I just love this shot Leif took of his son Lief, I think that's how you spell their names, looking towards the water as he walks the beach in Asbury Park. It just reinforces my belief that some of the best fly fishing images don't even have a fish in the frame. Monmouth County was slow today but what I hear it was all good in the snot in Ocean County. Adult bunker and adult bass, bigger ones, then we saw yesterday. While I was tempted to go I just couldn't. A few months back I made the trek to Scranton and picked up four new rims for the Silverado. Alloy rims, with covers, and decent Cooper AT3's.
I cleaned them, two better than the other two, and today Lauren said I could come by after her work and she and Brandon could swap them out. That plus an oil change was enough for me to pass on the ride south. Yesterday I saw more fish harvested then I had seen in a while. Couple that with the head and charter boats and their clients "keeping one for the table" and using the slot Bonus Tag and there's a lot of dead bass going on. We are hammering down on whats left of the 2014-2016 year
classes of fish. Remember that's just now in New Jersey, they still have to hit points south, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia. These 26-36 inch fish aren't all males, yes, a young female has to be those sizes as she gets mature and egg producing. Couple all of that with some shitty releases and snag and drop and the recreational mortality, they say it's 9% will be a lot higher. If you need to figure out your catches age and year class use the chart below for reference.
