Rhetorical question

Capt Mike the demise of the flounder fishing really hurts see my screen name but i believe that one main culprit mite just be the amount of fluke small and doormats living in the bays just wait and let me explain. I spend a good amount of time when i can snorkeling the flats in shinnicock bay the amount of marine life is always amazing,But what is as amazing is the amount of baby flounders that are on those flats in july and august i mean the bottom on the mussel beds are paved with them about 1.5 to 3 inches long and just off those said mussel beds lie all sized of fluke waiting for a meal. Now back when the saltwater license was being tossed around the DEC was starting to spend that money before it ever started to come in hence the Mattituck ramp the East Moriches ramp that was squashed in mid completion when the money was not to come. And they had a special marine biologist come over from England to study the flounder problem i met him really good guy and we talked at length about the predation of fluke on the YOY flounder and he was already ahead of me . See he had a tank all set up with small fluke and used to feed them all live food a favorite was grass shrimp ,killies ,spearing and baby flounders he swore the fluke would not touch any other prey till all the flounders were gone !!!! Well the money from the license got squashed and Rob the biologist was sent packing back to England and the research stopped .Its been a while now the seatuck group picked up the program but their studies are mainly on the north shore. Man i miss those presidents day flounder trips yes thats when we started flounder fishing way before the st paddys day season quantuck canal duck hunting and flounder fishing at the same time,Iv been chilly cod fishing but only really froze my butt off flounder fishing.Those were the days.
 
With your screen name I have no doubt you are a devout lover of winter Flounder, Joe. Actually I had heard the theory before about the fluke being another one of many predators that put Flounder high on their list of preferred meals. As many have postulated, there must be several reasons why we no longer have a viable winter Flounder fishery in our area and your observation must be a part.

I certainly do not dispute what you see on your snorkeling trips but I am puzzled as to why you see the juvenile fish in the summer but we still get no adults earlier in the season. And speaking of the old seasonal norms, while I used to start with the traditional St. Patty's day opening, I also recall that when we had a mild winter guys were indeed catching Flounder as early as President's Day. Sad to think about how far down we have fallen.
 
St. Patrick's Day was the "traditional" start of the flounder season back then. I too, remember as a kid catching Great South Bay flounder in mid to late February. If it was a mild winter it would start that early. If the bay was iced over, about two weeks after the ice melted.

On the subject of the the baby flounder. Don't for get the increase in the cormorant population. I have seen them with both baby flounder and 6 inch black fish in their mouths.
 
flounderjoe said:
Capt Mike the demise of the flounder fishing really hurts see my screen name but i believe that one main culprit mite just be the amount of fluke small and doormats living in the bays just wait and let me explain. I spend a good amount of time when i can snorkeling the flats in Shinnecock bay the amount of marine life is always amazing, But what is as amazing is the amount of baby flounders that are on those flats in July and august i mean the bottom on the mussel beds are paved with them about 1.5 to 3 inches long and just off those said mussel beds lie all sized of fluke waiting for a meal. Now back when the saltwater license was being tossed around the DEC was starting to spend that money before it ever started to come in hence the Mattituck ramp the East Moriches ramp that was squashed in mid completion when the money was not to come. And they had a special marine biologist come over from England to study the flounder problem i met him really good guy and we talked at length about the predation of fluke on the YOY flounder and he was already ahead of me . See he had a tank all set up with small fluke and used to feed them all live food a favorite was grass shrimp ,killies ,spearing and baby flounders he swore the fluke would not touch any other prey till all the flounders were gone !!!! Well the money from the license got squashed and Rob the biologist was sent packing back to England and the research stopped .Its been a while now the Setauket group picked up the program but their studies are mainly on the north shore. Man i miss those presidents day flounder trips yes that's when we started flounder fishing way before the st paddys day season quantuck canal duck hunting and flounder fishing at the same timeIv been chilly cod fishing but only really froze my butt off flounder fishing. Those were the days.
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Maybe we should ask the GULP folks to make small winter flounders and we could try fishing with those.

But them again, with Summer flounders not entering the sound, it may be moot. I just hope they return in 20121
 
I said before its the cormorants. didn't they just have an effort on Lake Erie or Ontario to kill them off ? I had my first boat from 78 to 85 or 6, never saw them. When I restarted saltwater fishing in 1996 or so there wasn't a pole on a dock not occupied by one of them, that is after I had to research what in hell they were. There are huge flocks of them sitting on the beach near the beach houses on Swift Creek. Every pole in Matzohpizza has one.
 
BoatGuy said:
Maybe we should ask the GULP folks to make small winter flounders and we could try fishing with those.

But them again, with Summer flounders not entering the sound, it may be moot. I just hope they return in 20121
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There already are some rubber flounder look alike jig bodies out there they are not easy to find and they work great just don’t last long and are by no means cheap
 
BoatGuy said:
Maybe we should ask the GULP folks to make small winter flounders and we could try fishing with those.

