Dozens of kids and parents arose before dawn Sunday morning to take part in the annual Kids Derby, a featured event of the 67th Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby. The contest is open to youngsters 4 to 14, and takes place at the Oak Bluffs Steamship Authority docks. 

“It’s been stellar, absolutely stellar,” Amy Coffey, who has volunteered at the weigh-in station for over 20 years, said on Thursday afternoon. “We had all four species weighed in from both boat and shore [in the all-tackle divisions], which is unusual for the first week.” Ms. Coffey estimated that it has been five years since the phenomenon last occurred.

‘Tis derby season. In just two days the Vineyard community will undergo a large transformation as the 67th annual Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby, the Island’s annual Olympics for fisherman, begins.

When Martha Smith and her then-boyfriend Charlie began dating 15 years ago, they spent a lot of time at the annual Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby headquarters at the foot of Main street in Edgartown.

She ran the derby headquarters, two hours in the morning and two hours at night, and coordinated the volunteers. He would watch, stepping in occasionally to help. “I hung out at the derby headquarters to be with her,” Mr. Smith said. “I think I was there just about every night.”

An eye-popping derby to be sure but no eyes popped wider than junior angler Chris Morris’s when his key sprung open the padlock that awarded him the 19-foot Boston Whaler complete with a 115-horsepower Mercury motor and a trailer last Sunday at the 2007 62nd annual striped bass and bluefish derby awards ceremony at Outerland.

Chris, with the top shore bluefish, was one of eight division winners lined up on stage with a key and a chance to win either a 2008 Chevy Silverado four by four truck or the fishing boat.

Total catch and catch by species during the 2007 annual Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby recorded large increases over last year’s derby.

The catch was the best since 2004 and among the best in the past eight years for all of the four species.

The total catch of 3,099 fish was 35 per cent higher than in 2006. Compared with 2006, striped bass were up eight per cent, false albacore were up almost 376 per cent, bonito were 204 per cent higher and bluefish nearly four per cent higher.

Aquinnah has opened its heart and its parking spots to derby fishermen.

The Aquinnah selectmen on Friday voted at a hastily called special meeting to open resident-only parking lots to derby fisherman for the duration of the derby after learning that contestants have been avoiding Aquinnah fishing spots for several years because they feared tickets or tows.

Oh boy, what a derby this is.

The second week produced at least two records as eager anglers produced leader changes on a daily basis in most categories.

Discussion of the sheer number of grand slams, including flyrod grand slams and a grand slam on opening day, almost tore the attention of Chris Scott away from a school of false albacore breaking 150 yards away from the weigh-in shed on Monday morning.

Eat your heart out, Nicholas Sparks.

Derby angler Janet Messineo last week found her second message in a bottle from an Island student.

Mr. Sparks’s popular novel by the same name about true love found by a woman who finds a message in a bottle may not be the stuff from which award-winning striped bass are found, but the derby weigh-in station was abuzz Sunday morning when Ms. Messineo popped in with a carefully sealed Snapple bottle enclosing a note.

For the casual fisherman, fishing the Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby is like going from sandlot baseball to the major leagues.

He realizes that a welter of customs, laws of natures, tips and superstitions have developed over centuries of Island fishing and more than six decades of derby competition to create a mind-boggling fishing culture.

This casual fisherman felt that it would take an act of God to prepare him to compete with the best.