squeteague......

[intrepid24]

i sure miss them, thats really what i learned to fish for first, besides flatfish....and i miss those too !
my grampa would bring me to gooseberry island at dusk, and we would cast swimmers, or use squid. as i remember they were soooo pretty.
the rule was; blues on top and 'teague down low......
guess i was a lucky kid..........!

[Clammer]

back in the day ><><><><><><><

[Swimmer]

Absolutely one of the prettiest fish in the world. Use to watch this kid fish for them just off of Tashmoo at sunrise with live bunker with a balloon attached to the line. When the balloon went under for ten or twelve seconds the kid would start reeling. I have never caught one.

[striperman36]

That's how I started in NJ weakfish. 10lbser's. Outgoing night tide.

[Raider Ronnie]

Anyone ever cook/eat them ?

[JohnR]

If they are cyclic they've been in a down cycle or a while now

[animal]

In my entire life,I've seen only two.Caught on successive casts at Ctown.(not by me)Maybe 15 yrs ago?

[RoyL]

I caught my first weak way before i caught my first striper......as a kid we would get them on the Cape..some big ones too...now they just happen every once in a while. The last weak i caught on the cape was about 5 years ago. We actually got into a good school of them, but they were all about 10-15inches long. At the time i thought it was a sing they were coming back......I guess not.....its so sad...I miss them very much

[robc22]

Originally Posted by Raider Ronnie

Anyone ever cook/eat them ?

squeteague are great eating fish but they freeze badly.......eat them fresh or let them go.......I use to catch some big tiderunners just outside the w end of the canal when I was a kid......I really miss that fishery......

[slow eddie]

i caught 2 at the s.k. town beach about 6 yrs. ago. bought them to ronnie at breechway bait for a wiegh in and the were both at 8 lbs.
they were the first ones for me in 20 yrs. delicous fish to eat. and very preety fresh caught. greenwich bay use to be loaded with them in the spring.
alas, no more.

[afterhours]

in the 70's and early 80's we used to catch loads of them up to the high teens. the bay, barrington and warren rivers were loaded with them...

[MikeToole]

Growing up in NJ in the 60s and RI in the early 70s there were plenty of weak fish. They would often be inter-mixed with blue fish. Fun fish to catch and good to eat.

Now there listed as depleted and the stock is at it's lowest level, yet ASMFC still allows both recreational and commercial fishing for them.

[joe the plumber]

I have only seen them in fish markets.I would to see one fresh caught.What I would like to ask the masses here....I have read of the cyclical nature of this fish and as John said they seem to be at the bottom of the cycle for awhile now..Yet no one seems too concerned about them..Can anyone tell us what biologists have to say about them?

[CowHunter]

We get a good run of BIG Weakfish in the Spring in Raritan Bay, NJ... The Weakie mixed with the bass is 18lbs... Ate a whole Pogie!

They are awesome eating if Bled, Iced down right away, and eaten fresh... They did not freeze very well and the meat goes soft fast....

[redcrbbr]

remember catching good size squeteague in mount hope bay early 80's. they have a very soft mouth and had to play them instead of horsing them in. flesh not as oily as blue and not as dry as bass. think the RI state record was 17 lbs in the 80's, had a couple back then that would have pushed the record. no idea what it is now. they are a very pretty looking fish with a bright yellow mouth.

[Clammer]

FISHPART ;
who,s on this site /put one in my boat 6 - 7 years ago //about 7# plugging for bass ;

The last two I caught were 12# & 15# while snagging pogies way back when :::

[intrepid24]

Originally Posted by CowHunter

We get a good run of BIG Weakfish in the Spring in Raritan Bay, NJ... The Weakie mixed with the bass is 18lbs... Ate a whole Pogie!

They are awesome eating if Bled, Iced down right away, and eaten fresh... They did not freeze very well and the meat goes soft fast....

that is one beautiful fish, Ken ! i've never seen one that big.
the largest ones that i have witnessed caught took a snag/drop pogie.
once i saw an awesome sight on the outer banks-NC, corolla beach maybe... a massive school of blues were pushing these "trout" right up onto the beach...for @ 500 yards. all were like 12-18 inches. thousands upon thousands were up on the sand, dying.

[trapperpierre]

......a moderate Northeast storm in September......live lined adult pogies....totes of gutted 16-19 pound squets off to Steve at RI Fish Providence....spring fishing with rubber Touts 6-10 pounders all of outgoing.......BI North Rip....eel head jigs with English rubba sand eels..double headers every drop............fresh squets fillets baked with vine ripened tomatoes with a "Gansett".......awe days of old......low impact rod n'reel.....................love the fang marks on live/cut bait....talked to biologists....mid Atlantic netting of adults combined with voracious appetites of well established populations of striped bass and bluefish(eating young squets) are part of the problem--with squet abundance cycles-hi/lows spanning decades...............

[clcharette]

I only caught one back in the 90's out in front of Barrington Beach during a Bluefish blitz. The fish took a Kastmaster with a yellow bucktail single hook in the rear. I still have the picture attached to my frig. The funny thing about that day, I took a nice fluke on a windcheater casting at breaking fish in the Warren River a few hours later.

