Daily Fishing and Outdoor Report
Weekly Nov. 4, 09 -- Blog-about
It’s that humbling time of the year where I ask for donations to keep this blog up and running. It is a time consuming enterprise but I enjoy it. It’s kinda therapeutic. I hope you find it fun – and functional. I’d also like to take this time to sincerely thank those who email or phone me with tales, fishing reports and questions. It’s energizing. Donations can be mailed to: Jay Mann, 222 18th Street, Ship Bottom, NJ, 08008-4418. Being Type A I don’t always have the time to mail Thank-you note but, believe me (!), your donations are fully appreciated.
Update: I’m PayPal ready for donations. Just go to PayPal, click “Send Money,” type in my email, enter amount and click “Services” box. It’s a snap and I’m grateful beyond measure. J-mann.
Bond-worthy Foxes and Big Bass A-Plenty
(listing of top bas can be nixed)
FOX FORRAYS: A fishing website had a long thread on foxes and how they now-and-again interrelate with surfcasting fishermen. Many comments focused on the often-aggressive behavior these wild canids assume once acclimated to anglers. One chatter told of foxes actually following him as he hauled bass off the beach – likely waiting for toss-aways when the fish get cleaned.
I’ll offer a very cavalier read on friending about with our local red foxes. Despite all the squawk and advisories about foxes and rabies or foxes and their negative impact on nesting shorebirds, I think they’re as cool as all get-out. I buddy up with them every chance I get. And Holgate and The Dike offer many a chance.
Hey, foxes are a perfect image of nature. They also offer that manly feel of a dog buddy. Most of all, they’re utterly astounding survivors -- as we of a mankind ilk seem hell-bent on killing off every creature but ourselves. Wait. Now that I think of it, I guess we’re not so nice to ourselves either.
Foxes are lookers and carousers and most of schmoozers. Thus the many responses to that website thread. Over a dozen anglers had close up and personal fox tales to tell.
The one seemingly obvious caveat regarding fooling around with foxes has to do with getting too chummy with them. Bonding at a distance is fine, but human/fox relationships should have some goodly breathing room.
I’ve known of two anglers getting (accidentally) bitten by foxes. Both were trying to hand-feed increasingly docile foxes. The foxes were willing to give the hand feeding route a go -- but in nature time, as it were. In both cases, the foxes pondered the food, iffily moved closer then -- in what many dog owners seldom see -- blistering wildlife speed. The foxes became veritable blurs, as they bolted forward, grabbed the offerings – and, in both cases, pieces of the fingers holding same. Both men then nursed bloodied fingers, not mangled by any stretch. They also hosted the ever so slight chance the foxes just passed on rabies. The rabies odds were so absurdly small as to be incalculable but when you’re bandying about a disease that is indubitably fatal, it takes some of the luster out of that wildlife/mankind bonding thing.
I can offer dozens of tales of seemingly friendly foxes finagling some foodstuffs from me. Also, I’ve rescued a handful of them, mainly in winter. Despite their legendary cleverness, I’ve seen foxes get themselves into the most hellish of predicaments, most often on ice floes.
Since I only recently told of the fox that all but snuggled up to me in Holgate, I’ll retell the time in late winter that I kayaked up to fox trapped atop a piece of thawing ice in Little Egg Harbor. It was during the time of rabies so I was on guard for any strange behavior exhibited by the animal, like climbing atop an iceberg to take a little ride.
In reality, the pathetic looking vixen was freezing to death, and could no longer balance atop the diminishing piece of ice. I paddled up, scaring her into the water – and instantly saddling myself with full responsibility for the immediate future of the creature.
Near death and barely able to swim, the downright doomed vixen grudgingly boarded my kayak -- after I almost overturned leaning sideways to offer her a climb-aboard point, low to the water. She barely hauled her self aboard – and quickly moved as far away from me as humanly possible (just an expression, mind you), all but collapsing in the hollow of my sit-atop. She was shivering uncontrollably under a cloudy sky.
As I paddled toward LBI, I could see her seemingly losing life, eyes closing. I reached over to put a towel over her. That snapped her awake, as she bared teeth and let out a weak yelp.
