Many options when fishing at the point

The point is open today!  WoooHoo!  Waited all summer for this day. Absolutely love fishing the point, there are so many options. You can fish the bay side for flounder along the surf edge, and cast net for mullet. Bluefish will run the bay side and the ocean side and around the point. Big schools of snapper blues always swim with lots of birds working the schools. The ocean-side beach along that stretch is decent fishing. When you fish the point, you can choose your conditions and location. There is also the bonus of spectacular sunsets and decent night fishing in the late summer and early fall. It is always fun to see what the point looks like after each summer.

As soon as it cools off, there will be beachgoers, horseback riders, and surf anglers on the Cape Henlopen Beaches.

Small black drum are all over the surf, they have to be sixteen inches or more to keep and only three per day per angler. Top and bottom rigs with Fishbites, squid or  bloodworms. They are right in the surf behind the breaking waves or out a little farther in the next trough. Kingfish is still the hot catch in the surf, but small weakfish are starting to hit more and more. Of course there is always cut bait for the obligatory skate, dogfish, ray, or shark.

Mullet rigs are working great for bluefish.  There is a lot of fresh mullet to catch around the inland bays up to the cob size in the flats of Rehoboth Bay. The bluefish carcasses make excellent crab bait.

Chicken just keeps them fed, crabs prefer fish it really brings them in, because when was the last time you saw a swimming chicken.

Crabbing is excellent in all the tidal creeks, rivers and around the inland bays. Hard part is finding a place to crab from land. One way to do it is walk around the flats areas of the Rehoboth Bay, look for them and scoop them up, drop them in a basket floating in an inner tube, just like clamming. Which has also been good around the inland bays. Wear shoes; there is a lot of glass in some areas. Kayak to the beach areas around the inland bays and try those areas. Set a crab pot along a grassline at high tide and let it soak for a few hours with bluefish or bunker. Don’t forget the proper buoy, with name and address on it, and you need a fishing license to crab and only two pots per angler. There are a lot of crabs in front of Lewes Beach, and Delaware Bay beaches. Just use the crab pot or two for the time you are around, to keep an eye on it, and then see what you get for the day. No need to soak overnight to catch a couple of crabs.

Bluefish action at night can be found at the Indian River Inlet with shad and short striped bass as well. Spoons, bucktails and swim shads are your best lures. Plugs are good too, especially gotchas. Shad will wear out shad darts and double up on some catches.

Problem is the bluefish will snap off your darts, so better to use the metal spoons. Soft plastics are good but the blues tear them up too, especially at the inlet they are vicious little biters. Sand fleas are good for sheepshead and some trigger here and there.

The best flounder action is still offshore around the Old Grounds, reef, and wreck sites. Sea bass and mahi are being caught in the mix. Yes they are in that close and have been for a bit now. Anglers are picking them up flounder fishing and in some cases just hooking up by throwing chunks. Flounder action around the inland bays is still slow, but the Delaware Bay is picking up.

Croaker is a fun catch with spot mixed in around the Cape Henlopen Fishing Pier. Using squid, Fishbites or bloodworms. The keeper croaker are not large. Some keeper flounder have been caught at the pier but not a lot. Little weakfish, short striped bass and sand perch have been hitting. Great place to take the kids and you can rent gear at the tackle shop there.

The end of vacation season is here, and now we get to the fish the end of summer season. Evenings on the beach fishing and grilling dinner, watching the sun drop. Fish into the dark, catch’m up and then go home to crash for work in the morning. Rinse and repeat, until it gets cold.