Fishing reports: Turd Ferguson helps the new guys

[DarkSkies]

I hear you dark, and if the herring don't come around this winter it will be a long cold one without bass.

Buckethead,,,,fishing in the Winter spoiled me.,...was the most robust fishing I have had in years....

There are no guarantees, but i'm really hoping for a repeat...if it's half as good as it was, I'll be ecstatic.



********
Mullet run 2012 -
In years past the September Full moon (Harvest Moon) has been the one yardstick when the mullet are supposed to leave the bays for the ocean. It doesn't always happen exactly this way. This year is an illustration. Some of the mullet have been streaming down the coast for almost a month now, which is a few weeks early.

Some thoughts -
When I scouted some water on the way home the previous trip, I found none, and was a little disappointed.

The thing that is driving most of the better fishing right now is larger schools of mullet. Although this may seem obvious to some, I say that to indicate that there is a good chance that if you can't find mullet in any larger numbers you may not be able to find fish. The rainfish and spearing are important as well, but in my experience the fish become a little more picky with only these 2 types of small forage... I'm always happier when there are more varieties in the forage mix because it gives you a better chance of catching them on artificials.

[DarkSkies]

I wanted to add a little to this.
I was thinking that Sunday's Harvest moon would have cleared the bay area (Raritan and Barnegat) out of mullet and peanuts.

Did some scouting on the way home after last trip and found this to not be exactly true.
There are many areas that no longer hold bait, so this bay migration to the ocean is happening, albeit a little at a time.

It seems the Barnegat Bay and similar areas have dumped their mullet out faster.
Evidence of this is in the surf line at IBSP and LBI, where you can see steady schools of mullet and the little blues are all over them.

However, this has not happened to as great an extent in Monmouth County...the mullet presence in the surf line there is noticably lighter. At least it was to me when i scouted these areas.








The important thing to note is that the Raritan Bay and NY Bight area is still holding a tremendous amount of bait, spearing, rainfish, mullet, 5" peanut bunker, spot/lafayette, and small porgies, blackfish, and seabass. Even some adult bunker as well.

I look for this bait to stick around awhile, possibly exiting around Columbus Day...or sooner if a severe storm system develops.

If you can do some scouting and know what to look for, you might find some good fish.
All the legal fish and bigger blues I have found so far have been tight to the largest bait concentrations.

[Monty]

The important thing to note is that the Raritan Bay and NY Bight area is still holding a tremendous amount of bait, spearing, rainfish, mullet, 5" peanut bunker, spot/lafayette, and small porgies, blackfish, and seabass. Even some adult bunker as well.

Three out of last four Sundays ocean side I have seen enormous amounts of SMALL bait. Nothing that approaches 5 inches.
I have not been able to identify anything over two inches.

[DarkSkies]

^
That's because it was in a holding pattern in the back bays..and the colder wind and weather is starting to push them out. Good observation, Monty...it's nice to know when you are not catching you are still thinking...on those 9 hour trips of yours.....

[DarkSkies]

Fall Fishing Strategies....
This fall is different. I know some will roll their eyes when I say there are less bass around, but I fish 5 nights a week during the season and this is what I'm seeing, and my logs show.


What works for me is being out there as much as I can and making a lot of sacrifices to do it.


My perception of the fishing in our general NY Bight, S Shore, and North Jersey fishing so far, is that the bass are just starting to show in numbers, making their way down from Montauk, and some finally starting to come down the E River.....


This has been a slow trickle so far.
I still am able to find bass, but spending 5-7 hours at a time at night to do it.


3 nights ago I fished the ocean, 14 bass to 15# on artificials. It was a great night of action for me.,,,because the fish were there, active, but picky......


The next night I was fishing the same general areas for 7 hours, not even a tap. :?
the bass had moved on further down the Coast., Lately I have seen that my catches have come in waves of catching, with a lot of skunking in between.






















In my experience...
Big surf can be an asset IF there is a lot of bait, AND BASS, around, as it can concentrate them.


There are times when the bass, or blues, are just not there, or within reach of surf fishermen.


They could be 1/2 mile out passing through on the migration and we would never know it....


The surf guys need fish to be on the edges, or accessible deepwater rips, or somewhere that offers easy food to bass, to catch numbers of them.




Most often for me, The "pattern" is....one or 2 bass for hours of effort...that's why I say that I see less bass out there....ALL the areas I fish I have caught fish for years there, (in past years) in numbers this time of year.







And I just ain't seeing those numbers without a 5 to 7 hour trip at night.

[DarkSkies]

Some advice,, if you want to take it....


Anyone can catch fish in a blitz, but it takes real thinking to find fish consistently if they are scattered, or not blitzing.....








Thoughts on fall surf fishing for Oct.....