I paddled over and landed on some nearby undeveloped LBI meadows. Feeling the landing, the fox tried to gather some strength to disembark. She couldn’t. Just then, the sun came out, warm as could be. It as much as poured life on her. After a couple/few warm-up minutes, she suddenly sprung out of the kayak, as if launched by a fox rocket. A little wobbly, she zipped over into some meadow grass. No thanks or goodbyes. No matter. I ‘m sure she recovered nicely, as the rest of the day was downright mild – and marked the onset of a super warm spring.
SAND POUND IN HARVEY CEDARS: I have it on good authority that the Harvey Cedars beach replenishment project will begin this month. Mid-month might be the safest prediction. This could mean an entire shutdown of the borough’s beachfront, right through the schoolie striper season. That would be a significant loss to mainly anglers in that borough, though it won’t be a very long haul for HC regulars to find equipment-free water. And it’s sure isn’t a let-down to work Loveladies to the north or North Beach to the south, both super striper sections. Obviously, beach buggying on borough beaches will be banned once work begins.
As for those still fretting over the possibility of more Deep-6’ed government munitions showing up in the arriving nearshore sand, perish the thought. Although the ocean sand borrows area for the HC project is the same zone that regurgitated all those fascinating former explosives during the Surf City beach redo, the screening attached to the dredge piping this time around will have smaller mesh -- much smaller than even the smallest munitions that began sunning themselves after the SC work.
Being a fanatic collector of vintage and antique stuff, I was one of the very few folks hoping to find the provenance behind those fairly ancient explosives that caused such a public explosion on the SC beaches. Of course, even up-there officials, with all the hidden government data at their disposal (good choice of word, eh?), couldn’t ferret out the scoop on how truly massive amounts of military munitions were dumped so close to LBI’s beaches.
I at first thought the military stuff was stored (and ungracefully aging) somewhere up toward North Jersey and New York. The problem with that has to do with the very limited space for such material in the NY/NJ vicinity.
Within the NY/NJ harbor complex there are over 1,100 facilities, 720 piers, wharves and docks, including numerous facilities which have serviced military vessel for over 100 years. Obviously, no work is done on a military vessel filled with things that can blow in a flash. Again, one would think that a metropolis harbor zone like NY/NJ would have loads of space assigned to store military munitions. Turns out, it was just the opposite -- right up to the onset of WWII. In fact, it was in a near state of panic that it hit our government that there was virtually no munitions storage areas right where they were needed most, i.e. the largest dispatch point in then nation. Naval Weapons Station Earle, Sandy Hook, was hastily built in 1942.
Historically backing up a bit, the only real way to ready naval vessels for upgrades or repairs was to deep-6 whatever explosives were basking onboard. It might have only been a captain-to-captain pass-on telling of this really cool and calm Deep-6 zone close to the beaches of someplace called Long Beach Island LBI. But why so close in? The further out you go into the ocean, the more bump and bounce a ship hits, not the best thing when clandestinely – as in the dark of night -- disposing of moody munitions. And, yes, the military has been known to be a tad deceptive that way.
I was told through something akin to third-hand account, that a naval officer told his grandkids of just such a covert drop-off near LBI.
KIDS SAY THE DARNDEST: Read the following email and check out the kiddy angle.
“Jay, Fished Brant Beach surf yesterday from 1 - 6 PM with my 10 and 7 year old daughters. No action until around 5. Then things heated up. 3 Blues at around 10-12lbs, and a striper @ 35". All on bunker. Fish were pretty far out. I had to go to a single pole because action was none stop. My girls had a great time. I heard my 10-year-old talking to the striper, thanking him for choosing our bait. Regards, Rick B.”
You gotta love the daughter’s approach of catch/thank/release (or eat).
While the adorability factor runs rampant here, I’ve seen many a professional largemouth angler kiss his catch right there on camera. Of course, that might very well be because the kissable catch is worth six-figures-plus in winnings.
And there’s nothing wrong with openly admiring your catch, though I’m thinking that repeatedly – and passionately -- kissing a stargazer is crossing the channel into some forbidden waters.
BIG BASS ABOUND: The big suds-based bass have gone bananas. There are now 20 bass over 30 pounds in the Classic! And the event still has five weeks to go. Somewhat oddly, there are more tourney weigh-in fish over 30 pounds than there are between the usually far more common range of 20 and 29 pounds.
If I had to guess at why the surfside stripering has gone big-time -- short of the fact to make it doubly obvious that I can’t catch squat on plugs -- I’d focus on the rowdy weather we’ve been having for weeks on end. All this sky stir has foiled the big ocean run bunker from balling up in the nearshore waters.
