It's still on.
Reports of it being over have been greatly exaggerated…
First, shop news.
We received some new gliders. These are from SaltyC’s Plugs. They are 5 inches long and 2.5 oz. They are currently available only in store, but if you ask nicely on the contact us page, we will ship them to you.
We reloaded on Charlie Graves tins. These are the original classic tin, and still catch fish like crazy today. We have restocked the brick & mortar and the online store. We also have a few new models, available right now in store, and available very soon in the online store.
We have been keeping our bait guy very, very busy. Why? Well, on to the report…
The striped bass fishing has been very good. It’s not red hot fishing, but it is awfully good fishing. We are still seeing lots of big (i.e. over the slot limit) bass being caught. Fresh bunker is the prime bait for them, with the bunker heads getting the biggest fish.
We have also seen an invasion of spiny dogfish being landed by the guys fishing bunker. Be careful unhooking these fish. Unlike smooth dogs, they have teeth, and they are called SPINY dogfish for a reason. The easiest way to tell the difference at a glance are the small white spots on the side of a spiny dogfish.
Don’t want to deal with spinys? Fish with lures. The guys fishing lures haven’t been doing quite as well on the big bass, but they have still been successful. Metal lipped swimmers, pencil poppers, large SP Minnows, and large Mag Darters have been working.
A good sign for the rest of the season is that some anglers have been picking up some smaller schoolie sized bass? How is that a good sign? They are getting them on lures that resemble sand eels, which is a great sign for a good, long fall/winter run of striped bass.
And finally, striped bass isn’t the only story this past weekend. The blackfish fishery is still going strong in the backwaters and nearshore wrecks and rockpiles. On November 16th, the season opens to 5 fish per anger (from the current 1 per angler). We have all the tog tackle you need, including S&S whitechin wrecker jigs..
Here are some of the notable catches from this weekend.
@jmatise sent us this picture of a surf caught bass on a bunker chunk from Saturday.
Steve Hosack sent in this picture of a striped bass he landed in the surf on Saturday using a metal lip swimmer under conditions not perfectly suited for such a plug.
On Saturday, we also had a traditional weigh in. Nate Cornell landed this 35 inch, 14.85 pound striped bass on a metal lipped swimmer. He also released a much larger one. To sweeten the bag he added a 4.85 pound blackfish.
In the surf on Sunday we got word of some smaller bass hitting teasers. Here is one of the many Allen Gonzalez got Sunday morning.
The schoolies were also falling for plastic swimming plugs. Sean Morelli found the schoolies down by the inlet, and this one fell for a swarter.
Durim Murzo also got in on the action. This bass fell for a Yo-Zuri Mag Darter.
The big fish did not leave on Sunday, however. Andrew from Blue Falcon Plugs sent in this picture of his son with a 42.5 inch striped bass landed on a bunker head Sunday evening just after dark.
Not all fish were caught from the sand. Jamie and John Budish got out on their boat Saturday and trolled up some “overs”. They fell for both bunker spoons and mojo rigs. The color du jour was chartreuse.
On Sunday, Nicole Ertle landed this bass out in the fleet. Nice stylish hat Nicole.
With all the good news this weekend Ray is, well, you’ll see…