1. As we near the end of the mullet run...the surf bite, has been a consistent 30 minutes to an hour in the morning.


2. Yesterday, pre dawn, I joined a lineup of 40 guys, popular NJ surf spot, because I hadn't caught a fish all night and was so thirsty for a bass, if you know what I mean,,,out of 40 of us fishing a 1/2 mile of beach, a handful of bass were caught, none by me. And where I was, there was no bite in the dark, though I have been getting them in other areas in the dark.


3. Wind and dirty water....
IMO a wind shift can be good if you have no action. If you have good action you don't want the wind to shift, you want that pattern to remain the same.,,,That N/ NE wind ruined the pattern that I had discovered, and killed the fishing in my area.


Also on sunday AM, our water was disgusting....you couldn't even see down 6 inches into the ocean. That has affected the bite, when the fish are scattered.


4. Versatility...
I'm not a bait guy, but sometimes when the water is that dirty a bunker head or clam will bring you the fish. They have an easier time finding that, than an artificial, when the fish are scattered.


5. Scattered fish....
For some of the reasons I went into above, I am seeing the fish to be scattered this time of year in the surf....and that shouldn't be,,,as I said....


To deal with this, I fish more locations, sometimes leaving one area, and fishing 1-2 miles away at another area that seems promising,,,,I have done this 7-8 times a night to get fish,,,but it is tedious and tiring,,,,,hard to keep motivated when you can't seem to find them,,,,,


6, Feeding times...
During the end of the mullet run, unless you can find bass and blues stacked up crashing bait somewhere at night, the most consistent action has been occuring when you were fishing, 30 minutes to an hour around sunrise....


I don't usually fish that time because I want more action than that when I am out there....and it has become hard for me to find, the action at the level I seek.
My best action and biggest fish this year have come from the 12-4am window.


7. Perseverance....
....you should be fishing every chance you have now....and your results should change soon.

[ledhead36]

good post turd. You have to put your time in.

[DarkSkies]

Thanks ledhead....I know Chas, you, and a few others have been fishing bait consistently......


My thoughts on that,,,,,
And for the guys fishing bait, (as much as it pains me to say this..) you may have a better chance of nailing a bigger fish right now, with a bunker head or hunk of clam.....

[DarkSkies]

The Ocean in a lot of NJ areas is in the low 50's. Bass are usually active and aggressive at that temp, but last night I found them to be very sluggish, just bumping the plug. Lots of things that didn't fit a pattern last night. Several fish hooked in the head, quite a few missed fish, and once you missed the hookset they would not come back for it.

My best assessment of this behavior is that with a temp drop of around 8 degrees in 1 week, that has been a shock to their system. You might not notice that if on a boat and come across actively feeding fish, but for the surf bite absent large quantities of bait, these bass are a challenge to catch right now, at least for me......

Remember if you are out fishing at night it's a lot different than the day bite. You may only have one or 2 shots at a quality fish. If you blow it you might just be telling your friends about "the one that got away" instead of having actual proof.

I know this because........

I was that guy last night......














********
For the most consistent surf fishing right now...
There is a 1/2 hour bite now at sunrise. Local tackle shop weighed in a 15. Kicked myself for having missed out on that, but 1/2 hour or hour at a time is just not my style of fishing.,.....it's not enough for me.....


And there is a bite, about an hour, at the end of day, before and up to sundown. If you can't find them by then and don't want to spend all night looking for them, most normal people go home at that point......



Getting it done:

Small swimmers.....
Bombers
Daiwa SP
Teasers
Bucktails

Fish seem to be in the top half of the water column lately foraging for small spearing and rainfish.

[DarkSkies]

"Basically, unless you're fishing clams, the fishing with artificials is poor right now....and the night bite is even worse....
Fishing with clams, however, you could get into some stable schoolie action."

[DarkSkies]

"Basically, unless you're fishing clams, the fishing with artificials is poor right now....and the night bite is even worse....
Fishing with clams, however, you could get into some stable schoolie action."

It really is terrible for this time of year, if you look at historically how it has been. The water has cleaned up from the storms. The migratory fish should be in NJ waters in higher numbers. There was a big body of bass in the Delaware bay, but there should be additional numbers in our local surf, part of the Hudson migratory stock.

By most Capt's accounts, they are not finding them in numbers either.

They are not stacked up in the Hudson yet, or in the NY bight, even the traditional deeper water places and channels where they usually hold.
IMO the colder water in the NY Bight has driven much of the food out of there, and the fish with them.



So where are they?

There is no huge body of fish yet to come from Montauk.
The Moriches, Fire Island bite is slowly diminishing. Many of those fish being caught are schoolies and small keepers.

A lot of bigger fish have taken the offshore route South, and those of us not chasing them in a boat may never see them this late in the season.


The Hudson fish should be here, right at our shores, or at least in the lower reaches of the NY Bight......
And although there are a few of us catching and finding fish,.......most of the better anglers I know have packed it in for the season,......