In recent falls, including last year when we had a near no-show of better bass in the surfline, calmer autumnal weather allowed the seasonal bunker school to orderly organize off the beach, from a few hundred yards off to many miles a-sea. During those ball-up times, the dinner bell sound made by millions of forage fish is a little too loud and clear. Surf bass toying with speedy mullet or downing the same old crabs readily zip out to join their buddies in bulking up on bunker calories. That left the suds striperless. This year, fall bass aren’t able to bunker down. Instead, they’re hitting the wave zones, looking for rolled foodstuff, like clams, crabs and anglers’ chunks of bunker.
A little more technically, I can also point out the long-term stock data indicating we’re just now getting to the fish that were born during particularly strong year-classes, in the mid and late 1900s.
I recently heard some gab about all the big bass – including the winter catches of 2007 -- being from the moratorium years. That’s a big stretch. Virtually every long-term study of stripers indicates that fish of 30 pound are about 15 years old. It’s hard to believe, of ye of long tooth, but the moratorium was over 20 years ago. Average striper weight of a fish 20 years old: 70 pounds. Now let me think back on all the 70-pounders I’ve caught. End of that chain of thought.
I should also not there are many 30-pound-plus fish being taken by non-tourney surfcasters plus (and it’s a big plus) many boat anglers are bailing bass, especially those using spot or eels. What’s more, some of the largest boat bass are coming from well inside the bay. Of course, the inlets are epicenter for the boat bass bite – as usual. Inlet workers are using spot, eels, plastic trolls, even jigging, I’m told stripers to near 40 pounds are quietly coming up. I say “quietly” because inlet anglers can be very hush mouthed about successes.
Here’s the big bass in the ongoing Long Beach island Surf Fishing Classic:
1. Michael Kane Doylestown, Pa. 42.69 bunker Loveladies
2. John Parzych Trumbauersville, Pa. 38.69 bunker Holgate
3. Mike Greene Ship Bottom 38.44 bunker Ship Bottom
4. Kenney Depierro Yonkers 36.94 bunker haven beach
5. Scott Simpson Hairvesport, NJ 36.81 bunker spray beach
6. David Bell Manahawkin, NJ 35.25 bunker Ship Bottom
7. Timothy Stumpf Elkins Park, Pa. 35.25 bunker Surf City
8. Richard Metzger Collingswood, NJ 35.19 bunker Beach Haven Crest
9. Joe Carmelengo Long Beach Township, NJ 35.00 bunker Brant Beach
10. Tom Law Sr. Beach Haven 33.00 bunker Spray Beach
11. Ed Lapp Hatboro, pa 32.56 bunker haven beach
12. Joe Carmelengo Long Beach Township 32.13 bunker Spray Beach
13. Robert Muller Park Ridge, NJ 31.88 bunker Peahala Park
14. Linda Hollins Riverton, NJ 31.75 bunker Ship Bottom
15. Bill Montrey Manahawkin, 31.56 bunker Harvey Cedars
16. Edwin McGlynn Beach Haven, 31.50 bunker Beach Haven
17. Jeff Suwak Medford, NJ 31.50 bunker Beach Haven
18. Brian Dalton Tabernacle, NJ 31.25 bunker Brant Beach
19. Brian McAllister Middleton, Del 30.88 bunker Loveladies
20. Darcy Kolodziej Ship Bottom 30.38 bunker Harvey Cedars
SPOTTING STRIPERS: The reason the baitfish spot (technically Leiostomus xanthurus) are the current bass killer is partly because more folks than ever now use them – after hearing other anglers are banging the bejeezus out of bass by swimming then. More so, spot are spot-on for serious bassing. Stripers unquestionably have some unspoken fondness (bordering on an obsession) for these round, soft and, seemingly delectable forage fish, a type of croaker. But is it taste or sound that makes swimming spot overwhelmingly attractive bass?
As with so many liveline baits, like eel or bunker, or herring, it’s astounding the way even spot instantly lose their bass appeal when they give up the ghost – or even most of the ghost. An exhausted or dead spot quickly loses its drawing capacity. That would imply that there is a sound, of sorts, given off by a wounded fish. It begs the question of whether or not various bait fish give off unique distress signals.
