Well it's that time of year again. Time to look at some numbers, point some fingers, make some false statements on social media, and then go fishing and be part of the problem. We, myself included, are hypocrites. Some more than others, which includes some of my buddies.
It's also that time of year where people get up on their soap boxes and speal about all things, of course that they do or don't do, that has led to the destruction or survival of striped bass. Let's be honest guys, striped bass fishing has gone down the toilet. I've only been in the game since 2009, but I've fished more than some guys have done in 30 years, and I can see the differences from my time up in New England down to around New Jersey, both from a boat and on foot.
So went everyone is talking about are the Young of the Year (YOY) striped bass numbers coming out of the surveys done in the spawning rivers. The biggest producer has been the Chesapeake (top 2024), then the Hudson (above 2023), and lastly the Delaware (New Jersey, 2023 below). You can't have a fishery if there aren't any horny and fertile adults making small babies. But I'll get into that in a minute.
Highest meaning lowest, or bad
I might was well pull out my soap box. So first, let's talk climate. I have seen it first hand since I have moved out to the banks of one of the spawning rivers, the Delaware. I have watched how the springs have gone for five years now. There's no normal progression from season to season anymore. It's 80 degrees in March some days with drought like water levels due to now ice pack in the hills that melts off, then monsoon like weather causing anything within 100 feet of the banks of the river from Camden to Port Jervis to make it's way to the ocean, then cold spells and snow in May. All of those swings and inconsistencies lead to less than favorable spawning conditions, which striped bass need to get their freak on and for the eggs a larvae to survive. Yes, climate something is real. Add to that things like run off and algae blooms and water quality and tiny YOY bass have little chance of survival.
I have put part of the blame on striped bass themselves. Whatever ones are left have changed their rules on engagement. Change in migration patterns, changes in the availability of bait, and where they choose to go-and-stay over the summer and winters, all lead to where we see and hopefully find and catch striped bass. Those "runs", both in the spring and fall, have changed, outside of those days of blitzing bass along the Jersey Shore. "Epic"... is a word that is used ad nauseam when anglers find that acre of bass while in a boat or a stretch on the beach in between the groins where the bass are going
good. Right now the bass are all up in the Lower New York Harbor, from a New Jersey perspective, chewing on baits coming out of the Hudson and East Rivers moving from the Long Island Sound. Some have trickled into the Raritan Bay and a few have hit the beaches. Same thing every year. Anglers drifting eels, which isn't a new thing but is the new thing, is what is getting it done. A few years back it was live lining bunker, then it was drifting mole crabs, now it's all about the eels.
The baits are the baits. In the fall the tiny baits make their move. Anchovies, spearing, mullet, peanut bunker. when and where is the question. But the real question is, and has always been, "Is there anything on them?". I watched this week, along wit the rest of the computer based anglers, as the bunker
made their way in and down the Monmouth and Ocean County beaches. Yes, from time to time I'd see a flash of what looked like bass between the whales and dolphins patrolling the pods. Anglers are throwing plugs and rubbers and even their treble hooks looking to snag and drop a bait under the pods. This year the Barnegat Bay did a nice job growing mules and they had a good run along the jetties and beaches, but outside of a ton of 3-10 pound bluefish it really is a wasted mullet run because I remember when in mid-September it was bass on Snake Flies. And there's no doubt a large problem with out changing landscape at the hands of the wealthy and the politicians. Beach replenishment has no doubt played a large part in the destruction of inshore ecosystems that once held bait and fishes throughout the year.
So that leaves us, man vs beast. How much blame can we put on ourselves? The above pic hit social media this week that got everyone, mostly boat guys, all juiced up that they "are here". While it is a lovely fish I'm not sure that the Catch, Photo, and Release technique we are looking for. "Swam away strong" isn't believable or sustainable anymore. And with the risk of being skewered on social media these days guys won't post, but the bad habits will continue. Just take a trip for fun on the head boats in the days coming up. Horrible fights, horrible netting, deck plops, photos, and then the 20 foot plunge back into the drink. Now that's not to say the beach guys do any better. Sand breaded fish, or fish that
are held up for a picture that look they were caught closer to the parking lot then the water, will be making their way out onto the air, well computer, waves. And if that all makes your stomach turn just show up for one of those early a.m. blitzes when the truck are lining very side street. It can and will just turn you off to the whole thing. I can't even stand to watch the videos because they are just as bad. The over-exagerated excitement of catching a 30 inch fish after making a 20 foot cast into a bloodbath of bass eating bait is getting old......."Dude, this is epic". And if you choose to find solitude a beach or two away, you'll be alone, catch no fish, and just be pissed off as you see the aerial releases being launching between the bent rods of guys mugging each other, most proudly displaying their bass thumbs.
