Ok. I'm not going to do this everyday once the season opens up which is in two weeks. Already social media is chocked full of ads and invites by charter Captains getting anglers to make a call or drop and email to "get in on the upcoming action". And after March 1st they will be dead bass after dead bass pictures flooding the internet. Mild winter. Water temps up. Fish are here. It's going to be early this year. Now I'm not picking on the boat guys, or the boat Captains, well maybe I am a bit. But here's a little persepctive from a striped-bass-tree-hugger.
My favorite fish, morone saxitalis, is awakening from their winters nap and are starting to feel the urge to procreate. Just a few years old but feeling the urge the striped bass start to move and stage before their trip to their natal waters. For some it's their first time getting their freak on. They'll follow and eat on their way up the rivers to where they will spawn. For the Chesepeake fish hitting the Potomac it'll be a 123 mile ride, the Delaware fish hitting above Philadelpiha about 100 miles, and the Hudson fish, it's a litle further to just below Albany, about 145 miles. When they get the urge to leave their staging areas like the Chesepeake, Delaware and Raritan Bays, they'll travel about 25 miles a day. So in 4-5 days they'll be ready to go, finish up some snacks on herring, shad, bunker and then it's go time. Then they'll stay for a bit and eat, or wait and follow the bait back down, to summer in places off New England or out past the three-mile lione where they'll be safe, at least from the boats.
When the season opens March 1st the anglers in pursuit of striped bass will be out in droves. Things have changed, especially with the mild winters we are now experiencing. No longer is it a fishery for the chair-sitting-chunk-soaker who gets into early fish. For the Raritan Bay angler, and thanks to the Menhaden Defenders and Paul Eidman, we have seen a plethora of bunker in and around the Raritan Bay, and the fish shake off the chill and will eat plugs, rubber bait, spoons, and even flies.
The surfcaster, or really the mudcaster, will watch the tides and pick that path that leads them past the No Tresspassing signs and find that spot-for-two and work hard to catch fish on the right tide. The boat guys will use their electronics, and peer into the depths of the channels to find the bass. They'll follow the other boats and get a helping hand from their bro in the other boats as the cell phone network will come alive for another year. And they'll be bird chasers, something I always liked, when the bass, and maybe blues this year, push the bait into the shallows or up on top.
But back to my girlfriend, or boyfriends, the striped bass. The horny boys, who fit into the slot size of 28-38 inches will come first, along with the some young girls who will flood the tides with pheromones looking to attrach some suitors, followed by the big girls. And then it's game on.
The predator fish will travel around the bay in search of food to fatten up before their journey. And on top of the water the boats will be traveling around the bay looking to find and catch those fish. Let's take a look at one small school of fish, above, that I'll call "The Baker's Dozen". 13 fish ranging from 26 inches to 38 inches. They've been in a school since early February, swimming deep in the Ambrose Channel and venturing out on the warmer days in late February when the 60 degree air temps raise the water temnperatures by a few degrees. After March 1st they've traveled far into the back of the bay where the bait follow the warmer water temperatures and leaving them a few paths of travel to shoot past the Staue of Liberty to start at river mile 0 (zero) heading north.
You and your boys have hired a six-pack Captain to take you out on Tuesday March 7th. You found a Captain that's starting early, way early, compared to years past. It's a good trip. It's your buds. It's a mild day. Good food and drink, (non-alcoholic of course) and the tides are right. During the flip is when you
take a pause and grab a bite and smoke a couple of heaters. The fish aren't up but the screen is lit up with bait and bass below the boat. You know it's bunker they're after so you all tie on the rubber shads and flutter spoons and begin the enjoyable thrill of jigging up bass. The fish start to hit the deck, and the cooler, as the season allows for one fish per angler 28-38". Soon, after May 15th, New Jersey's Bonus Tag season will start, so it's one slot fish and then an extra 24-28 inch fish for the table.
By days end there's 7 fish in the box, one for each of you, and of course the Captain's catch of the day, which makes 7. You and your boys played by the rules, only taking your legal limit, and had a great time doing it. That wittled the school of bass from 13 down to 6. That is one school, under one boat, on one tide, on one day. Throughout the night the school continues it's search for food and makes it's way into the shallows in Perth Amboy and it's there the bloodworm soakers meet just below one
of the fishing peirs. One fish grabs a plug but is quickly released. One unfortunately eats a fat bloodworm and finds itself gasping for air as it slowly dies covered in sand just feet from the waters edge and freedom. And another gets drawn in by the smell of a worm and is taken on a J-hook, which has lodged in the gill rakers and causes a hemorrhage it won't recover from and slowly sinks below the train bridge before becoming crab food.
By sun rise on Wednesday morning the Baker's dozen is down to three fish. They'll meet up and connect with more fish and continue the drive to eat and spawn. By 730 the armada of boats will leave the marinas around the bay, now choked full of boats that usally moor in other marinas found in the Shark and Manasquan Rivers. And today, unless it's a bad weather day, the cycle of seeing rubber and metal teased in front of them will repeat itself.
Maybe they will make it past the Raritan Bay and to the promised land below Albany like they have done for the past four years, or maybe their circle of life will get cut short, like hundreads of thousands of their fellow brothers and sisters will have happen to them in this year, in 2023, in different waters, reaching the same fate for different reasons, but with the same results. Dead bass = less bass.
I am amazed by these fish, Their story of survival, from the perfect conditions needed in terms of flows and salinity in their natal waters that allows the eggs to develop, to poor environmental conditions, to predation from below and above from natural predators, to recreational and commercial fisherman, and then just aging out and passing along, they are a fish that should be better protected, and better respected by one of their biggest enemies, us.
