My whole life I’ve been visiting the Rockaway Peninsula and also its bay but this year I’ve been back and forth quite a lot because of my new pandemic hobby….fishing! My girlfriend Cait and I are doing our best to become expert anglers and although we pull up seaweed almost exclusively we are really enjoying spending evenings by the water. Fishing has brought me closer to the lively Jamaica Bay with its radiant sunsets, culture of anglers, clammers, and crabbers, and it's natural beauty. It’s not all lovely though. The shores of Jamaica Bay in all of their beauty are marred by ever present trash, and a pollution/sewage problem that is bad for all of the life here including the humans who want to use, enjoy, and live on the bay (as highlighted by the documentary "Saving Jamaica Bay", available on Amazon Prime.) Here’s a collection of recent photos from Jamaica Bay. As stated in the documentary, I don’t see how anyone could spend time here and not become an ally of the Bay.
At nighttime, men come out with cast nets underneath the bridge to catch bait fish. Jamaica Bay, Queens New York.
Man throwing a cast net.
Men dragging a seine net onto the beach.
Women netting for clams.
Using a seine net is a two man job. One man walks closer to shore while another wades out waist deep. They’ll drag it parallel to the shore before quickly closing it and dragging it to shore.
When the tide is low, fishermen opt to wade out where they can reach deeper waters with their cast.
A big cast from a waist deep angler.
Men checking their crab trap.
Dragging the seine net to shore.
Men checking their seine net catch.