Sand Tigers In The Surf!

Ryan Franklin

I pulled into the beach parking lot a little after 7:30 pm, which is earlier than I typically start surfcasting for sharks.

I had heard from a friend that there had recently been a good bite at dusk, so there I was ready to go nice and early.

The beach which I have been recently fishing is a pretty popular spot, and even at 7:30 pm there still a buzz of activity along the shoreline.

I was ahead of my fishing partner Brendan, who would be joining me shortly.

More...

I drove until I found a little stretch of beach that wasn’t so crowded and jumped out of my Nissan Xterra, excited for the night of shark surfcasting which lay ahead.

When targeting sharks from shore, before I do anything, I walk down to the water’s edge. On this night the tide had just turned and was now receding. The warm water of the sound crashed over my feet and washed around my ankles.

Sea conditions were picture perfect, plus there was a light south west breeze-just enough to keep the bugs away!

I scanned the beach to my left and to my right, observing the shoreline. About 200ft to my right I a small point where the waves were rolling a little differently there.

Here's a Google Earth image of the type of point I am referring to. Keep your eyes peeled for spots like these!

The spot looked so fishy I decided to jump back into my car, move down the shoreline, and set up shop for the night at this point.

Now that I had my spot all worked out I began setting up my lines. I had my first line in the water just before 8pm.

I start setting up my second rod when my Penn 6500 (which I just put out) starts singing ZzzzzZzzzzZzzzz! I turned to see my rod bouncing frantically in its pole holder and sprinted down the beach towards the commotion.

I quickly removed the rod from its holder and drop the tip towards the water, putting slack in the line which allowed myself to tighten up my drag. Once the fish had taken all the slack I leaned back and set the hook Fish on!

Immediately after getting hooked this shark came to the surface and thrashed its tail in the surf. The shark then broke to the right and started swimming parallel to the beach.

I gave chase, slowly gaining on the shark as we both moved down the shoreline. Luckily for me Brendan showed up right at this moment, and he was able to assist me in landing what would be the first of four sand tiger sharks taken during the night.

This first shark wasn’t a fish to write home about (they get much bigger), but it was a good sign of things to come.

The safest method I have found thus far for removing the hook is to have one person sit on the shark's back to pin the fish down, and then hold the shark's mouth open for the other person to cautiously remove the hook with a long pair of pliers.

Brendan snapped a few photos of the sand tiger and back into the water the shark went.

These sharks are federally protected so it is catch and release only.

I put on another chunk of bait and cast my offering back out into the Sound. Another 20 or so minutes goes by and the sky begins to get dark. I break out the glow sticks, and attach them to the end of my poles so I can see the hits at night.

After about another 10 minutes one of the rods doubles over, violently sending my green glow stick spinning into the night. This was Brendan’s first shark fishing trip so I let him take this one.

Once he set the hook I could tell this fish was bigger than the last-especially after hearing the shark splash on the surface, somewhere out in the darkness.

After a great battle I grab the big sand tiger by the tail and drag it onto the beach. Woo hoo!

Again, we snap a few photos and release the shark back into the darkness.

Now that it’s pitch black, and we just released a shark back into the water, I am a little weary about wading in the water barefoot! Nevertheless Brendan and I fished for another two hours and managed to land two more sand tiger sharks.

At about 11 the bite seemed to have died off so we packed up our gear, called the trip a success, and headed home to bed.

Looking ahead, I think I am going to branch out next week and make a move a little further up Cape, in hopes of landing myself an elusive brown shark.​

Tight lines,

Ryan Franklin