Natural baits still get the job done

With all the new artificial baits and lures, we often lose sight of the natural baits that have served fishermen for generations. 

When I first began fishing with my grandfather back in the late 1940s into the 1950s, we only took squid on our trips to Delaware Bay out of Slaughter Beach. Croaker were our target species, and we fished the Coral Beds in a wooden boat rented from a lady who dragged them down the beach as if they were light as a feather. Pop had bought a 40-horsepower Elgin motor that had to be set just right or it wouldn’t start on the first pull. If it didn’t start on the first pull, it was going to be a long day.

When the tide was out, the water was too shallow to put the motor down, so Pop sat in the bow like King Tut while slave Eric pushed the boat out until we were in deeper water.

Once we arrived at the Coral Beds, I began to cut the squid into strips under the watchful eye of my grandfather. Those strips had to be just right. Not too wide or too thin. Not too long or too short. Having lived most of my life with my grandfather, I was well aware of his peculiarities.

He used an Ocean City reel filed with linen line on a bamboo rod. His top-bottom rig was made from catgut. I had one of the new-fangled spinning reels and rods that I bought at the Boothwyn Farmers Market. It had the newest monofilament line from the DuPont Company called Stren. My top-bottom rig was also made of monofilament.

We usually had no trouble catching croaker, and toward the end of the 1950s, we even picked up a few trout. Everything we caught was on bait.

By the time I returned from the Navy in 1965, the trout were becoming more common, and the use of bucktails was increasing. Before the trout population crashed, it was hard to find anyone fishing with a top-bottom rig baited with squid. Last week, I fished from my boat in the Lower Bay and caught several trout on a top-bottom rig baited with Fishbites.

Getting back to bait fishing, there are certainly good reasons to use fresh or live bait today. My largest flounder, an 8-pounder, came on a live minnow fished without any weight in Indian River Bay near what was once the Old Duck Blind.  

I have used the same rig in the Lewes-Rehoboth Canal to catch flounder to 5 pounds. It is a good setup when fishing water to 10 feet deep, as the minnow will swim to the bottom and the flounder will grab it up in a flash. I use a circle hook and put the rod in a holder while I use another rod with a bucktail and Gulp! that I jig just off the bottom.

The flounder fishing has been really good at the Old Grounds, generally located between B and A buoys out in the ocean. The water is deep there, so light tackle is out, and 6 to 8 ounces of lead is often required to reach bottom.

My favorite rig there is a Delaware Bay Green Machine by Captain Mitchell’s Tackle. You can fish it with a Gulp! or Fishbites tail, but a minnow and a strip of squid is a hard combo to beat.

On a trip to New Jersey a few years ago, I was fishing with a group of New York and New Jersey outdoors writers. We were drifting for flounder with squid and fish strips off Sandy Hook, and I broke out my Delaware Bay Green Machine. You should have heard the laughter. I quickly began bringing keepers over the rail and completely outfished some of the biggest names in outdoors writing. I knew it was nothing but dumb luck, but I would never admit that to my fellow scribes.

The one bait I have not used in years is bloodworms. Fishbites bloodworms seem to work just as well and cost considerably less. Plus, at the end of the trip, you can seal the bag and have the remainder of the bait ready to use on the next trip.

Some fish, like black or red drum, call for bait. Clams or crabs pretty much sum up the choices when those fish are the target species.

Tog, triggerfish, sheepshead and spadefish also require bait of one kind or another. The first three will go for sand fleas, green crab, blue crab, shrimp or fiddler crab. Spadefish are a bit different. You have to set up a chum slick of chopped-up clam and then put out your line with a small hook baited with a tiny piece of clam. Put the rod in a holder and don’t pick it up until it bends over double.