Because It’s Smooth
“Like butter,” was Dalton Portella’s brief and, given the day, appropriate description of the surf as he watched a set of waves peel across one of Montauk’s moorland coves a week ago.
He had just gotten out after a two-hour session before his internal clock told him he’d better get home for turkey at a neighbor’s house. He was shivering, but happily so. It had been a good go-out, and if his peaceful expression was any indication — chattering teeth included — he was grateful on the day specifically set aside for thanks.
The glassy, head-high waves were generated by the massive weather system that had plunged the Midwest into record-breaking cold for November. The system had moved east and south before heading offshore to produce a windy and rainy northeaster on the day before Thanksgiving. And the forecast promised northerly, offshore winds from a cold front on the day of festive gluttony itself.
These days surfers could deduce the promise of good surf coming either via a sixth sense derived from years of watching sea and sky, or by visiting any of the numerous surf prognostication sites on their computers. Either way, they knew that Montauk’s eastern breaks, as well as favorite beach breaks along Napeague and East Hampton beaches, would probably come to life on Thanksgiving Day. Perfect timing.
Not so thankful (at least in ocean-related matters) were the tribe of surfcasters who have been waiting for the last of the fall run of striped bass to make the annual pass along Long Island’s south shore beginning in Montauk. Alas, it hasn’t happened, despite a healthy showing of herring.
Rick Etzel, captain of Montauk’s Breakaway charter boat, said on Friday that he’d made a run out of the harbor, just off the bell buoy where, for some unknown reasons (perhaps some kind of sustenance flows out of Lake Montauk on an outgoing tide) schools of herring gather this time of year. “I got a bushel or so, but there was no fish on them,” he said, meaning predator bass.
Etzel said he planned on pickling the herring and putting them up in jars as Christmas gifts, with onions, “and a few jalapeno peppers for some heat.” Like cranberry picking, and bay scallops — one scalloper I know said he was able to dredge up a bumper harvest of 58 bags of scallops during the first week of this year’s season — putting up pickled herring is an old East End tradition.
Local waters are not completely void of striped bass. There are reports of small bass being caught on the sand beaches, as well as bluefish along the western end of Napeague and on the ocean side of Amagansett. And birds have been working on schools of something, perhaps herring, in Gardiner’s Bay. I’ve heard a few reports that bluefish are chasing them.
The Montauk SurfMasters tournament for striped bass ended with a whimper on Monday with the vast majority of the big fish caught in September and October.
In the Wader division first place went to Bob Howard for his 39-pound whopper caught on Oct. 14. Gary Krist landed in second by virtue of a 20.72-pound bass caught on Oct. 24. In third place is Gary Aprea who reeled in his 19.24-pounder on Oct. 2. Jason Pecoraro headed the tournament’s wetsuit division from Sept. 28, the day he caught his 50.30-pound cow bass, the largest fish in this year’s contest.
Lynne Torrento topped the women’s division with a 23.38-pound striper caught on Oct. 28. Mary Ellen Kane captured second and third places with 15.25 and 13.04-pound striped bass respectively. The larger bass was the only one on the leader board to have been caught in November.
The winner of a 14-foot East End sharpie sailing and rowing boat will be selected during a drawing scheduled for Saturday at the East End Boat Society’s boat shop at 301 Bluff Road, Amagansett, immediately west of the town marine museum. Each year, the society holds a benefit raffle of a vintage wooden boat built by its members, drawing the winner at its holiday party, which will run from 3 to 5 p.m.
Ray Hartjen, the society’s president, said a new raffle boat is now under way, a 12-foot-10-inch Pooduck, a sailing and/or rowing tender, designed by Joel White, the ninth boat the group has built since its founding. It is a recreational craft that can serve as a tender.
The society’s restoration projects include a 1921 Herreschoff 12.5-foot sailboat and a 1955 Dunphy, a classic runabout that was made through a cold-molded plywood technique developed in the ’50s. It will be outfitted with an engine from that period and will be part of the society’s permanent collection.
Membership in the nonprofit society is open to those with any skill level and costs $35 a year for an individual and $45 for a family. The group meets year round every Wednesday and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.