Help a guy out - Raritan River Fishing

[xDirty]

Ive been trying to catch some small mouth bass with very little success.

Now some of you might ask why the raritan. Well i live in central jersey and its fairly close to me.

I actually follow lardalmighty on youtube and i tried some of the suggestions like Duke Island Park Bikeway, but i got skunked.

Im having a hard time finding these "holes" the fish are in and honestly im pretty clueless when it comes to finding the fish.

I know my lures and equipment are decent, ive done countless hours of research and i use alot of the same lures i see people use on the forums, in person and on youtube.

I would eternally grateful if someone could give me some guidance and show me a few good spots to fish, if possible even GPS coordinates, cause honestly im horrible with directions.

[15FOOTER]

Live bait can always make up for lack of experience. Bucket of shiners, bucket of crayfish and big nitecrawlers. Try the lamington its easier. After you catch one on bait throw the lures to the same pool to figure out what they like and how they like it. Or just beg FASTEDDIE for his secrets lol

[xDirty]

Do you recommend any particular spot of the lamington ? Where can i get access ?

[liveitup1.75liter]

Gotta work for em.. loose lots of lures.. get snagged a ton.. n ull catch em.. work spots n take time learn that stretch of river thoroughly.. and once u got it get ready for a flood that changes everything.. then repeat from top.. good luck!!

[Andrushkin33]

Begging Eddy wont work.

But I hear a twelve pack gets him singing like a canary

In all best advise will be patience and patience. It is easy to loose interest when you getting nothing and don't hear that sweet music of line singing but there is light at the end of the tunnel.

All will come with practice.

Andre

[FASTEDDIE29]

It takes a whole lot of finesse to get them out from there hiding spots especially during the daylight hours. No easy task at all. I haven't hit the river recently but know that the Wolf Pacs Will be forming soon. You really have to change things up quite a bit and think outside the box to get the giant river Smallies to bite. Can't go wrong with tube baits this time of year. Of course there's a plethora of other baits to use but tubing is a great start. Good luck out there!

[AndyS]

HA !! Don't ask me, I float the river and fish for 8 hours and don't catch a thing !!!

[MudCat08]

I've only been to the Raritan twice and the first time i got skunked lol. Second time i caught a decent 16" smallie and a bunch of smaller ones.
I suggest finding a section of the river that parallels the D&R canal and try fishing for smallmouths in the Raritan at any opening you see on the bank. Walk a few miles along the D&R canal path and you're sure to find some decent spots that hold bass. Meanwhile you can also fish the canal for largemouth bass (there are smallmouths in there too) and other cool fish.

[Esox Luciano]

X2 on What Mudcat said. Get on fish. Use search engine on these pages for location to further your research. Pm sent.

[Lard Almighty]

Originally Posted by AndyS

HA !! Don't ask me, I float the river and fish for 8 hours and don't catch a thing !!!

Don't say that Andy, you're the bet tire fisherman I've ever seen.

There's lots of good advice here from the other posters. My best success with river smallies comes from fishing deep pools with soft plastics, mainly grubs, stickworms, or tubes in natural colors. At dawn or dusk I may also throw a topwater popper or walking bait as well. I have some videos on my Youtube channel about fishing the Raritan, you can check them out if you have a few minutes.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOG...XYidJay9irG9Zw