[DarkSkies]

So my question is,,,,,,Where are the Hudson River Migratory bass, if they are not in this area?...and not pending arrival from Montauk....



I put these things out there not to be negative, but to get folks to look at things realistically.

I'm still fishing.....
I have hope when the herring or bunker finally start to arrive in numbers, we will have a little better bite.





Tackle shops need your business, desperately.......If you're getting the Jones to fish now, you may be disappointed....
OTOH, the tackle shops need your business......

Some of them, without revenue for Nov and Dec, will not be around for next year....
So even if not seriously fishing, you might want to think about going down to your local tackle shops, and just buying something.......I did.....


Food for thought, folks....

[storminsteve]

^^ Thanks for the push about the tackle shops dark. As soon as Giglios is open I will go in there and buy something. Went in to surfside in long branch this week and bought some plugs. The owners name is Jack, nice guy.

[rockhopper]

I'm still fishing.....
I have hope when the herring or bunker finally start to arrive in numbers, we will have a little better bite.

Dark they're getting herrring in Montauk right now and using them in the rips for bass.

Herring at Mecca

Yeah baby!

[DarkSkies]

Thanks for the reports BassBuddah and Rockhopper.....
I keep hoping that herring or some more small bait will arrrive and save the day for this season on the South Shore LI and NJ, but at this point it doesn't seem likely......

Those fish at Montauk could be
1. fish that were pushed out of the Sound during Sandy and will make their way back into the rivers for the Winter once the herring leave......
2. or they could be Hudson fish that never made it down that far yet.......

In any event, not to be negative, but the average size of those fish is being reported as around 10#....and in the big picture there really aren't very many of them, certainly not as many as some are anticipating to arrive on the shores of NJ for a late fall bite......

Hope springs eternal in the mind of the fisherman, so I keep hoping I am wrong.....
And each trip out at night keeps reinforcing what I already know.......fat lady is around the corner.......

[DarkSkies]

"You can't catch what ain't there"........Finchaser, circa 2012.....


The cold dirty water in most of LI and NJ IMO has been a shock to the system of the fish.
The aftermath of Sandy, and the extreme temperature drop. has pushed a lot of the bait out of our immediate area.
Even the smaller bait that I normally see this time of year, bunched up at different areas, is a hit and miss proposition.
I know guys are still optimistic.

I don't want to be the bearer of bad news either (leave that to Finchaser, the King of Gloom and Doom reports) ...but without a presence of enough bait to keep the fish around, the season is winding down much more quickly than last year.

Those who have the same expectations as last year of "more fish coming from the North" are likely to be disappointed, as I just don't see it happening at this time.......

.

[DarkSkies]

Now transitioning to an end of day bite....(for all those who don't want to spend hours at night fruitlessly searching for the bigger fish....AKA needle in haystack fish...)

http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/...ed=1#post63836

[storminsteve]

Yeppers, and they all have diapers on!

[DarkSkies]

**Clams or daytime fishing are your best bet if you want to catch numbers of bass from the surf now...

(Steve, the daytime fish are small, I agree.....)
For those fishing for them,

1. please crush your barbs if fishing plugs or jigs....
2. And use small circle hooks if fishing clams.......
These fish are our future resource and it's best to minimize injury and get them back into the water ASAP.....please think of that if you are taking pics of them as well......

Thanks for reading.....

[DarkSkies]

Late report....
Fished 2 hours Sat night....

There have been some very brief windows to catch the small fish that are left. The larger fish that some of us were catching are gone from all the legal areas.
I wanted to get out earlier, but Sat was a 14 hour work day to catch up on a lot of things I had put aside to go hunt after the fish when they were there.....some who are jealous of that often don't realize the hours we put in, or the other prices we pay, to go after the fish when the bite is hot......

The dark side of fishing thread here is an illustrative example of that.......





Sometimes, even though you know it will be a waste of time, it's good to get out there anyway.....
The solitude to me is a big part of that package of what it means to me to get out there for a few hours.....


Final water temp - 38degrees, crystal clear water.....

**Death comes to the surf zone at those temps and below.....
(Actually, below 42 you really don't have a shot of catching bass on artificials, and below 40 your chances even of catching on bait or worms are less than winning the lottery.....)

http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/...-the-Surf-Zone


The forecast weather for the next 10 days isn't promising.....even friends who have fished clams in the last week have not really had any action.....

Ocean temps are pretty stable this time of year and take a very long time to increase or decrease, absent a storm system.

As previously mentioned, the limited windows are at the end of a very sunny day or 2, when the shallower water can warm up to the 42 degree range. Although possible, that's not likely going forward in the next 2 weeks...

I'll probably give it a rest for a week or so, get the work done that I put off for so long..... and maybe give it a shot during the last weeks of Feb.