I use to see big fish in the 15 lb class caught under the Mt. Hope Bridge in the late 70's.

[Clammer]

TRAPPER;;

Steve & his brother were two crazy bastards / we filled his schoolie s & white perch supply /// except on the nights the guy from Swansea set his net in the New England Power Plant Discharge ...... then the y would f $%^&*( us & we would have to peddle the fish

[jmac]

...nothing to do 400-800 lbs a tide at BI North Rip in late 70's, early 80's on jigs....or similar numbers at Pt Jude Light/Scarborough..jigs...late 70's.

At that time large numbers were caught by seiners in Peconic Bay....even though the commercial pressure on this fishery is minimal these days, the cycle has still not caught up. There were similar cyclic drops in the late 30's/early 40s and I believe in the late 19th century....as with most fish cycles, no real answers.....whats funny, is that there were a large amount of small (6 inch) squet everywhere in the upper Bay late 80's to mid 90's....haven't seen them since.....

Also, we would get them back in "old days" under the pogies...I'm sure Clammer and Trapper remember that.....

[Clammer]

Jmac ;;

Mu uncle would rell me storis about them when I was a kid ............ so it had to be 30/40,s .he had a flyrod / with a float .that they only used for squetaeague .. & all they did was fish grass shrimp /

In the seventies we started catching very small ones in Mt hope bay ...... I din,t even know what they were til we kept a couple & showed them around ..............that was beginning of the last cycle ......... we started to smoked them in E/G bay on yellow uppermans // as they got larger /the numbers got smaller ... we than would catch descent size commercial tubing /but they were a by-catch ;

they end came when they were being caught on pogies .
But there still must be a few around because B/M who is a shore fisherman in RISSA had the RISSA record a few yesra ago & I think it was the very next year he broke his own record. probably the largest from shore in RI .. I think its 16+ # ..

I few years ago I had a early summer where they were potting in my minnow traps .I guess that was going to be the start of the next local cycle / but the amount of bass, blues, fluke .add the seals & commarants . probably ended it befor e it really had a chance to get going ;;

never in my life I,ve I seen a fish si soft // if you caught in the morning / ya better have kept it on ice or in the water ......... even if you stacked them in a cooler & it was a long day .they were history ;;

[Nebe]

Originally Posted by Clammer- in the year 2023 speaking about Striped Bass in the upper bay.....

Jmac ;;


they end came when they were being caught on pogies .
;;

[Peterjay]

Squeteague were pretty much absent from RI from the 1940's until the 70's. We're on the extreme northern edge of their range, and when the population is in an up cycle, we more or less get the spillover as long as conditions are favorable here. They've never been consistently plentiful here in my lifetime. They might be around for a few years, then they're gone again. I started surf fishing in the late '50's and I saw my first squeteague in 1974. They're a great gamefish, but I doubt we'll ever see them with any great regularity. There were fair numbers of them in Quonochontaug Pond in the late '90's, but I haven't heard of much since then.

[Swimmer]

I had a dream this morning about catching a squeteague, d'uh. Maybe they will start swimming further north again.

[RIROCKHOUND]

Kept a bass this past spring loaded with 7 6" fish that I'm 98% sure were baby weaks... the teeth and everything matched, just a bit too digested to see colors

[wader-dad]

Connecticut sees some weakfish in a narrow window in May. In one famous 3 day period in 2006 was it?-- some guys from the CT surfcasters from the shore had a 13 pounder caught by Billy D. and 4 or 5 over 10 pounds. But the next year not much. Its very erratic. Most of the big fish that year were caught on mag darters.

[Mr. Sandman]

On the Great South Bay as a young kid I got one and I recall my dad's face...he was in shock, he said he hadn't see a weakfish in 20 years...within a few years (early 70's) it was gangbusters of weaks in the bays on LI. Lots of quality fish in the 10+ lb range.

They use to spawn in the flats on the bay, I would watch them swim in circles in 3' of water among the eel grass. Commercial Gill netters would pound them. Once I saw a fellow fill his cockpit to his knees with fish he caught during the spawn (I was probably 13 or so at the time). I approached him in my boat at the dock and asked him why the took so many...what he said was he needed to take all he could because he was getting just ....15 cents/pound. I told him that I would pay him more than that just to keep them alive. It was a shame to see the row-filled females slaughtered like that. Wish I took a photo.
Now, I hear it is pretty thin these days, nothing like those days.

Caught good numbers in the surf on BI in the early 80's. Now on MV I think one or two come into the local tackle shop each season with a "what is this?"

I am sure bass eat them too, there is noting else for them to eat.

Very mild and tastey fish, as a kid my mom would cook them with eggs for breakfast

[Sea Flat]

So, the questions are......

Are the Weakfish stocks down because of overfishing? Does it have commercial value? Has the weakfish become a major source of food for other predators now that menhaden are not as plentiful?

I have no idea and I have never seen or caught a weakfish. Just curious if anyone has any ideas.

[Mr. Sandman]

Probably all of the above. But IMO it's also due to a lack of understanding of the species by the fisheries management groups resulting in poor regulations across the board.