Winter showed up and then it’s spring in the afternoon with a dash of early summer into fall for about 10 minutes. Then you need your big coat again. Bone chilling cold is coming, they keep …
Join our family of readers for as little as $5 per month and support local, unbiased journalism.
Already a member? Log in to continue. Otherwise, follow the link below to join.
Please log in to continue |
Winter showed up and then it’s spring in the afternoon with a dash of early summer into fall for about 10 minutes. Then you need your big coat again. Bone chilling cold is coming, they keep saying, with a winter storm inbound. We will be staying warm and dry at the Outdoorsman Marketplace at the Millville Firehall on Saturday. There will be a bunch of great deals. The show season is starting and this is one of the first locally. That same weekend there is a giant show in New Jersey. The Maryland shows are all coming up throughout February. Local outdoors shows are great for the community, with local brands trying to get their name out and sell their products. You never know what new product or innovation you will see at these shows around Delmarva. Also, what else are you going to do on a cold Saturday? I’m going fishing in the morning, too, on my way to the show. See you there after for coffee, donuts and lies.
The usual winter fishing is in swing — white perch with some bass mixed in and all around the waterways as usual. At least that is consistent. I’ve seen a few migratory bass still out of Jersey from the surf and the resident fish are larger this year. Our schooling resident bass will be “fun” size for the winter around the inland bays. They are always that fun size in the Delaware Bay.
The warmer temps last week are still keeping the fish more active but the cold snap will slow them down. I’m trying to catch pickerel on the fly rod. It’s a fun winter activity from land. It finally got cold enough to slow me down a little. Fly fishing helps warm you up, the heat is in the tools and the wizard wand. You get a little workout casting a fly rod for a couple hours. It helps keep you warm to balance that cold hand exposed at times. Now I have to break out the gloves and decide which are best suited. Sometimes the best choice is multiple pairs and switch out when they get too wet, which explains why I have 12 different pairs of gloves. It’s hard to resist those bins at Lowe's that have the cheap winter ski-like work gloves. Then it depends how close I am to the truck and gear, versus what I want to carry in excess. Dry socks are a must for me in winter, too. I do not like getting cold, but I can handle it with the correct gear. I mean, these days in a couple hours it’s going to be warm anyway. I’m that guy changing socks on the edge of the river because my feet are cold. I’d stick them in the gloves if I could.
I will never stress this enough: If you wear waders, get one of those auto inflate PFDs to wear. If you wind up in deep water all of a sudden and the waders fill up, you are not coming back up. But that auto PFD will pop and keep your head up and give you the time you might need. You have no idea how many times I am walking along and all of a sudden, hey, where did the bottom go? The auto one doesn’t look bad and could save your life. It’s the same for kayakers. Yes, we have kayaked in waders and, no, it isn’t a good idea either for the same reason. Learn from the unfortunate accidents of others, don’t repeat them.
The surf has been skates and dogfish. There are striped bass around or along structure at the Indian River and OCMD inlets, with plenty of throwback tautog. Boats are getting out more but it’s that time of year to check to see who is doing what for trips.
Anyone who uses the beach and is prone to getting stuck, or knows a guy (looking at you SUVs with the sand button), the OSV Assist LLC service has a program much like Tow Boat US. You sign up for free tows out of the sandbox. It’s a nice peace of mind to have if you go out when there are less people around. And it’s great for Assateague which is required to have less people around. Speaking of Tow Boat, get that peace of mind, too, if you own a boat. The waterways around Sussex County get worse each year. The dredge for Indian River in Millsboro is doing its usual, barely making a dent by spring channel dredging. These areas need to be dredged deeper like they were back in the day. Put the slurry back on land and create that berm to filter the rain and runoff. The river would come back to life instead of being choked out by deep silt.
Anyway, Captain Clarke’s favorite pastime activity is yanking people constantly off the same sand bars, just ask him. It’s not. That actually costs them more in the long run, pulling the same boat from the same spot, and it happens a lot. Technically that makes the bays more commercial waterways — can we get some more federal channel dredging?
Speaking of stuff needing fixed — I know I am a joy today, but it’s a new year and it’s the same problems with no solutions just Band-Aids till next year — the Cape Henlopen Fishing Pier is a disgrace. It is aggravating as an angler embedded in the fishing community to hear the same complaints from the same people every year, only to hear the same gaslighting from the folks in charge about the solutions. In the amount of time I have heard this, which is over 13 years, we could have built a pier to Cape May with a GoFundMe and a bake sale. If we put a bar on top of the bait shop at the pier can we get some support? Before you ask, yes, we have the money to fix this and the group to make it happen. The bipartisan Delaware Sportsmen’s Caucus should step in and make this happen. They can use the recreational fishing funding money to get a loan or however that works and pay for it with our fishing license money. I am 100% behind this and if you need a petition or the votes, let me know. How many licenses are not only sold at the pier but used? They are mostly out-of-state licenses, too, that make us bank back in federal monies. Maybe we should put a little love into the lady feeding our system? The pharm company has to pay into these repairs/upkeep, maybe they would like a more solid investment. How about Fort Miles? That is your old pier. Can we get a federal antiquity loan?
Anyway, no one is catching anything around the pier except a cold and really dope winter sunsets.
Low-level beach combing the bay there is fun and great for those that have a hard time walking softer sand. The bay sand is a little more packed at the water and no waves make it easier to avoid getting wet feet.
I’m glad to see the bypass bridge over the Millsboro Pond is pylons driven and not a pile of rock and gravel pack that would cut the pond up. Maybe we can taug the pylons. I am kidding but they will become structure for fishing. I’d pay real money to make a cast off the top of the access ramp hill on the other side of Route 30. DelDOT, you are missing a quick money maker — let’s talk long-distance casting contest. I’ll still get hung up with my fly rod, snag a car going by and get spooled. But later that day on the interwebs, it would become the largest gar anyone ever heard tell of in these here waters.