Bass, Blues Breaking Wide Open

No Excuses…

Although the weather has been a little uncooperative this past week there were some windows where those that made the effort, were rewarded with their season starting fish story.  Breaking out of this winter funk, where it just seemed so much easier to complain about the conditions than go out and face them, has reached an end.   There are no more excuses for sitting around when water temperatures have reached the 50’s and reports from our network start registering some really impressive outings.

Out of Long Branch Bait & Tackle the word is that the bunker are making the turn!  Into the river and across the front, big schools are flipping and the bass are on them!  Reports of big bass, including a 22-pounder that was taken on a fly rod, are hitting the shop and one report from last night says two guys landed 20 between the two of them in the river.  That’s 20 fish, not a 20 pound fish.  Oh, it’s on!

Pretty simple equation from Eric at The Reel Seat.  If you come down now, you are going to catch fish!  Bluefish have been “everywhere” for the last 4 days in the inlet in the early morning and late afternoon, and the striper bite is on.  Bunker are everywhere as well but the stripers seemed to be schooled up pretty tight.  Jigging is working better than trolling with those big swim shads being the best thing to drop or slow roll.  Up in Asbury and Deal off the beach there has been some plug action on SP Minnows and bucktails, but from the sand clam still seems to be the best bet.  The NE blow has been letting guys get out, but as of Friday morning it looks like it is picking up a little so pay close attention for safety sake.

They are Maxin’ out at Pride Bait & Tackle in Red Bank, with a hot striper bite and big bluefish on the hunt.  The Navisink has been very productive both day and night with most stripers in the 8- to 22-pound range but a couple of slobs are mixed in.  Regular Pat Delisa brought a beautiful, clean 22-pound bass to the shop this week.  Two nights ago, there was action on poppers over at Monmouth Beach.  Also great to see is the number of nice tiderunner weakies that are coming out of the back in the 5-8# range.  You know that there have to be a couple of 10-pound-plus fish we are not hearing about.

At the Bait Shop in Brielle the scales have been busy.  Mark and Dominick have weighed in Monmouth Beach bass from Harold Burns at 15.8 and 14 pounds, a 13.4-pounder for Brian Arling from Long Branch Beach, and a tasty 2.8# winter flounder for Kristina bacon from Farmingdale.  Lots of shorts from the beaches on clams.  Bluefish are marauding, so save your swim shads for the bass and have some beat up plugs ready for the demons.

Best Bet for this Weekend

Here is the bottom line… the bunker are on the move and you should be too.  There are stripers everywhere there is bait.  It does not matter right now if you have a boat or not, you can get to the fish from the beach or the river banks.  If you can’t fish at night, you can totally connect solid during the daytime.  This is the classic “early” North Jersey run, which will fall in to a lull for about 10 days or two weeks very soon, and then come back strong.  This is the run that the guys that got their boats in early for are rewarded with, and the ones that did not get motivated by.

Time to start getting some of those “payback” markers from the family for all that hard work you did around the house this winter.  Grab the gear boys, the time is now!

Stay Tuna-ed!