Matthew Mateyak's Blog: 12/30/2006 - Blackfishing the North Star

12/30/2006 - Blackfishing the North Star

Well, today my dad and I headed out blackfishing before the 8 limit season ended on the 31st.

We fished the North Star out of Ocean City.

I guess we'll start in the beginning. I tend to arrive early because, well I want to secure a spot and be sure I get one. Well this morning, we were running a little later than I'd like, but it wasn't a problem since we were like the first ones there at 6:30AM, boat departs at 8:00AM. The boat was dark, no lights on...it honestly didn't even look like they were going to sail that day. 2 hours before the boat leaves and it's still dark? Man I was confused...fortunately the captain was there sitting in his truck. We talked briefly, I said I was suprised no one was there yet...he said guys don't come until after 7:00AM. Little different than in Point, Brielle, and Belmar...where guys are known to be there like 3 hours early to MAKE SURE they get THEIR spot...haha.

Anyway, we load up, secure our spots, met a nice guy Ken and his buddy Anthony. They seemed knowledgeable, turns out Ken is a pretty good blackfisherman and wound up with 6 fish fishing just green crabs on a tough, tough day. He was 2nd in the pool to a regular (picture below) who brought his own white legged crabs and was beating on the fish compared to the rest of us using green crabs. This regular won the pool with a nice fish around 8lbs or so and had high hook on the boat with 7 keepers.

My dad and I each had 2 keepers a piece, really was some tough fishing but I learned a few lessons today.

First, fishing 2/0 Gami Octoupuses is too small. Bumping up to 4/0s helped out with the hook sets and also allowed us to "wire" more body in the crabs.

The second lesson was leader lengths. We were both fishing short leaders, virtually a high rig above the weight. We lengthened that and on the next drop my dad had a keeper, I missed a nice one, etc...but it was literally out 2nd to last spot before heading in...learned a little too late.

Third lesson was fishing double vs single hooks. I tend to fish single hooks, but I think the double hook setup will aid in hookups, both when fishing single crabs (hook on each side of the body) and fishing double crabs for those times you get picked clean quick...you have double the bait down there to get that fish on the second try. The downside is if you are fishing real sticky bottom, double hooks will certainly get snagged a hell of a lot more.

The fourth lesson was, bring a small bucket for crabs...don't ever rely on the boat to provide anything to hold you bait. I'm used to boats providing prepared bait and something to hold them in, but it really, really sucks when they don't. The North Star neither provided prepared bait (i.e. cut crabs), nor a bucket to keep them in. Not a big deal, we made due.

OK, so let's go over the good and bad of the trip...

The good is, FINALLY, a boat that sets double anchors!!! The captain and mate were quick with the anchors, worked well together. The captain did struggle to get us on structure at a few spots, but overall did a good job. The only other peeve with the captain is he moved a little quick some of the time. We'd drop double hooks and move in like 5 minutes...even when some guys were catching. But, on the other hand, maybe he had a reason or expected to see more action and didn't want us wasting our time picking at fish if we could be bailing them over the rail elsewhere.

Well, the bad is a bit longer.

First off, the bait was generally horrible...an honest HALF of the crabs were dead and rotting in the bins with the lives ones. The mate put one 50 gallon holed out drum filled with mixed live and dead crabs IN THE CABIN! It stunk to high hell and was really just straight up disgusting to smell that crap IN THE CABIN! The other crab drum, also mixed with live and dead/rotting crabs, was set up in the bow and when the boat moved, the wind blew that nasty, rotting smell right down the aisles of the boat. You simply couldn't escape it, you just had to bear it out. I have to say, I've ridden a lot of boats, head boats and charters, and there is only ONE boat I've been on that was that dirty. My captains would have kicked my [no swearing please] off the boat if I left a boat looking and smelling like that...it would never, ever happen. It doesn't take much rotted crab or fish to make an entire boat smell like complete ass...well imagine what 50 gallon drums of rotting crab smells like, now put yourself in an inescapible room with that. Fun eh? grin

Second minor gripe with the bait was you were expected to pick your own, cut your own, and have a container of your own. So what happens to the guys that come for a weekend of fishing to give it a try...they have nothing, don't know what they need, etc...well this boat didn't have much to provide any level of customer service. I realize blackfishing is generally old, salty veterans...so this is just an observation. I was 90% prepared, and we made due just fine.

The mate was...well, let's say, not entirely focused on customer service...so much so that I cut his tip IN HALF because of his unnecessary commentary and attitude. He just seemed like he didn't want to be there, and it just trascended through his personality.

Examples....

1) My dad hooks into his first keeper, sees he has a marginal hookset on it (foul hooked actually) when it reaches the surface and calls for the net. We call for net, the mate comes over, and I say briefly we only called for net because of the hookset, we realize it's swingable, but didn't want to loose it considering we haven't caught many keepers yet. He nets it, gets it over the rail and then says "Geez, people calling net for 2 lb fish". How uncool is that? That is your job, isn't it? Seemed like a total dick comment to me, I dismissed it and said, well maybe he was just busting balls, trying to poke fun and have a good time.

2) The mate walks around before even filleting fish to collect tips in a hat. I don't know, perhaps this is standard down south, but I've never seen mates on the boats I've fished or worked go around with a hat or jar asking for tips. Seemed strange, especially collecting before filleting. I guess this was an angle shoot to double dip tips? No idea...but it stuck out in my mind.

3) I asked the mate to fillet my fish, and said I'd tip him afterwards. He filleted the fish, kind of hacked one, but one comment he made literally cut his tip in half. While filleting the first fish, he asked "Hey, did you bleed these fish?" I responded, "Man, I totally forgot. I know you are supposed to and I didn't even think about it, totally slipped my mind". Now what would be the appopriate response? How about "Ah man, that's too bad, the fillets would have tasted much better getting that blood out of there right away. They'll be just fine, but remember it next time, it'll be worth it!" Well, instead, how about a smart witted, "Wow, that sucks for you!"...Ummm OK then...thanks asshat!

So needless to say, the mate's friendliness, helpfulness, and overall sense of customer service was very subpar. As a mate, we lived off tips...if you want to make good tips, you better work on how you interface with your customers....otherwise it will really, REALLY suck for YOU. He's lucky he got anything...the only justification in my perspective was that he cleaned the fish and he had to set the anchors quite a bit...that was the extent of his usefulness.

As a comparative point, take the Captain Robbins mate. Super friendly, nice guy, funny, chats it up with you to get a quick laugh when things are slow, brings fresh cut crabs around to you to keep you fishing...IMO, he's the kind of mate you want on a boat if you are the captain/owner.

Anyway...let's move on. So what else...the net was interesting. I was kind of surprised to see a uber small net that could barely reach the water being used. Maybe they lost their main one, who knows...but if that mate needed to reach a fish...he was going to have a heck of a time. Bring the fish to the net, of course, but seriously, this net barely reached the water...the mate was leaning over the rail to get fish. Seemed pretty odd...but it worked.

That's really about it...overall, the day was slow, but we did catch some fish and the weather was absolutely beautiful! I certainly think this boat can catch some serious fish, but the way the boat and bait were kept was less than desireable, and I think the mate needs to be a bit friendlier if he'd like to see some better tips. I'd ride with them again, certainly worth another shot, but I am going to employ my new learned lessons and also try to get some more bait variety to up the fish count...those white legged crabs were definitely the ticket...but this dude brought them all the way down from Brooklyn! WTF^2.

OK, so lets move on to some pictures...

Some shots of the North Star before we departed...