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I've fished plum island all my life, almost from infancy, I'm now 50, as I stated before ,I started in '72, schoolies mostly, I trapped eels and sold them to the local fisherman and bait shops, I dug worms and seined sand eels, I gill netted pogies,I made plenty of mad money on schoolies and bait, but wanted something bigger, I used my money to buy a 16' mirro craft to replace the 14' Amesbury skiff I was using... now I could jig cod in the mouth in the spring and fall ( some will remember that awsome fishing, that we will never see again) but more importantly I could now run the beach at night where the big ones roamed... I studied hard, slept little and won the favor of some of the sharpies that fished nightly, at the age of 17 I took my first "bull" it weighted 38lbs and was caught on a seaworm trolled via an electric motor along a grassy bank in Ipswich bay... I was on my way, a few years latter I got my first 40, it was on a goo-goo eye in the mouth of the river, my right arm and palm still bears the scar of the treble hook that "dead" fish sank into it...
I fished real hard after that, and back then EVERYTHING went to market.. in 84 a huge scool of big bass hung out in the mouth of the river, they never left, incoming, out going, no matter, if you had a boat capable of sitting in the rip and 300' of wire on an outfit capable of delivering a goo-goo or danny to the bottom , you were sure to get into some big fish, several '50's were caught, and I wanted one bad,that fall I bought the boat I have now, an 18' jon dory, it was the perfect battle wagon ( and still is) despite weeks and months of hard fishing my fifty eluded me, there were others caught, but not for me...in July of '86 on a full moon night, on a teacup calm sea in the last curl of the wave along the plum island shorline, my efforts paid off, a 61lb striper inhaled my eel and ended my quest for a 50.... there's been a few since then but none as memorable or satisfying as that one (or as large) the picture of that fish (as well as a few others ove the half century mark) hangs on the "big boy" board at Surfland B&T on plum Island..
fishing now is as good as it gets, I still spend 30-40 hours a week on the water in peak season, I no longer sell them, there are enough big fish being caught that I hope one last school of mobies makes around the tip of the cape and up to plum island before I loose my night vision....it's enough for me to keep going out lookining for one more behemoth bigger than my first...
My .02
Roc
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