But them again, with Summer flounders not entering the sound, it may be moot. I just hope they return in 20121
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Remember the Petri Fish buck tails. Looked like baby flounder.
 
pequa1 said:
I said before its the cormorants. didn't they just have an effort on Lake Erie or Ontario to kill them off ? I had my first boat from 78 to 85 or 6, never saw them. When I restarted saltwater fishing in 1996 or so there wasn't a pole on a dock not occupied by one of them, that is after I had to research what in hell they were. There are huge flocks of them sitting on the beach near the beach houses on Swift Creek. Every pole in Matzohpizza has one.
Click to expand...
Oh, cormorants were around in the late 70s/early 80s, at least on the North Shore. Used to see them duck hunting. My gunning buddy & I had some derogatory names for them....
 
Montauk to me has definitely been on a downslide in fluke fishing. I have caught many a flounder at the hooter in the late 80’s with yellowtail in the mix. I’ve also have had some great trips in the lake in the early 90’s. The last flounders I’ve caught have all been at Coxes Ledge In November. My fishing buddy and myself used to slay big fluke right in front of Gurneys on the South Side late April early May. Now Fluke fishing for a limit is a all day affair in deep sticky bottom. Kind of boring if you ask me. The last few years the good bite of big fish doesn’t happen till the end of the season. I got this fish on September 5, 2020, 10.3 pounds. My 3rd 10 plus pounder and it was after I took my crew to Block Island and put a solid catch of porgies and cbass together first. It was in the Cartwright grounds on a rough day on the third drift of about five in the later afternoon.
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Are you sure that what you saw in Shinny bay were baby black back flounder and not hog chokers? Up in Narragansett bay URI studied the decline and they found it was due to Grass Shrimp predation on flounder larvae.
 
As a LI Sound angler for over 40-years, I too have seen what many of you have witnessed. I made a post on FB about this and I was attacked pretty hard by the charter captains.

But like flounder joe, I have seen the exact pattern. After hours upon hours of studying this issue, I've come to the conclusion, in addition to the many factors mentioned above, that it is the warming waters in the Long Island Sound and the entire northeast region. Our waters are warming faster than anywhere on the planet. In fact, Scientists believe that the Gulf Stream is pushing north and is pushing cold water species north to colder waters. The northeast region, which takes in the sound is warming 99% faster than the rest of the coast. We also witnessed an acidity level higher than ever before. It has now begun to change.

As the lobsters and crabs left the sound the void is now being filled by a dramatic increase in spider crabs that thrive in warmer waters. This can eventually become a problem as they eat more plant life. There's so much that I uncovered that I will be doing a podcast on this in the near future to discuss all that I have found.

If the experts are correct, we will continue to see more changes in the sound. For example, biologists predicted a few years back that we will begin to see other predators do better with less competition. ie: porgies and they also predicted the LI Sound Sea Bass fishery will continue to grow.

It's a very complex issue with no easy answers, but the one sad fact that remains is Ll Sound anglers may never see the fluke fishery we had just a few years ago.

Look for my podcast on this. I hope to get to the bottom of it. No pun intended
 
Loss of eelgrass habitat in the South Shore bays, coupled with a slight increase in bay temps, plus the friggin’ cormorants. ‘Nuf said.
 
BoatGuy said:
"petri fish" bucktails? Never heard of them. How far back are you going?
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7&1/2” total length, 3” wide at the shoulders with about 3oz lead in the head brown back with a white belly I’m guessing about 25yrs old. This one has accounted for a few stripers Soft rubber body. Hard to see in the photo but their is about an 8/0 hook sticking out of his back. John
 

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Im going to throw another thought into the declining flounder population which is based on having grown up in Moriches. Ive brought it up and many dismiss it as a crack pot theory. Back in the early 70’s as a kid i would go out with my father and grandfather in the spring and fall and we would fish in the general vicinity of Terrell’s river on the north side of the bay in 4-5’ of water. 1 drop would produce more fish than needed in 2-3 hours.
Anybody familiar with that area knows Terrell’s river was the capital of LI Duck farming. Given that flounder are a bottom feeding species im convinced there was something in whatever was flowing out of those duck farms that flounders thrived on. I think its more than a coincidence that the downfall of flounder in Moriches Bay coincided with the closure of all those duck farms. Today there are zero left of both flounder and duck farms
 
Chinacat said:
Im going to throw another thought into the declining flounder population which is based on having grown up in Moriches. Ive brought it up and many dismiss it as a crack pot theory. Back in the early 70’s as a kid i would go out with my father and grandfather in the spring and fall and we would fish in the general vicinity of Terrell’s river on the north side of the bay in 4-5’ of water. 1 drop would produce more fish than needed in 2-3 hours.
Anybody familiar with that area knows Terrell’s river was the capital of LI Duck Farms
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And a great place to scoop up crabs and gig eels at night.
 
Flounder like to bite on a mudflat during low tide
with sun warming the bottom. It made the difference.
A rind of clam. Maybe blood or sand worms. They
do like muscles. Chumming turned them on. A
bright yellow twister tail or corn bead caught their attention.
On April fools I'll put a 6 hour effort with two rods.
Just out of curiosity. To see where I'm standing.
 
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