Springtime in the Salt
Each spring, the waters off the north and central New Jersey coast come alive with bluefish, weakfish, and trophy striped bass. Anglers from across the tri-state area come to fish New Jersey because they know you don’t have to wait until fall to catch blues and trophy stripers. In the last two seasons, more big stripers were caught in May and June than later in the season.
The New Jersey season begins in early April, but you can’t catch fish everywhere. To catch bass in April, you must concentrate your efforts in the back bays, estuaries, tidal rivers, creek mouths, and flats.
The water warms relatively quickly in these shallow areas and awakens many mud-dwelling invertebrates that were buried during the winter. Baitfish such as herring, bunker, silversides (spearing), sand eels, killies, and bay anchovies also re-appear on the scene. These arrivals of bait coincide with the migrating striped bass, bluefish, and weakfish as they move north along the New Jersey coast.
Before you take your first cast in the early spring, look for water 50 degrees F. or warmer. While wading, carry a thermometer and check water temperatures frequently. On our boats, we pay close attention to the temperature sensor. Big fish seek warm water, and so do we.
Runoff from spring rain adds warmer water to the bays where it enters through rivers, creeks, and streams. You should also fish near warmwater discharges from power plants. In early spring, the creeks carrying warm water from the plants into the bay are often 10 to 15 degrees warmer than the surrounding bay. These areas can be fish magnets, and when the fish congregate, they take flies greedily.
Resident Bass
The first New Jersey striped bass caught in the spring are resident fish that spend the winter in the deep holes of the river systems or just offshore. These resident stripers range in size from 20 inches up to 10 pounds.
When targeting the first fish of the season, you should retrieve your fly right along the bottom. Baitfish are relatively scarce in April compared to later in the season. In spring, stripers often root along the bottom looking for small worms and invertebrates. Because the water can be turbid and discolored from rain, use bright chartreuse or yellow flies with flash.
When fishing from a boat, concentrate on the south and west shores of Raritan, Barnegat, and Great bays. These areas have mud flats and tidal creeks that hold bait early in the season. Because these areas run from one to four feet deep, they are best fished with shallow-draft boats you can pole. Another technique is to start upwind and quietly drift across the flats with the engine off. You should always cast in the direction the boat is drifting, because water the boat drifts over is usually spoiled.
A strong south wind can turn off the fishing by churning up the shallow bottom of these western shores, but under other circumstances you will often see stripers on the surface, feeding furiously on sand shrimp and spearing. At such times floating fly lines and shrimp and spearing imitations like Popovics’ Ultra Shrimp and long, sparse Deceivers and Surf Candies work best. [For more information on the flies mentioned in this article, search for them by name in the Archive of Fly Patterns found at: http://www.flyfisherman.com/ftb/. The Editor.]
When the mud flats are not producing, try working the deep tidal rivers and warm-water outflows with 300- to 450-grain sinking lines to get the fly deep. Presentations should be slow and erratic, always allowing the fly to swing through the current.
When fishing your fly deep, it’s important to use a short leader—4 to 5 feet maximum—to keep the fly at the same depth as the sinking fly line. We use large, bright-colored Jiggies, Clousers, Bucktail Deceivers, and Hollow Fleyes to imitate the 4- to 7-inch spearing inhabiting these backwaters.
Wading along the shore of a mud flat can be productive, particularly at the end of the day on an outgoing tide, when the water is at its warmest. The best approach is to fish the water directly in front of you before wading out to waist-deep water. We prefer clear, coldwater intermediate lines with an 8- to 9-foot leader and a slim-profile weighted fly such as a Clouser or Jiggy to get to the bottom. A slow strip-pause retrieve draws the most strikes.
Ocean Fish
In May, large migratory bass move through the estuaries and freshwater rivers and feed heavily on herring and adult menhaden (bunker). Migratory bluefish and weakfish also appear and keep things interesting.
Spring herring—alewifes and blueback herring—spawn in fresh water. These 6- to 12-inch baits are the filet mignon of a striper’s diet. Adult menhaden are also members of the herring family. They move up the coast from their late-winter offshore spawning grounds near the Carolinas into New Jersey bays to feed on plankton. These baits are big—up to 14 inches long and two pounds. When large adult bass move into the estuaries, they are hunting the herring and menhaden.
Copyright © 2012 Intermedia Outdoors
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