Capt. Ed Noll, the owner/operator of Opus III Charters, is a retired Marine Corps Colonel, aviator. "Recreational and commercial fishing has been my mistress for over 40 years and she has brought me great comfort and joy."

Hey, guys and gals, come to Rhode Island where the bluefish are studs and they're at our back door.

If you're impressed with 12 pound blues I want you to head out to Washington Ledge during July and August and see what many Rhode Islanders think slammers should look like.

Washington Ledge is the frequently referred to - but unmarked area - about 4.5 miles south of Castle Hill. Charter boats from all over Rhode Island descend on the ledge in the fall to catch tautog. During the heat of summer it lays basically unfished except for bluefish fanatics.

The ledge is about three football fields in size around loran LOP# 144196 / 439595 or GPS 41 23.312 / 71 22.072. There are numerous humps in the area with water depths in the 90 to 95 foot range. It will be 105 to 110 feet off the ledge.

You can drift the area, but you'll do better if you anchor up and chum. Chumming for bluefish in 95 feet of water may not seem very productive, especially when your baits are near the bottom. Trust me, its worth the extra effort. Bring a paper sack and some rocks, put the chum in the bag with the rocks, tie it off with some line and drop it to the bottom. A quick jerk on the line and the bag breaks depositing the chum on the bottom or, better yet, break it a few feet above the bottom.

The terminal tackle consists of a 9/0 traditional J style hook swedged to a six inch section of sixty pound, seven strand wire with a 90 pound swivel. To that is attached a 3 foot section of 40 pound mono line snapped to a 2 to 4 ounce drail type sinker (weight dependent on speed of current). You can use a double hook rig and even a double treble hook rig, but I find both excessive and unnecessary. Baited up with 1/3 of a pogie, either the tail, mid section or head and down to the bottom it goes. The bait is than elevated about three feet off the bottom.

Last Summer I took Dr. Carol Jaraki, a world traveler, aviator and ardent angler out to the ledge for some slammer action. We anchored up and set out two twenty-pound outfits. It didn't take long before the first rod went off. Carol spent several minutes running back and forth testing the rod's capability while trying to control the fish. She's an excellent angler and brought the fish to the boat where I netted the still snapping slammer, hooked it to the scale and she released what would be the first of more than a dozen bluefish between 14 and 16 pounds.

As the day progressed, the fish came up higher and higher in the water column, drawn up by the meals regurgitated by the blues we had already caught and the additional chum I dropped in at the surface. Early in the action Carol also boated a nice twenty-two pound striped bass that wasn't scared off by the wire.

On another trip with Jon Isham, his brother and son, we were able to draw the fish to the surface and they caught them with a fly rod. We started fishing deep, and when the fish came higher in the water column I drew them to the surface from the mid- depths by casting a hookless popping plug behind the boat. When the bluefish started hitting the plug I jerked it to the boat, and the fly was cast back to where the plug had been. The action was unbelievable. With the action on the surface we were able to drop down to six pound test tippets and ultra light conventional gear.

While the action at Washington Ledge is fairly consistent it's not the only place to catch big bluefish. Fifteen-pounders are routine along the south shore as well as along the Ocean Drive and the east end of Second Beach. Two years ago Joe Perry, a member of the Newport County Salt Water Fishing Club, set a new club record with a 20 pound bluefish he caught from the shore near Charlestown Breachway.

If catching twelve pound blues on Stellwagon or reading about it excites you, get a real thrill with even bigger fish on lighter gear in your back yard. A 20 foot outboard launched in Newport can be out to Washington ledge in 15 minutes. In July the afternoon winds are from the south so the ride home should be smooth.

Enjoy a fishery that's better than the one you read about in a magazine. Battle that 16 or 18 pound bluefish in Rhode Island waters. Wrestle a mess of real slammers at Washington Ledge.