A Fishy Place in Decline

Sag Harbor used to be a fishy place.

Most landlubbers might associate the harbor with sailing or yachting because of its long history as a whaling port and its piers and large anchorage packed with blow boats and billionaire’s ships. But for decades, a stop at the 7-Eleven before dawn in the shoulder seasons would have introduced you to a small army of eager anglers gathering up stores for a day on the water in pursuit of the many fishing options within an easy run on a small skiff.

First of all, for most of my life, the harbor was a veritable mecca of flounder fishing, nearly as much as the Shinnecock Canal, and the annual flounder derby that would attract hundreds of participants was a testament to the success that could be expected in the muddy bottoms off the Long Wharf or in the cove or waters just outside the breakwater. Rarely did anyone have to go farther than a boat could easily be rowed by a couple of kids to catch a limit of fat blackback flounder.

In the spring, the fluke and striped bass fishing was unparalleled. The Ferry Slip was the best place to catch the first 40 and 50 pound stripers of the season and the Green Lawns and Jessups were the place to be for big fluke in May and early June, after which the hot fluking would gradually migrate east to the waters inside Cedar Point and then outside and was as reliable a place as any to put a limit of fluke on ice until at least mid-July. After that, there was Plum Gut for stripers and the backside of Gardiners Island for fluke and porgies and sea bass when the weather got hot. It was an all-summer fishery that rarely required anyone looking very far afield to put fillets in the fryer.

But Kenny Morse closing the doors of Tight Lines Tackle on Bay Street this week, after nearly 30 years, seems like the coda on what has been a slow but steady decline of Sag Harbor as a fishing town.

The flounder fishing faded out nearly 20 years ago, like it did everywhere. The derby hadn’t had much more than a smattering of participants for years when it finally ended in the early 2000s. The spring fluke fishing has gradually gotten worse and worse, to the point that this year I could count on one hand the number of fishermen I know who even did a single drift at the Green Lawns or Cedar Point.

The spring striper fishing around Jessups is still decent and the return of weakfish to the Peconic injected a burst of life to the docks in Sag Harbor the last two years. But weakfish are a heartbreak waiting to happen and the striper fishery as a whole is clearly a train headed for a cliff that even 3-inch slots are not going to stop.

Tight Lines arriving in Southampton Village, on the other hand, will be a welcome change in a major social center where there are a ton of fishermen that have not had easy access to a tackle shop (Hampton Bays is only 8 miles, but it might as well be New Jersey after 3:30 p.m.) since the tackle aisle of Alan’s Auto. Hopefully it will be a fruitful venture for all.

Tuna fishing has taken top billing once again over the last week as the inshore fall migration has struggled to get rolling off our shores.

Last week’s superb weather conditions meant that a lot of local boats, even pretty tiny ones, were running for the tuna grounds nearly every day during the week last week (yes, the fishing was frustrating for those of us stuck in our offices) and finding excellent fishing for either bluefin or yellowfin, depending on which direction you went.

There are lots of stripers in Shinnecock Inlet and a fair number in the Peconics, but the surf fishing along the sand beaches has been hit and miss and the classic fall run fishing for allies and blitzing bass has all been up on the Rhode Island coastline the last couple weeks.

Weather should be prime for the next week or so, no hurricane swells or nor’easters on the horizon.

Catch ’em up. See you out there.