Sometimes I just ask myself why. Why do I, or we, continue to fish the same waters day after day after day when nothing seems to be around? Because if you stay in the same spot long enough, sometimes for the day, or days, or weeks, or months...eventually a fish will pass bite and bite your offering. I figure if I wait long enough at my regular haunts by October a bass will pass by and eat a fly.
Started today on the beach at 330. Hell, since there's no spot burn I might as well let the cat out of the bag. I started in Spring Lake on a full moon tide. Low water and high water. Well low water these days means no structure in any of the beaches that were replenished, or even north of where the sand was pumped. So I walked the beach and threw a popper basically into the sand. Then I moved to Shark River Inlet fishing the Avon side from inside and around the jetty. On my last stop I hit Deal covering two groins and two beaches without a bump or sight of any bait. Met a guy who had been swimming live eels with a friend since 2am, he could release them back unharmed.
While I was there he stuck the water and it read 67 degrees, so it's starting to warm up a bit from the cool to cold upwelling temperatures. Now, there's bass around, mostly in the back bays and the rivers and being caught during the deep night on bait and lures. Fly rodding is a different story, at least that's what I'm going with.
The bass massacre continues. Remember, when you, or we, get all happy because the bass have shown up, well they just left somewhere where they got pounded, and will leave you and go north, or south, only to get pounded again. We had our shot through the end of June here in New Jersey for the most part before they moved north, where they are getting pounded again.
The killing grounds are now around Montauk where party boats are running two a days catching and killing all the big fish.......where is the ASMFC??? I am starting to sicken over the striped bass and sometimes wonder if I can, but I will, continue to fish for them. The age of the internet allows us to see daily reports of the massacre up and down the East Coast. Below is a picture from a recent night trip with the Viking Fleet out of Montauk, NY.
 |
| Viking Fleet photo |
Yesterday a post was made on Facebook on the Striped Bass page, HERE. The picture (below) was from a recent outing on the charter boat Windy. The lead sentence from the Capt Jack Passie was 'How long will it last." to which I replied, "Till there all gone...."
 |
| Charter boat Windy photo |