Access at Sandy Hook Rip has been fully restored
- the fence is down and the Coast Guard said "Go Fishing! :-)

Step outside - feels like fishin' season
And the Sandy Hook/Rip Fence still stands!

March 1, 2004
(ARCHIVED)

First things first, there's still two very important battles being waged that each and every one of us should be aware of. Regardless of what some people were recently told at a local boat show by an apparently misguided representative of one of the recreational fishing organizations, the fence at Sandy Hook blocking access to "The Rip" is still there and is not "being torn down as we speak"! It's very important that folks understand that this issue is far from over, we're trying to figure out why any organization's representative would casually say the fence is being torn down when they really have no idea. Forty eight hours later, Windknot, one of our SurfTalk members, took the walk to see. He reports, as of Sunday 2/29/04:

"Its alive and well and no sign of being torn down. It extends to the high water line. There are signs on it warning folks to not pass the fence. It may not go INTO the water but the effects are the same. "

So please get the word out to anyone that may have been misled about the fence "being torn down as we speak" - it is not being torn down, the Coast Guard is still fully intent on leaving the fence up and blocking all fishing access to the west of Fisherman's Trail. There's a couple threads SurfTalk with much discussion and lots of directions on how you can get involved - one is titled "Goodbye to the Sandy Hook Rip" - and the other is title "The Petition to Remove the Fence on Sandy Hook". If everyone makes an effort to get involved, we can win this one...but it's going to take getting involved. There's also a link at the top of this page to a petition and letters to send - please take the time to sign the petition - and print and mail the three letters - losing an access battle like this one will certainly lead the way to pushing fishermen out of more and more of the few remaining public accesses we enjoy. This is far from over folks, don't be coddled into a false sense of security.

Our friends in Delaware are still fighting the Indian River Inlet/Turbine battle! The meeting that was supposed to take place last week was postponed due to a snow storm. The meeting will be held this Wednesday evening - 3/03- this is a very important meeting! Even if you do not wish to speak at the meeting, it is imperative that you go with your fellow fishermen to be seen and counted! The meeting is Wednesday night at 7pm, at Lord Baltimore Elementary School - Route 26, Ocean View, Delaware. There's two threads on SurfTalk if you have any questions or need directions - the first is titled "IRI is threatened" - the second is "IRI - Turbine Meeting Postponed!" Please, if you can make it, grab a buddy or two and go to the meeting - you won't have to speak, but you need to be there! Ask them to address the physical size of these turbines - how deep will they be - will fishing still be allowed - can they guarantee that fishing will always be allowed - how do these turbines impact the inlet during storms - what level of noise will they produce - how will that noise level increase as the turbines wear - what peer reviewed research has been done on the environmental impact? So many questions...anyone at the meeting should get answers to these questions. Someone should tape record the meeting.

I had to get those two issue updated...I'd rather be talking about fishing cause it's really starting to feel like Spring out there - we've had air temps in the 50s and even 60's for the past 3 days! It feels like striped bass season should be upon us...in reality, the flounder are probably just starting to stir :-) If the weather continues on this track for a solid week, there will be some stripers caught by next weekend for the folks fishing worms in the warmest mud flat areas...it doesn't take much to get those hungry little resident stripers stirred up. Flounder season officially opened today...possibly one of the nicest open days for winter flounder I can remember. Then again, when I used to flounder fish frequently, there wasn't any closed season...so there was no need for an opening day These days, there's a season for everything...which can be good and it can be bad.

Last weekend PhilL and I went trout fishing up north...it needed to be done, I didn't do it a single time last year. Dubs and I used to do it every Saturday from late December right through March when they close the rivers to restock them for opening day. The weather forecast looked like a perfect trout day up there - temps in the upper 40s, cloudy, drizzle...all the best trout fishing stuff - and oddly enough, the weathermen finally nailed one - the day was everything they had forecast it to be Unfortunately for Phil and I, the trout were much less impressed with the weather than we'd expected them to be. At our first stop, within the first 1/2 hour, Phil landed a beautiful rainbow trout on a nymph - the trout looked to be a good 18" As fate would have it, my digital camera tells me the batteries are dead - but I know they aren't, they are fairly fresh. I take the batteries out, put 'em back in - dead. Repeat....still dead. Not wanting to jeopardize the spectacular RBT's life over my camera's issues, I tell Phil the camera ain't working. As he turns around, just as the trout was starting to taste the river's cold, clean escape - beeep - the camera comes on Oh well, I tell Phil we'll see plenty more just like that, maybe even much bigger - I've taken trout up to 23 1/2" in that stretch on nymphs this time of year - had 3 over 21" in the same day one warm winter! It wasn't meant to be...we fished 1/2 mile more in that piece...then fished 2 more spots on another nearby river - without so much as a single lone trout! Befuddled and confounded, by 3pm I was ready to head for home - probably only the second time in my life I remember leaving those wonderful woods and waters to head home before dark. It's a strange reality to be fishing some of my favorite trout waters on such a spectacular day and not land a single trout At least Phil got that one volunteer, it was nice to fish up there again and the sight of that one beautiful 18" winter survivor, it really made the whole day worth it :-)

This Sunday is the ~~Fourth~~ Third Annual SOL Food Fling - Ben Lippen and his hand picked helpy-helpertons have done a spectacular job! This should be the best Food Fling yet - and that's saying a lot, these things are always the social event of the season There's far too much going on this year at the Food Fling for me to even begin discussing it here - but I will say one thing - I know I'm not alone when I say I'm very much looking forward to two things - meeting TLDig who's coming from California just to punch Gadwall in the nose - BobPop's "Shady Rest" chicken wings and Soad Jerk's most amazing ice cream There's a number of threads on the Food Fling, directions, who's bringing what, etc, etc - the bottom line is we're gonna be meeting at the Pine Beach Firehouse in Pine Beach, NJ next Sunday 3/07! Everyone is invited...we'll see you there :-)