Big Jamaica Cod Slam!

[nickh]

Sat they had 300 fish to 39 pounds and many in the high teens and twenties. Close to Montauk standards in Jersey!

[EC NEWELLMAN]

Morning Nick....yep, both Captain Bob Bogan of the Gambler and Captain Howard Bogan of the Big Jamaica had some of the best codfishing trips for a New Jersey based part boat in a very long time. Incredible in fact.

The Big Jamaica is running anywhere from 50 - 80 miles and did this on back to back trips, with the first trip being the one many will never forget:

3/6 report

Cod Invade New Jersey

The Saturday offshore wreck trip was the best in years for the big Jamaica. About 300 keeper cod up to 39LBs were boated (we don’t count throwbacks) along with a dozen Pollock and some ling. We fished several wrecks and they all had life on them, some better than others. The cod were larger than our last trip with most from 8 to 15LBS and a few larger.

Good Again on Sunday!
3/7 report

We sailed offshore again Saturday night and tried a different area. Once again we had very good codfishing. It was not quite as wild as Saturday but the cod were a little larger with most of the fish between 10 and 18LBS, and several larger fish up to 28LBS.

A light crowd onboard boated over 140 cod with a few ling and Pollock mixed in.

This is from Captain Bob Bogan of the Gambler of the fishing on Saturday...fish up to 37lbs:

Real nice catch of cod today --up to 35lbs. 1st wreck started out with a bang. 5 to 7 fish on at a time --it looked like we were bluefishing. Heavy action lasted abour an hour then settled into a good pick. Most cod were in the 6 to 12 lb class.

On Sunday they caught pollock up to and over 20lbs, along with cod and ling on their trips which go up to 50 miles offshore.

Fishing has definitely picked up on the offshore wrecks in this area.

[Rodwinder]

Wow thats some fishing, glad to hear it

[NMSBob]

Those are our cod, come on back home for april 16th

Bob

[nickh]

The last time we had fish on those wrecks was 1997. These are not wrecks just in range of Jersey, but also New York. Boats from Freeport should also have similar results. I went with Anthony when he had the Starstream and we hit a couple of the kingpins and got the big ones. I mean there were probably 20 fish in the 30-45 pound range that day. The Jamaica and Jamaica 2 also had similar results. The fishing was good the first few trips and then slowed. I was on the first trip with the streamer with 15 guys the next trip they went with 40. The trips ran to the end of April, but by that time it was done.

[whitechin]

I rememebr in the 90s we did a limited Big Jamaica trip to those wrecks. It was all the regulars and we decided to gamble rather than go for sea bass again. We had fish up to 49lbs but not as many as the Jamaica had the last two trips. It was more like 4 to 6 per man for about 18 guys but pretty much nothing under 15lbs. Think i had 6 fish, 4 over 20lbs with a near 40lb kicker.

As for the Gambler, I fished it yesterday. I had no keeper cod or pollack and 8 very nice sized ling. We had approx 40 cod and pollack for a large crowd and the Capt stayed out vvery late until after 7. Most were only a few inches over the size limit but the pool pollack was a dandy. Day before was quite a bit better with a smaller crew. It definitely seems like the extra 20 miles are putting the longer trips on a lot better fish.

[whitechin]

Those are our cod, come on back home for april 16th

Bob

You have plenty of cod up there right now, you just can't keep them. It takes two guys about 2 hrs to jig up their 800lbs right now.

[NMSBob]

Chin
I think your confusing gilnetting with jigging. There is a reason the cape "Hook" association went to gillnets after they got their own sector. While two guys can jig 800 lbs in a couple of hours provided they are on the right size fish and spot, its a bitch when 3 out of every 4 are throwbacks. As for our fish well they were our fish until the powers at be shut us down so the southern boats could fish them all winter. My sour grapes!

Bob

[whitechin]

Not confused, actually. According to a local commerical fisherman, Capt Phil, they are easily avialbale thru jigging right now. He did a jig only trip a few weeks ago and filled his limit easily in 2 hrs. Looked like all markets, nothing too big or small. Get a better price for line caught.

[whitechin]

I'm doing the Jamaica Thurs trip, so hopefully I'll have a good Jersey report. On 2 10 hr trips, I've only had 1 nice market and maybe 20 ling, so I have a lot of room for improvement.