A November Oasis: Late-Season Action At Coxes Ledge - The Fisherman

A November Oasis: Late-Season Action At Coxes Ledge

pick
Picking your days in November is almost certain to put you on some codfish at Coxes Ledge.

Find a weather window and fish for a wide variety of species at Coxes Ledge!

When I was starting to drive, in the mid-1970’s, I would often head out to Montauk Point to fish on The Viking, a large and popular party boat. The target species was cod and the destination was usually Coxes Ledge.  Back then the average cod was well over 20 pounds and the pool winner was usually well over 40 pounds.

These days it’s rare to see such cod, but they are there for the taking under the right conditions. Coxes offers a variety of bottom structures such as wrecks, rock piles and gravel beds. The habitat itself is a magnet for many species, but its location, in between Block Island and Martha’s Vineyard, is along the highway of choice for migrating and residing/feeding fish of many species.  Depths vary from as shallow as 90 feet to as deep as 160. I suggest you try to find structure, as that is where fish concentrate on the ledge in general. In addition to the rocks and hard bottom, there are many well-marked wrecks on the charts of the area.

Cod At Coxes

If fall cod are in your sights you can easily target Coxes Ledge with a small boat on a calm day.  As with any type of offshore fishing, know your boat and your abilities before venturing so far from home because “rescue” may or may not be available! I have gone to Coxes Ledge many times out of Montauk, and later out of Point Judith in a 23-foot boat. Newport and Westport are both closer than Montauk and make for an easier ride, especially to the north edge of Coxes which is situated fewer than 20 miles from either of these ports. The south edge of Coxes can be an additional 10 mile run (each way) so keep that in mind. If the wind is out of the north, it may “seem fine” on the ride out but getting back can be a different story altogether. Keep your eye on the weather and be sure you can make it back safely!

I like drifting and jigging when the conditions allow for it. Winds of less than 10 mph allow you to get down with a 17-ounce jig (or smaller) and I like to put a dropper fly or just a 5/0 bare hook (Gamakatsu baitholder) about 18 inches above the jig. The bare hook gets a soft plastic about 6 inches long and in a dark color to imitate a sand eel (same for the dropper fly, with blue or red being the most consistent colors).

Note that if you are in the right place, there will be rocks and if you make a habit out of smacking the bottom with your jig on every down-stroke, you will lose many jigs and have a pretty miserable day! Once you hit the bottom, be sure to reel up two or three turns before getting busy with the jigging. If you are using the soft plastics, remember to check often for small fish hits that pull the plastic down off the shank of the hook. Fix it as needed to make it hang straight.

bonito
Sometimes bonito will take a deep jig on the bottom.

Drifting & Anchoring

Also worth mentioning about the jigging is when the wind and/or the tide are a little too much you can put out a good, high quality drift sock/drift anchor to control your drift which will allow you to use smaller jigs.  Just remember to bring the thing into the boat before you run up for another drift (I’ve made that mistake!)  In lieu of a drift sock, if you have a trolling motor you can often use that to regulate your drift speed too. Whether drifting with or without “enhancements”, be ready to put a mark on your GPS when you hook a good fish or go over some interesting structure. A series of boulders in the middle of nowhere is a hot spot waiting to be fished!

So let’s say you get a hit each time you go over a boulder and you want to concentrate on that spot? You can anchor up tide of the rock and let out anchor line until you are 20 to 30 feet ahead of the mark. Put on bait rigs and the appropriate sinker size (8 to 20 ounces, depending on how hard the current is running). Bait with clams and send them down! I use the same 5/0 baitholder hooks on a high/low rig. It is simple and effective and if you lose it, it’s relatively easy to replace.  If you are not catching after 10 minutes, make sure you are lined up with your mark.

A couple of things to try if you need “adjustment” is you put your anchor line on a forward/side cleat. Never anchor on a mid/side cleat, you can sink your boat! If you want the boat to be “influenced” to the port, put the anchor to the starboard forward cleat and vice versa for the other way. You get about a 5% push in the direction you want by doing that and with 300 to 400 feet of anchor line out that means 15 to 20 feet of adjustment as needed. Cocking your steering wheel to either side adds or takes away from the adjustment too.

Species Roundup

If you’re bait fishing on Coxes Ledge and you are getting some smaller bites that are not cunners, scup or sea bass, you may want to try some 1/0 hooks baited with clam for flounder. Drifting with the baited rigs over mud or gravel bottom out there is also effective for cod, flounder, sea bass (closed season if landing in Massachusetts), giant scup, blackfish, monkfish and more. Over the years my clients have caught all that and many more species such as triggerfish, mahi, bonito (yes, on the bottom, 125 feet down), haddock, hake (silver, red and mud hake), fluke, blues, weakfish, several species of sculpins, all kinds of sharks and the occasional tuna.

If you are fishing good bottom, you will probably be catching some large cunners (some call them bergal, sea perch, etc.). They make for excellent eating and are some of my customer’s favorite fish to eat. They are too boney for my liking, but one of my friends prefers to eat cunners, even over sea bass! And, some of the world’s largest scup inhabit Coxes Ledge so be prepared for whatever she has to give you on any particular day to make the most out of your trip.

coxes
Bigger cod are showing up with greater regularity now, adding some extra excitement to these trips.

Finding The Ledge

“As a guideline” you can get on the middle of Coxes Ledge by heading 140T out of Point Judith for about 20 nautical miles, 21 NM out of Newport at 160T, 18 NM out of Sakonnet at 170T and 19 miles out of the Westport River at about 185T.  The windmill companies have moved a lot of boulders around and some of the best areas of habitat have changed so you and I will all be looking for new places to fish out there, especially if you want to fish around the middle of the ledge. For now it seems that they left the rocks alone that are on the northern and southern edges but that could change as they seem to be expanding the area of wind turbines each time I go out there.

Be sure to have a landing net aboard that can handle a 20-pound fish (or more). Current regulations allow for five cod per person, 23 inches and up from through December 31. Current regulations state that these cod regs continue into the new year, through the end of May, as well but that could change when the 2025 regulations become available. Black sea bass can be retained, three per person with a minimum size of 16.5 inches, if you are landing in Rhode Island as well. Not if you are landing in Massachusetts where the sea bass season closed back in early September.

Again, I can’t stress enough that you don’t take unnecessary chances with the weather, especially in November. It’s a long ride and the weather can change on a dime. Pick a good weather day, and the fishing can be awesome. Be safe and good luck!

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