Well, well, well. Sitting here at 0641 a.m. after convincing myself not to take the drive at 0445 when I woke up. Nice day yesterday, blah, blah, blah. A few nights ago one of the slides in my presentation at Orvis Princeton was regarding The X Factors when it comes to fly fishing for striped bass.
In a pretty basic way I described how factors like moon phases, tides, big fall weather, wind, and time of day affect how bait and bass settle, move, eat, or don't eat. In that weather tidbit I also discussed barometric pressure and how the rise and fall of that can really have the fish with locked lips or the feed bag strapped on.
So, by chance, well not really chance, did yesterdays bite, and the building bite through the week, have anything to do with the current moon phase? Of course it did. But what's funny is most anglers just think about the moon phases when they see the moon in the sky, like during a Full or Supermoon phase. The last Supermoon we had was a few weeks back on September's Harvest Moon.
I am no moon phase expert. But ironically last night I went and picked out a book to read to put me to sleep (no disrespect) after a long days fishing. It was Kenny Abrames book, Striper Moon, which was next to Peter Kaminsky's book, The Moon Pulled Up and Acre of Bass. Mmmm, think the moon has anything to do with striped bass fishing?
So, I knew that moons affect fishing. I even knew a little about the moon phases and how they affect the tides. But did I really understand it looking at diagrams like the above. They're great diagrams, that from Encyclopedia Brittanica, but I needed to see it better, that's when I went to You Tube, below...
And there you go. No need to for me to try and stumble through it. That visual explanation really worked. Now let's look at what happened this week and yesterday.
Yesterday, Saturday October 14th was the New Moon. A New Moon and Full Moon have the same effect on the gravitational pull, or gravity that affects things like tides and their height and current, in effect more or less moving water. So this week we had a "building" waning crescent moon phase until the New Moon yesterday. This past week was kind of like last year when we had big bass on bait around the New Moon of October which went off more south at first and then more north. I'm talking about ocean side fish, not the ones, even the big ones, sticking in the back bays and eating the bait before following them out.
What I think has happened is we have started to see the bait really pull out of the bays and rivers and is now out front. Tracking all of this bait movement through a few weeks of storms was difficult. But yesterday I saw some things that made me think about what is going on what could be coming.
So bait moves when the water temps tell them to, or not, and when the moon phase and tides line up for that push. You can learn more from NASA on moon phases and tidal effect, HERE. Yesterday we had peanut bunker along, not necessarily on, the beaches followed by adult bunker. Peanuts coming from the back and basically adult bunker enjoying the ocean out a bit. The New Moon no doubt had something to get these fish active to begin their own migration.
Each year we try and figure out what is going to happen in the fall and early winter. For years we have been dialed into thinking that bunker are what it's all about, outside of the lame mullet run and the white bait, spearing and bay anchovies, that provide steady snacks for the bass, blues and albies. But what would happen to our lives if things occurred differently each year? Like if the October moons, say this year, was the time when the bait emptied and what bass are around are it, or the majority of it, meaning the fall run? Mmmmm.
When I went to Belmar yesterday and what I saw really made me think. Has that majority of the bait poured out already. So there were boats, an armada of every type and size you could imagine. Hooking up on fish a hundred feet or so from each other, yeah that's fun. Same baits, same marks, same spots, same fish. Okay, I'm not a boat hater.
But what I saw was a line of "current" on the ebb tide emptying out of the Shark River and moving south, with no doubt a little help from the NE wind. And in that "slick" were the birds. Flocked up and picking here and there between all the boats. So did that occur for no reason? I don't think so.
I think, and it was yesterday and has been like that below the Manasquan Inlet and at the top of Sandy Hook for a good weekor so, that this moon has been a very important one for 2023. The September Harvest Moon, which we know is a good moon, was camouflaged in those big blows and storms we had. Now some may read this and say, "Yeah, Colin, some genius you are with your stupid maps and theories. Bait comes out and heads south. Big deal". And yes they may be right, I didn't discover shit. But couple the above scenario, like it has done this week, at the Barnegat Inlet and over along New York as the catching has been real good where the Long Island Sound, Jamaica Bay and the Great South Bay empty into the ocean. The October New Moon of 2023 was the start of the fall run for sure.
And now lets talk about the bait this fall. Is there alot of it? Where is it? Most importantly is it still here. Just like the striped bass, bait, let's say bunker don't ALL leave during the winter. Bunker are in the bays and river all winter. So while a lot of bait empties, not all of it does.
I have been disappointed in the amount of bait I have personally seen in the back of the bays and rivers this late summer into fall. Bait, yes. Loaded?, not so much. Now there is a ton of bait still in all the bays and rivers, but it's hasn't been like I've seen it in the past few years. And if there is less now, did a bunch of it move in the last week or so?
The action along the beaches, of course better for the boats, are the first signs of the fall run. Catching fish in the back isn't a fall run, run means moving, fall runs means moving south. Some may say what we are seeing is right on schedule, big bass early on bunker, but the peanuts? That made me
think. I think of big bass on adult bunker, out front and in recent years out back, but the peanuts a later push on the bigger biomass of fish making the run. And again, that "run" doesn't have to be heading south to winter over in Virginia as fish heading down from New England may just be the ones to winter over in the Raritan and New York Bays and the Hudson and larger rivers in the tri-state area.
For the past few years we have settled into that routine. First push of big bass, then a lull, which may coincide with hunting and fall football, and then a November, used to be late October, where the bait would empty and the bass in big numbers would show up, more in quantity than quality, although any bass is a good bass, at least to me. But each year is different, while it really all remains the same.
And that brings me to the above, the beloved sand eel, a fish, yes it's a fish, that can come and make the fall and winter a truly extended season of solid striped bass fishing. They're not moving south to north along the beaches, the move east and west, and they stick, and the bass sticks with as long as they do. I'm hearing of sand eels being washed up on the beach, good ones, like those 5-6 inch Slim Jim sized snacks.
So watch your tides and moon phases, today we're one day closer to the next Full Moon, which is on October 28th. It's called the Hunter's Moon. So make your plans now because if the moons matter then you can see good things happen when the moons are close and the tidal bulges happen.
