Digging Bloodworms

Type: Tidal
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Growing up on the coastal bays of southern New Jersey I was introduced to many of the varied ways that men who worked the bay waters made a living. One day I was talking to an old bay man named Dipper about winter flounder and I was explaining about finding my own bloodworms under waterlogged planks lying on the mud at low tide. He mentioned a hand rake that was stashed in his old shed and talked of the days when he raked bloodworms and sandworms on the tidal flats which he sold to local bait shops and fishermen.

Once retrieved to his kitchen table he began to explain how and where to dig worms as his old hands moved over that the old handle and worn tines. I wondered if this rake may have been handed down to him since it looked so old and worn, that day Dipper chose to hand it down to me. To this day I remember my cherished times with Dipper at that kitchen table. I was to find out a few years later from a local decoy carver that Dipper got his nickname from his habit of checking other people�s traps and removing the muskrats. Dipper also taught me the ways of running eel pots that had many financial rewards in my teenage years.

I practiced with my new rake and one thing for sure it was a very muddy business digging for worms on the mud flats. During the warmer months the prize to be found were large bloodworms and sandworms often about 10� or more in length. These were either slow trolled on a worm rig called a June bug rig or drifted in the inlet on a summer night for striped bass. I was invited on many evening fishing trips near the inlets by older men who appreciated my supplying the large bass worms. I learned a lot of early lessons about fishing for striped bass from those men.

Where I grew up, winter flounder were the first saltwater harbinger of spring and they provided many a tasty addition to family meals in late winter/early spring, much like our yellow perch spawning runs here in Maryland. They are much thicker than our familiar summer flounder and have a pucker type mouth. They would congregate in late winter/early spring in the coastal bays near the inlets prior to spawning. They would typically be caught on bloodworms and the fishery is very active in the New England states, they are not common south of the Delaware Bay.

When early spring came, I set about exploring my best worm sites in my cherished Sears, Official Ted Williams hip boots, my rake and a bucket. Often there would be a mix of bloodworms and sandworms of various sizes and an interesting worm that had U shaped burrows called acorn worms, all were good winter flounder bait. The worms would be in a muddy soupy mess in the bucket so I soon learned to wash them in salt water and place them in rock weed to keep them wet and cool.

When fishing for winter flounder you would anchor up your row boat in what was thought to be a good spot and try to stir up the bottom with a long pole or a grapple to cause a plume of mud to drift down current, this would attract the flounder. Some would try using cat food or clams in a weighted wire chum container on the bottom and others fished from piers. I always felt my method worked best which often showed by my success. The mouth on a winter flounder is small since they mostly eat benthic worms so a narrow gapped hook called a Chestertown style was used and often on a spreader bar so you could use two hooks.