April is Long Island’s number one month for catching all species of pelagics. There are still plenty of wahoo hanging around, and the dolphin and tuna come in strong. The tuna birds will also migrate through this month and they are always a big help offshore locating schools of yellowfin with their “radar.”
Blue marlin also begin to show up around this time and can easily be targeted by trolling a spread of skirted marlin lures, either plain or with a horse ballyhoo or belly strip. Adding some bait to the lures, will add to your catching success. My personal favorite setup is the Iland Cruiser Flasher blue/white rigged with 300 lb. mono and a single 11/0 Mustad 7691 galvanized hook baited with a horse ballyhoo and trolled at 8-10 knots. In case of a lost rig or a need to cut the leader, I prefer not to use stainless steel hooks, since this gives the fish a chance for the hook to rust out.
A good number of marlin have been caught on Simms Bar just off Clarence Town, but if you venture a bit further to the seamount off Bird Rock, Crooked Island, there is world-class marlin fishing in those waters. I have personally seen fish in the thousand pound class just free jumping.
Fishing has been good this year off of Clarence Town and we have caught our fair share of wahoo, yellowfin tuna, and dolphin. The action will continue to kick through spring.
We had a memorable experience a few weeks ago as we took a crew of world-class freedivers out to Simms Bar and we baited up schools of wahoo and yellowfin tuna around the boat with live pilchards. The divers enjoyed getting some good video footage, as well as taking a try at the tunas with a pole spear, that is until Mr. Tiger showed up and crashed the party!