Bluefish should also be available to shore anglers in Raritan Bay and Navesink River, but haven't been as much of a problem for striper fishermen as is usually the case in Raritan Bay at this time. Betty Nick's Tackle reported big blues on bucktails Wednesday morning at the south end of Island Beach State Park.

With seas remaining rough (the Jamaica from Brielle has cancelled Wednesday's trip), it's a good thing that big bluefish have been providing plenty of action in the calm waters of bays and rivers. Capt. Vinnie Vetere of Katfish Charters in Great Kills was thinking about getting some protection from this morning's NE wind and heavy rain by running up the Hudson River, but instead trolled Mo-Jos in the lee of Staten Island to find big bass before anchoring on them for a good catch on chunks and live bunkers without interference from blues.

The early break was wasted on the Manasquan Inlet bluefishing as I didn't see a rod bend there after dawn after a good Saturday morning when I caught a blue on my first cast. Matt Slobdjian, at Jim's Tackle in Cape May, submitted his first report of the season as follows The beach bite has been pretty good on bass on the North Cape May side.

Arrived at 2 pm for the outgoing tide, light SE wind and immediately got Into some action with big blues on a red head white body Polaris popper in the bowl area along north beach. I got up near False Rip by 3 pm to find the northern end of North Beach stacked with big blues that provided non-stop action from when I arrived up there at 3 pm until the tide went slack at 6 30 pm when the wild action finally petered out.

The run of big blues in Manasquan Inlet on surface lures continued early in the morning, with poppers producing lots of surface strikes. Jim Freda had his Manasquan High School Fishing Club out on the north jetty rocks during late afternoon, casting into the inlet with swimmers to catch some big blues when nothing was going on west of them.