Late Fall Tautog Fishing in Long Island Sound
The forecast showed a high of 28 degrees with a steady 10-knot northeast wind persisting throughout the day. “Frozen guides, here we come,” I thought, with one hand cupped over the air vent while the other clutched an icy steering wheel. From May to October, the 10-mile stretch of road between Greenport and Orient Point is jumping with anglers, clammers, beachgoers, and farm stands. But, as 6 a.m. approached on November 25, the area felt deserted and eerily quiet. While I cruised toward the rising sun, most sensible fishermen were heading west, hot on the tails of what could be the final wave of striped bass migrating south for the winter. I was joining a devout bunch of blackfish anglers, some who drove all the way from Bayville and Queens for a day of tautog fishing in Long Island Sound with one of the North Fork’s most revered captains, Rich Jensen of Nancy Ann Charters.
Tautog, like the Insane Clown Posse, have a cult following. However, tautog fanatics don’t paint their faces or adopt strange monikers like the juggalos; they live among us, dreaming of ugly but tasty fish that lurk in the shadows of enormous rocks. And, when they find a good rock, they keep its location close to the heart. Between Rhode Island and Maryland, the community of dedicated blackfish anglers and captains is tightknit.
Like surfcasters in pursuit of striped bass, blackfish fanatics share information, techniques, and drive long distances in pursuit of their quarry—they’re the rockhoppers of bottom fishing. What better place to be a rock-hopping crab-dropper than in the craggy, cool waters of Long Island Sound?
The Sound
At Exit 73 on the dreadful Long Island Expressway, drivers continuing east can head inland toward the Main Road, which runs through the quaint villages of Mattituck, Cutchogue, and Southold, but I always opt for the scenic route. Sound Avenue and the North Road give passersby a view of these pebble-laden and boulder-strewn shores. Unlike the fine-grain sand of Long Island’s Atlantic-facing side, the Sound is comprised of larger, more permanent hard structure resulting from glacial passage over tens of thousands of years. Today, rocks the size of cars peek above the surface at low tide like stationary icebergs, providing a mere glimpse as to what the Sound’s stony sea floor looks like.
With an average depth of 63 feet and some boulders that stand nearly as tall, navigating shallower coves can be treacherous, but these are the rocks that make the Sound a haven for such structure-dependent bottom-dwellers as blackfish.
This late in the Sound’s fall tautog season, which differs from that of the New York Bight season, keeper-class fish are generally hanging in deeper water. So, while running aground on a sneaky boulder is of little concern, snagging rigs and jigs still spikes a togger’s anxiety. Luckily for our group, the man at the helm has almost a half century of fishing in Long Island Sound under his belt, and tautog are his bread and butter. I didn’t know it at the time, but I had enrolled in a master class in tautog fishing and terminal-tackle loss prevention at the hands of a generational Long Island fishing legend.
A Blackfish Pioneer
Rich Jensen’s blood runs deep on the North Fork. Beginning at age 18, he cut his teeth captaining the Wilhelric in Greenport— the family-owned charter boat named after his grandparents, William and Helen, and his father, Richard. At that time, winter flounder were the biggest draw for party boats on the North Fork and carried them through the spring months. However, Rich’s grandfather was especially fond of targeting blackfish in shallow water. According to Jensen, spring tautog fishing was tremendous in those days because they were not yet valued as table fare or as a sportfish.
After learning the ropes as captain of the Wilhelric, Jensen began work for brothers George and Jay Porter, who operated the Brand X, another famous party boat out of Greenport during the 1970s. “The Porters were responsible for locating many of the big wrecks off Long Island, like the Coimbra, and I grew up fishing with them,” Jensen recalled. They taught him the basics of locating wrecks, a skill that would become instrumental in his pursuit of big tautog.
