casts but manage only a few small fish. I have an inclination to stop at one of the coves on the way back but I miss it in the dark. By the time I realize it, I’ve already passed it, so I keep walking home. The guys trickle in tired and bruised. You can call it a good pain. Some of them swam to the rocks for the first time ever tonight. All and all, it was a very nice way to end the trip. It is time to get a few hours of sleep before departing on the Sea Horse at 8 AM.
Janet Messineo has lived on Martha's Vineyard since 1966, and has been fishing the shoreline of the island for more than 30 years. She has written for and been featured in books, magazines and on television Janet is a professional taxidermist graduating from the Pennsylvania Institute of Taxidermy in 1987. She is the owner of Island Taxidermy and Wildlife Art Studio. Her work is shown in many art galleries on the Vineyard such as Louisa Gould's Gallery in Vineyard Haven and The Schrimshaw Gallery in Edgartown. Janet is a surf fishing guide and can be contacted through her website www.freewebs.com/vineyardsurfcaster Chuck Leigh fished the surf from the late 1940’s to the mid 80’s. A lot of that time was spent on Cape Cod but he admits that his heart belonged to the jetties in Long Beach, New York. He landed many 50’s from the surf although he can’t remember the exact number. He says “I fished with the greatest of the greats Arnold Laine, Jimmy Andrews and Al Bentsen, the greatest of them all.” He lives on the Cape and operates a real estate business which he says is lots of fun and way more profitable than fishing for stripers.
Jason Colby's exploits as a surfcaster on Long Island are not as well known as they should be. Considered one of the best surfcasters in the 70's and 80's, Jason moved to New England in the late 1980's. He has beached or boated 24 stripers over 50lb including his personal best, a 64.50 pound brute. These days Jason runs a charter boat, the Little Sister, out of Quincy, Massachusetts. He can be contacted through his website at www.littlesister1.com Ken Baldwin is a fly fishing guide in Alaska and published photographer. After guiding anglers all summer he treats himself to a one month trip to Montauk Point, New York in the fall. You can find more about him on his website at www.dancefish.com
Roger Martin has fished the rocky beaches of Rhode Island, plowed through soft sand on Cape Cod beaches and navigated the treacherous rocks of Montauk. But most of the time you'll find him close to home, on the sandy beaches or the back bay marshes of Long Island’s south shore. Over the last half century he has written numerous articles, authored a chapter in William Muller's book “The Secrets of Surf Fishing at Night” and given many presentations on the subject of surf fishing. He was taught how to rig eels by his friend, the late Al Bentsen and has passed this knowledge on to many others. Roger is also an editor of the Surfcaster's Journal who labors over our sloppy writing, bad grammar and terrible pronunciation errors. For that alone he should be saluted. Vito Orlando might be one of the most popular anglers ever to walk the beach. His ever present smile is disarming while his wonderful sense of humor is infectious. Although he has fished the beaches of Cape Cod and the islands of Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard, Vito is always drawn back to his beloved rocky shores of Montauk Point. One of the true Montauk regulars, Vito is known as a white water bucktailer extraordinaire.
Zeno Hromin is the author of two recent bestselling books, “The Art of Surfcasting with Lures” and “The Hunt for Big Stripers.” He is a budding angling photographer who has won numerous awards for his camera skills and a surf guide who specializes in instructional guiding. He is one of the founders of the Surfcaster's Journal and a frequent contributor to the Surfcaster's Journal Blog. You can get more information about Zeno on his website www.zenohromin.com Lou Caruso is a long time member of the Farragut Striper Club, Surfcaster's Journal official "Rod Guru" and one of the most well regarded custom rod builders on Long Island, NY. You can contact Lou via his website www.louscustomrods.com
I heard you guys did well on Cuttyhunk with rigged eels. I hope you continue to fish them. I'll feel like the baton was passed to some real dedicated bass men. I know of over 100 fiftys caught on rigged eels over the years. So think large. surfcaster’s journal -Al