Okay, here's to my spin buds. Your 6/0 rubber shad single hook with a one inch barb that gets swallowed down the gullet, sometimes, has to go. Your circle hook that you're using to transfer your snagged bunker, has to go, or at least the barb. Treble hooks on plugs, have to go. Treble hooks out the back, have to go, fly a flag, you only need the head hook (s). "But I'll catch less fish" ....exactly, well you'll definitely kill less fish. When you're sneaking up to the bunker pods and throwing your one foot
long plugs against the tide and hook a fish, with one treble down the hatch the the other in the ripped lip, or eye, or gill plate, and then fight them for say 100 feet.....c'mon man. Really. Maybe sometimes just throw that same plug with no hook, just to watch it followed and tossed out of the air. Aren't the visuals what it's all about? Or is it the video or photo? And yes, I like fish and fish holding photos like the next person, but done right.
I've talked about seasonal closures. Close down the bays, rivers, and ocean if you must. They do it in the Chesapeake, although it doesn't really help. Make certain days catch and release only. Close down certain days of the week. Don't a lot of these guys hunt as well and know that drill? I can tell you this, I would go all in on closing the Delaware River from April 1st to June 1st, as long as I can "fish" with a fly with no hook. I want to see the eat, the rest you can have. I'm sure every responsible angler out there has some wiggle room in what they are willing to do to help get these fish back on tract.
Commercial fisheries. At least for striped bass- have to go. Not sustainable anymore. Sorry, I guess you will have to start eating that tilapia taken from large tanks over in Vietnam that is sold at Costco. So I guess we'd have to say, well, you can't even cook your own fresh fish because soon you won't be allowed to "take one home for the table". If you want to see what responsible fishing looks like, or shouldn't look like, look at the pics of those six-pack charters coming back from tuna or mahi trips. Do three guys need that many fish? Do they really have that many friends? I know those far out charters cost a pretty penny but c'mon man?
So where are we and where do we go from here. The ASMFC is a joke even though they got some love after going to the 28-31" slot. The do-gooders and groups saw this as a win. I posted early on this is not, while you protect certain year class fish, you decimate others. If you don't admit students into your school for grades 2, 3, 4 how can you look for any graduates in 4, 5, and 6 years? It is just a band-aid to a larger problem. They meet again on May 2nd so they'll have over five months to come up with more addendums to their addendums. The only thing they are are dumb. Remember, like I've always said, fisheries management comes down to two things....money and politics.
I am at the point in my life where everything pisses me off. 3/4 life crotchety old man in the making. This whole striped bass thing is pissing me off. I come up with more excuses, too windy, too hot, too cold, too far, to not go fishing these days then lies to get me down there. These reports coupled with the actions of the people that pursue the striped bas leave me so jaded it turns me off to even wanting to go, which, I guess, saves more fish from the what is now reported as a possible angling mortality rate of 50%. The other day I got rear-ended by a box truck on the New Jersey Turnpike in Newark, yesterday I tattooed a deer at 5 am heading down Route 29 on my way to Newark. I woke up this morning with no covers on and shivering like a baby bird in the nest. Cold season is here and getting old and cold, for me, don't go together.
If they shut down striped bass altogether, and they fired me from Essex County College, and my house were to magically disappear I think I would be good. I'm ready for a change of scenery, life, and even for a new passion, which I could tell you wouldn't be pickleball.
And with all things that piss me off it's that time of year again.....show season. Like Pavlov's dogs we're gearing up for those Cabin Fever busting spend more than you should on stuff you don't need shows. But hey, we do it every year. So this email comes every year. It's The Fly Fishing Show asking me if I'd like to present a seminar in one of the Destination Theaters. At my expense of course.
But I'll be able to "impress and inform future customers" and be "likely (to) book trips on the strength of your presentation, educate customers, sell a product or more copies of your book...". Basically it's a way to draw, entertain, and provide content (for free or at the presenters expense) to the paying customers at the show. That pisses me off today as well. Same shit every year. Bah humbug.
