Hi Quinte fishers. The wife and I have been on PEI since June. Now that I'm back here's the summer's scoop. Other than oysters, clams, mussels, potatoes and blueberries, this place has a lot of fishing to take advantage of.
Of course, May and June is lobster season, when they are as sweet and flavourful when from the cold water, so we eat as many as we can. Right of the boat at the dock they are $5 a pound. Soooo tasty.
Mackerel are common, and we fish for them off the local pier. Either they are in, or out, in which case you have to come back some other time. Good broiled, smoked or raw.
Brook trout are found in most streams as they are spring fed and remain cold all summer. The common fish are pan sized 9 to 12 inches, but every other outing I run across a sea run fish which get considerably larger. This one was 17.5 inches and silver from the ocean. Caught in a brook you could jump over.
We often go out on the deep sea public charters for cod and mackerel. The wife likes the evening sailing so she can watch the sunset. There were some decent cod caught. Even this double.
A new one for me was this 15 to 18 pound halibut. Lots of excitement, but there's no recreational season for them, so I threw it back. I did buy a 33 pound halibut off a commercial boat for $6 a pound, and ate blackened halibut until I'd had enough and switched back to haddock.
And the big attraction at this time of the year is giant bluefin tuna. The big boys. The third day I was out on a charter out of North Lake we found one. After 2 hrs 10 min of fighting him we brought him to boat. When the skipper saw the fish he decided to bring it to market. The more common action is catch and release, but this was a good fish and he had a precious tag to fill. It weighed in at 701 pounds, and in comparison, I'm 6' 3". I was honoured to be a part of helping the captain make a living on the sea. This is something I will never forget, and would do it again in a heartbeat, and likely will.
As it happened, I was invited out again in the afternoon to crew for a party from BC, and we hooked another fish !! An hour and a half we brought it to boat, took a few pics, and let it go. It musta gone 650 to 700. One boat brought a fish to the wharf that weighed 1146 pounds. What a blast.
Looking forward to the hard water season on BOQ now. Bring it on.