By Mike Busch

Sunday morning massive schools of Bunker (Menhaden) could be seen right off the beach in front of Davis Park and according to other reports,  up and down the entire South Shore of Long Island.

These oily fish are considered the most important forage fish along the East Coast and have made a nice recovery after overfishing decimated the fishery.  We have covered the importance of bunker here before with several features late last Fall.

From the beach the pods were clearly visible, along with a few Bottlenose dolphins swimming near the schools.

To get a better vantage point I launched my drone around 10:30 a.m. and took a short flight over the schools.

Look for some a mystery fish attack the pad at the 20 second mark, and Bottlenose Dolphins at the 1:54 and 2:54 feeding and swimming near the schools.

Below are images and video taken Sunday 8-6-2017.

I suspect this a Bottlenose Dolphin on his side crashing the bait pod below but can’t be sure.

Around noon you could see some kind of feeding frenzy.  I re-launched the drone but a passing boat ended the blitz.  The new Surf Cam on the Davis Park Casino picked up some of the action.

 

More images on pages 2 and 3