With nearly a decade of experience, a 27-year-old Jensen decided to get into the family business. He bought his first boat in 1979 and named it Nancy Ann after his childhood sweetheart (now wife). “It’s exactly the same style boat I have today,” said Jensen, referring to the Nancy Ann IV, currently docked in Duryea’s Orient Point Marina.
“Back then, I docked in Greenport to fish in the Bay during the spring and moved to Orient for the summer and fall.” At that time, Orient did not house the charter-boat fleet it does today. But Jensen, being the humble trendsetter he is, made the move in order to save time and fuel running to and from The Race and points in the Sound. Eventually, the rest of the boats followed, and Orient became a small yet undeniably fishy hub on the quieter of Long Island’s two forks.
In 2001, after 20 years of Nancy Ann Charters and a few different boats, Jensen acquired the Nancy Ann IV that he still runs today. She’s a 45-foot Burpee—a custom-finished vessel that was built in Florida as a dive boat. “They built only 12 or 15 of them,” said Jensen “and mine was set up the same way, only I got rid of the platform and the stern door and turned it into a fishing boat.” The walkaround Chesapeake-style hull has a deep bow with a flat bottom and a single diesel engine, so it rides smoothly and allows him to pursue a variety of species. “We’re set up for bottom fishing, but we also do a lot of drift fishing. It’s versatile enough that we can do it all, and that’s what we need out here.”
On this brisk, late-November day, there’d be no drifting. We were fishing over rock piles and wrecks in 40 to 120 feet of water, and with a full moon only two days away, Jensen’s prowess in maneuvering and anchoring us over the fishiest pieces of structure would be on full display.
Good Company
It was around 8 a.m. when I heard the unmistakable crack, hiss, pop of an opening beer can. Tautog fishing, as much as it demands an angler’s focus and attention to detail, is meant to be fun and laid-back—even when the possibility of a double-digit blackfish is on the line. Plus, everyone knows breakfast beers are only socially acceptable on a fishing boat. An ice-cold Miller Latte? Don’t mind if I do.
As it turned out, the crowd on board were regulars who block out dates to fish with Jensen each autumn. “During the fall, I never have a day available because we get the same people every year, and they will never give up their dates,” Jensen said. The Nancy Ann’s packed schedule is a testament not only to the quality of Long Island Sound’s tautog, but Jensen’s ability and dedication as a captain.
Mike Dunne, the organizer of these trips, hopped on the boat that morning with a sack of breakfast sandwiches for everyone. In these sub-freezing temperatures, the warm welcome (and the hot egg sandwich) from Mike was especially appreciated. He might as well have been wearing a cape.
One by one, members of the group introduced themselves after greeting the captain with a hug or a handshake, along with a couple of wiseass aging remarks in good fun.
Now, fully confident that I was in good company, I settled in at the rail and joined the toast as we approached the first drop. Our mate Cristina, the fiancée of Rich’s son and first mate, Rick Jr., had been cutting green crabs all morning and handed me a bucket. I found it admirable that Jensen maintained the values instilled in him during the 70s, employing his own family members just as his grandparents did.
While Cristina packed bait buckets with a hodgepodge of green crabs and the occasional white-legger or mud crab, our other mate, Derek Grattan, rigged up the boat rods. During the peak season, Grattan is the captain of his own operation, Gratitude Charters, just down the road in Southold.
Insider Knowledge
“Get ready to drop ‘em, guys,” Jensen hollered from the cabin. Beers were cracked, bait buckets distributed, and halved green crabs dangled from the hooks of eager anglers waiting for the go-ahead sign. Seventy feet of frigid saltwater separated us from the boulders that bordered a small wreck below. In a few hours, the tide would be falling and we’d have no option but to fish shallower.
In Eastern Long Island Sound, the captain explained, the flood tide is the slower of the two tides, and with less current to battle, it’s more favorable for tautog fishing.
