The pressure is on as the Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby heads into the final week of fishing. As the grand leader board changes, nerves may get a little more frayed and the blood pressure may begin to creep north.
As he weighed fish at derby headquarters in Edgartown late last week, Mike Cassidy had some advice for those sweating it out.
“You’ll see people lingering out there in the parking lot whose name is on the board, which is not the thing to do,” the longime derby committee member said. “If you’re worried about somebody coming in with a bigger one, you should be out fishing.”
And that is exactly what anglers of all ages did all weekend as a stretch of mild, summer-like weather set in. Derby hot spots like the Big Bridge and Edgartown Lighthouse have been crowded. At the Cape Pogue Gut on Saturday morning fishermen lined the shore on both sides, shrouded in dense fog. At midday the fog burned off, replaced by warm sunshine around the time of high tide.
Asked how the fishing was last Thursday morning, Rick Mikula of Hazleton, Pa., held up his fish.
“Obviously fantastic,” he said. “I got up at 6 a.m., went to the lighthouse and got myself a fine bonito.”
Meanwhile, the grand leader board has been changing all weekend. On Saturday Stephen Hansel weighed in a monster 51.05-pound striped bass caught from a boat. There are new leaders too in the shore bonito and boat albacore categories. Grand leaders as of Sunday afternoon are:
Boat bluefish, William Kadison, 18.49 pounds; shore bluefish, Robert Bottary, 16.70 pounds; boat bass, Stephen B. Hansel, 51.05 pounds; shore bass, John Stasiuk, 29.61 pounds; boat bonito, Steve Bacelli, 10.80 pounds; shore bonito, Mark Campos, 8.57 pounds; boat albacore, Trish Lyman, 12.23 pounds; and shore albacore, Casey Elliston, 12.56 pounds.
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