Great day of toggin' out here in early May.
Buzzards Bay.
Awesome way to start the season.
One of the things I like most about tautog
fishing is its simplicity.
It's early May so often times I find tautog
fishing is the really the kick off of the
good fishing season.
It's a good eating fish that are easily accessible.
Finding them is a trial and error process.
What you're going to want to do is look at
your chart and look for a series of rock piles
in about 20 to 25-feet of water.
Once you locate one of these rock piles, as
indicated by good structure on your fish finder,
you'll want to anchor right over the spot.
Using as little weight as possible, I find
1.5oz to 3oz to be ideal, you want to fish
with fresh cut green crabs on the bottom.
Now if you don't have green crabs, fresh cut
clams will work in a pinch.
If it is a little windy, it's a good alternative
to perhaps striper fishing where you can anchor.
One thing you want to do is anchor over rock
piles or structure that you find on your chart.
Here I have basically a hi-lo rig.
Some people would call this a chicken rig.
The Hogy Lure Company manufactures these and
we call them the Utility Rig.
Here I've thread on two small 1/0 live bait
hooks and attached a small, some people would
call this a casting sinker, others might call
it a dipsy sinker, but a small sinker at the
end.
Fishing with live crabs, just waiting for
the subtle taps of the 'tog.
Tog fishing, another nice thing is it tends
to be in shallow water.
Today we're in about 26 feet of water.
I'm going to let this rig all the way down
to the bottom.
Wait for the tell-tale tog bite which is a
couple hits and then the rod pulls down just
a little bit more.
A long sweeping motion is a good method for
setting the hook on tautog.
Decent tog here.
Took the bottom hook.
Healthy fish.
Not the biggest tog I've ever seen but this
one is perfect for the table.
What I love about early May tog fishing is
its simplicity.
A simple dropper rig which in this case is
a Hogy Utility Rig. 25 feet of water.
A few crabs.
Wait for the tap.
Set the hook.
Then it's fish chowder time.
To prepare a crab for fishing, you want to
cut the legs off.
Get a nice pair of kitchen shears.
Take out this hard shell on the top here.
Discard it.
Same on the other half.
Now I have two good bait-sized pieces.
We try and hook it through the leg hole or
right through one of the leg joints and then
we're good to go.
The most important thing about togging is
to keep your bait on the bottom.
There he is.
That's a tog right there boys and girls.
Bringing 'em in.
Another nice early May tog aboard the Gray
Goose.
Having a great day out here.
Wow John that's much bigger than mine.
That's a good tog.
That's a good tog right there.
This rig will work for just about any groundfish
species.
Very simple rig.
Easy to use, easy to rig and very durable.
Another nice tog.
Now one little tip I like to have when bottom
fishing -- if you leave a rod's length of
line that allows you to put the rod in the
holder and grab the line and swing the fish
right into the boat.
Now I have both hands free.
The deck's free.
I can move my rod and take my rod with me
so John can fight his fish.
That's a good 'tog.
It's a nice early May day here in Buzzards
Bay.
The tautog are biting.
We had to work for a little bit.
We fished through a slack tide now it's cooking
going the other direction and the bite has
heated up so its worth sticking it out in
the spot.
We're catching fish using green crabs on our
Hogy Utility Rig which is basically a hi-lo
rig where you can interchange the hooks.
These little live bait hooks are doing the
trick.