“We fish a lot of deep-water spots, and when the outgoing tide is running hard, you just can’t fish certain wrecks, or everybody is getting hung up. The incoming tide, on average, runs about 2 knots slower than the outgoing tide because we have so many islands out here,” Jensen continued. “So, when the flood tide is running (west), the flow is inhibited by Fisher’s Island and Plum Island, and we can fish all the backside eddies with relative ease. When the water is rushing out (east) on the ebb tide, it all exits the Sound through either The Race, Plum Gut, or Sluiceway. That funnel effect makes the tides stronger here than anywhere else in the Sound.”
We started our morning fishing the early incoming tide. Having scarfed down breakfast sandwiches, our stomachs were full and morale was high. Soon after the first drop, we started picking away at mostly short tautog, with a few keepers in the mix.
Spot number two was a short steam away, and with the incoming tide still on our side, the bite really fired up. This time, Jensen anchored us over a barge wreck, and we dropped baits 115 feet to the bottom. This required between 10 and 12 ounces of lead, and bank sinkers were favored because of their ability to slip in and out of tight pockets between rocks.
It became apparent after two drops that the deeper water was holding bigger blackfish. Keepers, and some nice ones at that, came over the rail where they were met with a mix of cheers and friendly jeers by anglers competing for the pool money. The largest fish was around 6 pounds—a nice tautog, but not the double-digit caliber that the Sound has been known to produce.
Throughout his 45 years as a charter captain, Jensen says many 14- to 15-pound tog have hit the deck of the Nancy Ann. The biggest, over 16½ pounds, was caught by veteran outdoor writer, Tom Schlichter, on a charter trip eight years ago. “A friend of mine has a boat in Connecticut and has had a couple fish over 20 pounds. Some of those extra-large blackfish live along the edges of their rivers, and they don’t go very far,” Jensen noted. “But for whatever reason, they rarely get above 16 pounds over here.”
Jensen admits that very big blackfish were once plentiful in the Sound. “There are still a lot of fish, but not as many jumbos as we used to see,” he said. Not long ago, they would catch a double-digit fish once or twice a day; now, they may see only a handful all season. “Tautog are very slow-growing fish,” Jensen said, “and so many people are targeting them now and are good at it,” he added, citing major improvements in electronics, like the trolling motors that allow anglers at any experience level to “anchor” the boat over structure. “But fishing is still good, and we get 7 to 8 pounders pretty reliably.”
As more people discover and pursue tautog in the Sound, the Nancy Ann crew does their part to minimize mortality and preserve the fishery. They make small tweaks to their approach that come from years of observation. For example, Jensen requests that all the boat rods are rigged with 4/0 hooks and instructs the mates to cut crabs into halves. They used to opt for 3/0 hooks, but a 4/0 can handle a larger bait, and a larger bait helps minimize how many undersized fish are hooked and released.
“Release mortality is probably lower than we think for most of our season,” Jensen said. “These are strong, hardy fish. It’s only the late season that’s a little tougher on the released fish because, at that point, we’re fishing much deeper water than we do in October.”
Jensen is a firm believer in keeping a fresh crab on the hook. “We tell our anglers to change out baits every few minutes. A fresh bait will produce more bites, even if those bites are from smaller fish. More bites generate more chum, so the fishing will typically improve,” said the skipper. With that, now I understood why we had a vat of green crabs on board, more than I’d ever seen in one place.
As with any recreational fish species, there are obstacles to overcome. Jensen claims one of their greatest challenges to this day is the division of Long Island’s tautog fishery into two zones. “The regulations have less of an impact on the charters to our west, in areas like Port Jefferson, because it’s unlikely those blackfish ever leave the Sound. But our fish out in Orient could be in 2 different zones in one day,” Jensen said, pointing out the 1-fish difference in bag limits. “It just complicates things for us.”
As one of the most experienced captains in the Eastern Sound, Jensen makes sure his voice (and the voices of other North Fork captains) are heard. “I’m probably the oldest member of the North Fork Captains Association, which started back in the 80s,” he said. Their common goal is to self-promote fishing charters in the area and to be recognized for having a say in regulations as a group. The local boats may compete for business, at times, but in this close community of like-minded captains, their voices are stronger together.
