More than three tons of fish have been weighed in so far in the month-long 65th annual Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby. At least 460 bluefish have been weighed in, three times more than the number of striped bass.
False albacore is again the scarce fish in the derby; only 35 have been weighed in so far. A total number of 96 bonito have touched the scales. That translates to 4,172.37 pounds of bluefish; 2,398.12 pounds of striped bass; 586.27 pounds of bonito; and 332.41 pounds of false albacore, as of yesterday.
Autumn is in the air and there is no better evidence than the sight of pickup trucks loaded with fishing rods and gear. The 65th Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby opened on Sunday; so far there are 1,400 fishermen registered.
The biggest striped bass weighed in at the Edgartown headquarters is a 32-pounder brought in Wednesday morning by Evan D. Metropoulous, a boat angler with a reputation for loving to be on the water and a persistence in catching big fish.
The 65th annual Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby opens Sunday morning at a minute past midnight. The fishermen are waiting.
George Moran of Oak Bluffs will be out there. At 64, he is almost as old as the derby. “For me it is wonderful being outdoors, being on the beaches, out at night with the stars and moon,” Mr. Moran said.
The sea and coastline around the Island have been roughed up by hurricanes and tropical storms this September, beginning last weekend when Earl blew through and again midweek when more tropical disturbances cropped up. The weather has been unstable: thunderstorms crashed down on Edgartown on Wednesday while West Tisbury stayed dry and sunny.
But the forecast calls for weather patterns to settle down by Sunday, just in time for the opening of the sixty-fifth Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby.
They came for prizes and they came to support each other. The 65th annual Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby awards ceremony at Nectar’s on Sunday was a festival of storytelling, stories told by those who won and those who didn’t. And two anglers who were friends and relatives to many there walked away as the proudest owners, one of a truck, the other of a powerboat.
After days of bad weather, most of it wind, the fall derby busted open last weekend with great fishing from off Wasque to Devil’s Bridge in Aquinnah. This is the closing week of the 65th annual Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby. With more than 2,700 fishermen registered in the contest, a lot of fishermen were out on the water to make up for lost time. The contest ends at 10 p.m. tomorrow night.
Columbus Day weekend was the last chance most anglers would have to devote high energy to the sport.
Churning seas over the weekend produced three new derby-leading fish including a 46.15-pound striped bass.
The striper was reeled in from a boat by Richard A. Penney, of Carver, who weighed in Sunday at the Edgartown headquarters of the Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby. Though the fishing competition continues for two more weeks, Penney’s fish would have won the category in either of the past two years.
During the Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby, everyone lining up in the mornings at the Island’s councils on aging has got to love a fisherman. Every weekday during the derby, the Island’s seniors receive free fresh striped bass and bluefish and only occasionally get fresh Atlantic bonito. The program is a derby win-win.
A battalion of volunteers extending across the Island administers the program.
Two fishermen participating in the 66th annual Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby had their leading fish pulled from the contest on Monday, for not registering for a state saltwater fishing license. While the derby officials are not disqualifying the fishermen or sharing their names, the organization hopes that anglers participating in the contest get the message. To fish in the derby, anglers must comply with state and federal fishing requirements.
The idea came from an eight-year-old Chilmark boy. Three years ago young Jack Nixon was reading journalist David Kinney’s book The Big One, the hot new fishing read of the summer that year about the Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby. As Jack was reading, he gazed at a newspaper nearby and had a sudden thought: He wished that some of the men who had served in Iraq and Afghanistan could fish the derby.
