Barnegat Reef is for the Birds by Ed Valitutto

Posted on July 29, 2021 by VHFC

My last report mentioned there were still fish in the bay. So what do we do – we go to the Barnegat reef. Dave Spendiff and I departed around 6:30 yesterday 28 July and first stopped at the horn buoy where just 10 days back we limited out. After several drifts without a touch, we headed to the reef. For the next 3 1/2 hours we caught one short and birds, birds and more birds! Fluke belly and Gulp were ripped off the hook in no time. We fished the Tires and the middle of the reef with identical results. The drift was slow but my trolling motor moved us along at ~1 kt.

Finally we decided to head back in and try the north cut off DC. The first drift gave us more action than we had in the prior several hours. We ended up with two nice keepers (Dave), one nice one lost at the boat and several shorts. An added surprise was the 3 ft. needlefish Dave landed. BTW, when returning near the shallow water where DC and High Bar meet, stay to the right of the white shallow water marker.

When we arrived at my dock, my wife asked, “How come Dave always catches the keepers?” To quote Rodney Dangerfield, “I get no respect!”

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