Know When to Fold ‘Em
Tautog (Blackfish) Regulations – Long Island Sound Region
- 3 fish per angler, 16-inch minimum size limit
- Season: 10/11 – 12/9
Per New York state regulations, the season for tautog fishing in Long Island Sound opens in October and lasts into early December, but Jensen concludes his season by November 30 each year.
“The Connecticut River is really what shuts us down,” said Jensen. “When the rivers get cold up north and all that freezing water flows downstream into the Sound, it changes our water temperatures drastically.”
In Eastern Connecticut, the Niantic and Thames rivers also contribute to the rapid cooling of the Sound’s waters. “We can see as much as a 5- to 7-degree temperature difference just on the tide change,” Jensen added.
For All the Marbles
By the time we reached our third and final spot, I had lost all feeling in my toes, which I realized when a 12-ounce sinker rolled right off the fillet table onto my foot. Even with the sun overhead, it was cold enough that a few anglers who had already caught their limit retreated to the cabin. “If we’re gonna catch a big one, it’s gonna be here,” said Jensen.
This spot was different. We had steamed across the Sound and were hugging the Connecticut shoreline. The Cross Sound Ferry, which I’d be catching to New London later that day, cruised right past us. I poked my head into the cabin to ask Rich what the bottom structure looked like. Rather than big boulders or the rigid remnants of a barge, we were fishing over a gravel and rubble bottom in 45 feet of water. Jensen anchored up and we shared the small piece of real estate with a center console using a trolling motor to hold its position. The northeast wind was hardly a factor on this side of the Sound, but in the time it took us to run across, the tide had flipped. Jensen’s plan was to put us in shallow water during the slowest portion of the ebb tide, which would soon be cranking. The jig window was closing.
I pulled out my lucky tog jig: a white-legger-patterned S&S White Chin Wrecker, tipped it with a halved crab, and pitched it up-current. After several minutes, there was a delicate peck-peck on the bait. Using all my restraint, I waited out a few more pecks, willing the line to move, indicating that the jig had been picked up. The split second between that line movement and the hookset is full of anticipation. I reared back and upward with the rod. Big headshakes surged through my line, and 20 seconds later, a chunky sea bass showed itself on the surface, pinned right in the roof of its mouth. It was indeed a black fish, but the wrong kind. “That’ll eat,” I heard over my shoulder.
There was one more chance to drop a jig before we headed for Duryea’s in Orient. This time, I opted for a heavier one, painted bright green and blazing orange to match the innards of a green crab. The tide pulled my jig beneath the boat, where it got bit twice before a decisive thump. Ready for my pool winner, I swung away, but the hook didn’t connect. “Last drop, guys, so make it count,” Jensen said. “Someone always catches a pool winner on the last drop,” Cristina chuckled. “Who’s it gonna be?”
Sure enough, on the last drop of the day, David Velasquez pulled in the biggest fish of the trip with an estimated weight of 8 pounds. “See?! I told ya!” Cristina crowed. I missed my shot at a big one, but I had learned more in six hours of fishing than I had anticipated.
What I learned is that tautog fishing is not about catching the biggest fish. It’s about the likeminded people we meet, the relationships we develop with them, and what we can gain from those relationships. I’ve been out on the Nancy Ann IV a handful of times now, and fishing with them feels like fishing with friends and family.
If you can manage a few fillets on top of all that, you’re walking away from the table as a winner. A good captain leads to good fishing, and that’s what keeps folks like Mike Dunne and his crew coming back to the North Fork to fish with the same captain, for the same fish, on the same day, year after year.
» Book a trip on the Nancy Ann IV / nancyanncharters.com
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Source: https://onthewater.com/late-fall-tautog-fishing-in-long-island-sound
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