Last Striper Trip of the Season

Well I hopped aboard the Gambler out of Point this morning. It was a beautiful day on the water, high in the 50's flat seas...maybe too flat. The boat started out North and around Shark River Inlet layed down the throttles. We were greeted by bird activity on Shrewsbury Rocks. It was a good sign but only 1 short and 1 30" fish was caught by the 50 anglers. We continued to fish in and around the rocks and Ambrose Channel. We also hit the Elberon Rocks on the way back. At the end of the day there were only two keepers and about four shorts caught. There were several spineys caught and I had an eight inch squid. I debated on keeping it for the table to avoid the skunk but after a short debate re-hooked it and sent it down. I had a run-off on it but did not hook up. It was supposed to be a half day trip with the Holiday coming and Bobby did his best to put us on fish moving around a lot and trying a dozen or so spots to find fish. We ended up getting back an hour late of the half day return time. All in all it was a nice day on the water with some die hard fisherman.

I guess it is only the trip of the year since I have no intention of stopping with this mild weather. I think I am going to switch to blackfishing though since that seems to be better right now. There are also some small schools of mackerel showing up so may get that chore over with. One trip should load the bait freezer for next or should I say this season.

A Sad Day in Boating

Well I did not want to come out but decided it was for the best. She is hauled, blocked and winterized. Now it is time for the annual cleaning and polishing. We did not fish as many days this year but caught a heck of a lot more fish and the decks are filthy.

I am a firm believer of putting the boat away clean. I get criticized by everyone else at the marina but I typically launch in the end of February or beginning of March and usually, maybe not this year, but usually it is damn cold that time of year. So with this mild weather I have gone ahead and washed and waxed the entire outside of the boat. I may need to apply a non-skid traction agent to the decks yet but can do that later. I recently switched to Interlux's product, Premium Teflon Marine Wax with Cleaner. The boat came out much better than last year, it is whiter, shinier and smoother. Last season I had used the Meguire's boat/RV product. I know many people recommend the Collonite products but they are much harder to use and if you miss the small window to remove the wax it is a real pain in the but to polish off. I guess we will just have to wait and see how it holds up with weekly fishing trips. I am hoping the Teflon in the product will really help prevent bait, slime, guts and the like from sticking and staining the decks, gunwales and other nooks and crannies of the boat. Now it is on to cleaning the interior and installing new electronics and gadgets.

Last Two Trips of the Season

Well we had our last two trips of the season. It was a tough call but I decided to pull the boat next week. With all the warm weather and lack of threat from freezing temps it was a tough call. After getting some house work done if it is still warm I will put her back in early (end of January) if there are good reports of fish hanging around similar to earlier this year.

Saturday we fished from the bathing beach up to Lavalette. The entire ride down from Manasquan to the bathing beach there was absolutely no bird action. We marked a lot of bait and some fish. Trolled south from Lavalette to the bathing beach, picking up and running to our usual spots along the way. Our total for the day was 13 fish to just about or just over 28". Since they were so close and our recent visit from a conservation officer we decided not keep any. Most fish were caught trolling from North to South or West to East and all fish were on blue and white shads. We tried chartreuse as well as pearl and neither got touched except by a few blues.

Sunday we had Bob out (a fell BFH'er) and decided to run North to the rocks after hearing great reports on Saturday about the action up there. If only we had decided to run up their for the afternoon bite instead of having lunch and hanging out down South for it. But, let me tell you...it was worth taking a slight beating on the ride home with that stiff south wind. We had a rough total of around 75 fish. Yes most were school fish of around 20 to 24 inches with a lot of 26 inch fish thrown in. It was typical December jigging action with tons of bird action. The fish were so thick you could feel the jig bouncing off them. Bob had some great top-water action with small poppers (wish I could have gotten a photo of the boils and blow ups) there was mid water column jigging, bottom bouncing. The fish were everywhere. There were so many boats it made it hard to troll which was producing many larger fish. We saw 1 30 pounder landed and heard reports of several in that range as well as one that was estimated around 50# and according to the captain the largest bass he had ever seen. The bigger fish were reported to be on spoons and plugs. Once we got on the troll again with only the blue and white shads seeing action it took less than 10 minutes to boat the only keeper of the day...a 10lb 13oz 31.5" fish. Not long after that the bite died off. Due to commitments on Monday morning we had to cut the day short otherwise I think we could have put a few more keepers in the box trolling with the fleet thinned out once the tide changed. After cleaning the fish back at the dock it was loaded with blueback herring, and they were 8-10".

Blackfish Off the Rocks

The blackfish are still inshore. I headed over to the canal and there was no action so I figured I would try the jetties at Manasquan Inlet. Had several shorts and keepers in a couple of hours. Kept one at 18.5" and 3lb. 7oz.

So far all the blackfish I have caught this fall are on clams. I have had no action in the canal or on the jetties with green crab.

I'm glad I went by my own thoughts on the weather and not the weather man's...3PM and only a drizzle, the whole time I was down south there was barely a breeze and no rain. The fog was something to be reckoned with. A few times you could not see across the inlet.

Only three more days till the bag limit goes up!

Second Striper Trip of the Fall a Bust

We headed out late due to other committments...Broke the inlet about 11:30 and arrived at the Casino Pier a bit before noon. As we were slowing down and getting ready to setup the troll we passed over a couple of enormous bait clouds, repositioned the boat and trolled over the edge of them, nothing. We continued to troll out to deeper water (50-55') and continued to mark huge clouds of bait but no marks under or around them. We trolled south down to IBSP where there were a few birds circling and one diving here and there, same thing no good marks and no knockdowns at all. At about 4 PM we picked up and headed back North. We thought the sight of dozens of birds working just outside the inlet would save the day but once we got there there were no marks not even bait on the scope and no one out of the 10 boats or so with bent rods. We jigged for 10 minutes to be sure there was nothing there and headed in. It was a gorgeous day on the water and I felt bad for those guys out in center consoles freezing their asses off while we were inside the cabin, warm and dry.