Ocean Fishing / Striped Bass Report Card

[Michael82929]

Charter boat captain, headboat captains, old saltz.. lend me your ears.....

Get on your soapboxes and mail in your .02 cents....

Lets hear it.....Want to see if mind are thinking alike or if I can learn something new today...

As we all know the spring migration / ocean fishing has not meet the expectation for a majority of anglers who target fishing for striped bass along the ocean coast of NJ.

From my observations, weather has played an intrical part of this seasons bass fishing. The bait situtation has also not been to my liking based on past seasons.

Can't say the fishing pressure has been a major factor with a lot of boats still in dry dock.

Are we starting to feel the pinch of yrs of putting a beat down on these monster fish?

While I am not throwing in the towel, since we have another 30 days of evidence to gather, I feel like we are at the midpoint.

I would appreciate peoples feedback and theories on this year spring season. This thread is intended for mature audiences, let keep this objective and not intended to negatively impact people comments.

[Ol Pedro]

Bottom line for me is if you can't make live bait on the ocean side and there isn't a clam bite up by the hook then the Big Boats are out of the game . Also we have seen Sand Eels offshore outside of the line over the weekend. Weather has either scattered the bait inside the line or kept us in port . I had a Great Day and a good day in May but the rest has sucked .

[O'Connor]

Four years? It has been more like ten that these big fish/bunker bites have occurred. Before I left NJ the old timers said it was better then the 70's which was the "good old days" The old timers also warned of repeating the mistakes of their generation. People will tell you that rod/reel cannot impact overall bass stocks, but I do not believe that to be true. I remember one day going back about 8 years that the whole shark river inlet had 25lb-God knows how big bass stacked up from the jetty tips all the way back to the main street bridge. I estimate there were 250 25 plus pound fish taken that tide. Events like this must have an impact...and this is not the only example.


I am not a catch and release nut, nor am I a doom and gloom person. It could continue, but I believe the end is near....events like this just cannot keep repeating.. Striped bass are not supposed to be that easy to catch. The younger guys will be talking to their grand kids about the days of ten 30 lbers in an afternoon of fishing...

maybe it is time to learn how to plug the jetties again, fish shedder crabs in the summer, rig eels, jig bucktails on wire on the spots up north of sri etc. You will have less but better striped bass fisherman. in the process maybe the striped bass will gain it's respect back...right now it is a bucket fish like a porgy or ling...that comes because it was too easy.

[Gerry Zagorski]

I think we've been lucky and spoiled the previous 2 springs which was insane fishing. This spring has been a more typical one and I think it has a lot to do with the water temps and the path of the migrating fish.

I believe the fish we've seen in our area are the resident fish/Hudson spawners. The crazy fishing we had the past few springs well into June were the migrating fish that simply stop by and feed along their migration and this year they might have passed us by.

I'm certainly no expert so I hope others will chime in here.

[muskynut]

Think about it.....every day a multitude of party/private boats target these migrating fish. Most people keep their limit.....some are released but most are kept. You do this every day.....and you are in for problems. I've read that the young of the year index from samples is excruciatingly low.....if we don't change our ways we are headed for another stock collapse and a moratorium like in the 80's. Capt. Dave

[RnK]

Originally Posted by Ol Pedro

Bottom line for me is if you can't make live bait on the ocean side and there isn't a clam bite up by the hook then the Big Boats are out of the game . Also we have seen Sand Eels offshore outside of the line over the weekend. Weather has either scattered the bait inside the line or kept us in port . I had a Great Day and a good day in May but the rest has sucked .

My sentiments and experience exactly. Terrible Spring except for Raritan Bay. It's always all about the bait. no bait, no fish.

Literally acres of bunker last year kept stripers here for a long time close off our coast as they migrated north. Actually, too much bait made them harder to catch, as they gorged every cpl days and as there was so much to eat that when they went on a binge it was over quickly too.

2011 was ideal, plenty of bunker, plenty of bass, always some bite happening somewhere north or south of MI. Very few bad trips, everyone caught.

This year with the bunker very thin along our coast, except for in RB, and with sand eels very thick beyond the line, the migration moved fast past NJ-NY. Cape Cod seems to be having a very good striper run this Spring from what I hear.

[Michael82929]

Agree on the bait theory, if you have acres of baits offshore, why come inshore on limited bait access unless you get pushed off the bait by someone bigger in the food chain.. no????

The only silver lining to this spring was seeing a dramatic change in the fishing inside raritan bay...

[jigman90]

well I havnt fished for stripers this year as my boat is for sale but if you think the bunker reduction boats dont have a hand in this well your wrong and how about all the commercial boats that killed all the big bass down south!
Ive been commenting on the same thing for the last 3 years about loss of bunker mean loss of stripers and next it will be blues!
I didnt walk in Washington AND WILL NEVER WALK NEXT TO A COMMERCIAL GUY!

What you all dont realize is commercial fishing isnt like it was 15-30 years ago! high tech equipment, radar, use of planes are rapeing our oceans!
it sucks for the little guy that commercialy fishes, but until the regs and enforcement of the regs can be controled our fishing will get worse and worse! so you must lump all commercial fishing together!
as for the stripers I love to fish for them but our days are numbered again!

[paparalph]

Originally Posted by Michael82929

Charter boat captain, headboat captains, old saltz.. lend me your ears.....

Get on your soapboxes and mail in your .02 cents....

Lets hear it.....Want to see if mind are thinking alike or if I can learn something new today...

As we all know the spring migration / ocean fishing has not meet the expectation for a majority of anglers who target fishing for striped bass along the ocean coast of NJ.

From my observations, weather has played an intrical part of this seasons bass fishing. The bait situtation has also not been to my liking based on past seasons.

Can't say the fishing pressure has been a major factor with a lot of boats still in dry dock.

Are we starting to feel the pinch of yrs of putting a beat down on these monster fish?

While I am not throwing in the towel, since we have another 30 days of evidence to gather, I feel like we are at the midpoint.

I would appreciate peoples feedback and theories on this year spring season. This thread is intended for mature audiences, let keep this objective and not intended to negatively impact people comments.

So here we go. I am 64 years old and have seen the complete story of our striped bass fishing. I raked calico's and shed them in my basement then into the icecube trays for a morning of summer bassing. I've plugged the coast from Martha's Vineyard to South Jersey. I hand tied my eels for the evening bites down the beach.
Four years ago as I started seeing and reading about the bunker slaughter of our breed stock I hung up my rod and reels and started freshwater fishing for Largemouth Bass. I think it's a crime how as fisherman we need to kill our breed stock for some pictures at the dock. It was great when an 18" fish went home for the table. It is probably to late to undo the damage done, guess we shall see the closure of these fish in the not to distant future.
As for me, I will stick to freshwater.

[Capt Sal]

Ten years ago we did not go ocean side until June 10 !!!!!We are one week late and the water is just approaching the perfect temp.We need more west wind and more bunker schools.It is hardly over.I am sure we will be catching stripers into July.I keep log books for this reason.Why are the bass still in the bay?The water temp in Raritan Bay is 10 degrees different than this time last year.It is not rocket science lol