Killing It in the Nor'easter

 

The wooden egg float with a bucktail jig was the
hot combo this evening in the rough water.

I had a big day today in the howling wind, rain and high surf.  While the monster waves were breaking as far out as I could see, the stripers were, at times, right near my feet.  They were going nuts in the white water in close, blasting away at big schools of peanut bunker that were being driven right onto the shallows.  I even saw some peanuts wash up onto the sand where I was fishing. The birds were also going nuts picking the bait up from above while the stripers blasted them from below.  It was truly and all out blitz in the midst of this nor'easter.

Upon arriving at my location, I snapped on my wooden egg float along with my half ounce bucktail, a great combo top use when the stripers are on peanuts.  First cast into the melee I had a hefty schoolie.  And that pretty much set the tone for the rest of the evening.  It was a fish or a hit on just about every cast for over an hour before the bait and fish moved on.  All the fish today were hefty schoolies in the 22 to 26 inch range.

I would advise to proceed with caution if you get out and fish in the coming days.  It is VERY rough and dangerous with a big surge of water coming in. I was standing on dry shore today casting.  Most rocky drop offs are way to dangerous to fish right now.

Lights Out Fishing for Slots/ Over Slots

 I had two of the best back to back days that I've had in a long time. It was a bonanza of big stripers with nearly all the dozens of fish that I landed being slots and even overslots.  There's been a shortage of these larger fish all fall, but not in the last two days.  I saw blitz after blitz of stripers smashing through massive schools of small bay anchovies that were one to two inches long.  At times the water was brown with them in massive schools the size of a school gym.

Given the size of the bait, the stripers were incredible fussy and most of the fishermen throwing big plugs caught nothing, even when tossing into a mass of breaking fish. It was a finesse game.  Two things were working for me.  The first day, the float and fly ruled.  I was using a pink Deceiver. On the second day, they did not go for my float and fly trick so I snapped on a white Albie Snax.  That did it and got me lots of hits and fish. I used a slow retrieve with twitches of the rod tip along with a stop every so often.  As I've stated many times, a lot of hits come on the stop.

An interesting weekend is lining up before we get battered with another big storm. Tomorrow's weather seems to be ok but then all goes downhill for Sunday with rain, wind and BIG seas coming our way. Monday is forecasted to be very stormy with high NE winds along with massive waves hitting the shore.  If you are going to get your fishing in the Columbus Day weekend, tomorrow looks like the better of the two days.

Stripers on Small Bait Driving Fishermen Nuts

 We are in this pattern of a lot of small bait along the oceanfront.  I'm talking one to two inch bay anchovies.  Albies, stripers and blues are feeding on them.  When they are on the small stuff, they can get mighty picky, and that's what's going on right now.  

The larger bait, peanut bunker, is generally holed up in the backwaters and in the Bay.  It just doesn't seem to want to come out.  When it does, the fish will get far more aggressive.  The other larger bait that we often see at this time of year is mullet. I've seen very little of this bait so far this year. The stripers get super aggressive when on this bait and will hit a variety of mid size plugs.

When bay anchovies are around, I've had my best luck catching stripers on a wooden egg float and a fly, something I have written a lot about.  The fly I have been using is a pink Deceiver. That fly is running about three feet off the float with a Varivas fluoro 35 lb. test leader. Judging by what I see being caught around me, my float and fly is your best bet right now to catch stripers and even albies (when you see them feeding on top) when these fish are keyed on small bait.

Take a look at this video clip of stripers foraging under schools of bay anchovies.  It is typical of what's been going on in the past couple of weeks:

Big Waves Pound the Coast

 Here we go again with another round of hurricane waves just pounding the south shore coastline. I did fish yesterday in it, and I must say it was quite dangerous and unfishable in some places. I finally found a place that was fishable and safe and ended up doing quite well fishing a float and jig in the white water. I landed a good number of slot fish. So, the fish are still around, but use extreme caution if you get out in the coming days.