While fish don’t have ears, per se, they have something way better. Both sides of a fish are vibration receptors of the highest order. The lateral line seems to be the repository for this mechanism, which can pick up the slightest cry of a wounded fish -- or, just as importantly, the potentially deadly pulsations offered as an attacking predatory fish approaches. On many occasions, I’ve seen small bluefish take off in terror well ahead of arriving slammer blues. There was no sight involved, just a vibratory read that the cannibals were coming.
Somewhat similar is the way the distant communication sounds of approaching dolphin can all but empty the water of any and all fish. In fact, it is believed that attacking dolphin turn a fish’s vibration receptors against it. By bombarding a target with high-pitched sounds, sensory overload fully disorients the meal-to-be. There is some amazing footage of a dolphin on the tail of a fleeing mackerel that suddenly begins doing abrupt circles instead of maintaining a beeline escape route. It’s a pure case of death by sound disorientation. Get this: The military has long been studying a dolphin’s ability to disable a target via sound. Of course, at the same time as those dolphin sound studies, the U.S. military resorted to heavy metal music to capture Panamanian dictator General Manuel Noriega in Panama. It would have been a lot cooler had they used high-pitched dolphin sounds, driving Noriega to do circles on the floor – a lot like Curly of the Three Stooges.
Anyway, a few tackle shops are carrying live spot. Per above, it’s very important to keep them well aerated and ready to rumble the minute they’re dropped overboard.
Can a live spot be used to fish the beach? Absolutely, though long-distance casting them is way too traumatic. You need to choose a safe tide and hit a choice jetty with spot in tow. The trick is to remove a single spot from your buggy’s livewell, transfer it to a 5-gallon bucket (with some seawater in it), haul the bucket onto the rocks and carefully dorsal hook it right before gingerly flipping it into some ripe water. I always like the leeside of the jetty end. Spot are not major swimmers when compared to bunker or (especially) herring but they’ll still snuggle up to any outgoing current and cover some ground when needed.
By the by, spot arrive locally much the way mullet and bunker do, as larvae or post-larvae, pushed from the ocean and into the backbay by winds and currents. However, spot may also arrive as part of a northerly or westerly spring migration from deeper waters. The spot caught by hook-and-line in the upper part of Barnegat Bay are much too large to be young-of-year, indicating something of a local breeding stock that moves east and slightly south in the winter. The species is actually very understudied.
Update: I’m PayPal ready for donations. Just go to PayPal, click “Send Money,” type in my email, enter amount and click “Services” box. It’s a snap and I’m grateful beyond measure. J-mann.
Bond-worthy Foxes and Big Bass A-Plenty
(listing of top bas can be nixed)
FOX FORRAYS: A fishing website had a long thread on foxes and how they now-and-again interrelate with surfcasting fishermen. Many comments focused on the often-aggressive behavior these wild canids assume once acclimated to anglers. One chatter told of foxes actually following him as he hauled bass off the beach – likely waiting for toss-aways when the fish get cleaned.
I’ll offer a very cavalier read on friending about with our local red foxes. Despite all the squawk and advisories about foxes and rabies or foxes and their negative impact on nesting shorebirds, I think they’re as cool as all get-out. I buddy up with them every chance I get. And Holgate and The Dike offer many a chance.
Hey, foxes are a perfect image of nature. They also offer that manly feel of a dog buddy. Most of all, they’re utterly astounding survivors -- as we of a mankind ilk seem hell-bent on killing off every creature but ourselves. Wait. Now that I think of it, I guess we’re not so nice to ourselves either.
Foxes are lookers and carousers and most of schmoozers. Thus the many responses to that website thread. Over a dozen anglers had close up and personal fox tales to tell.
The one seemingly obvious caveat regarding fooling around with foxes has to do with getting too chummy with them. Bonding at a distance is fine, but human/fox relationships should have some goodly breathing room.
I’ve known of two anglers getting (accidentally) bitten by foxes. Both were trying to hand-feed increasingly docile foxes. The foxes were willing to give the hand feeding route a go -- but in nature time, as it were. In both cases, the foxes pondered the food, iffily moved closer then -- in what many dog owners seldom see -- blistering wildlife speed. The foxes became veritable blurs, as they bolted forward, grabbed the offerings – and, in both cases, pieces of the fingers holding same. Both men then nursed bloodied fingers, not mangled by any stretch. They also hosted the ever so slight chance the foxes just passed on rabies. The rabies odds were so absurdly small as to be incalculable but when you’re bandying about a disease that is indubitably fatal, it takes some of the luster out of that wildlife/mankind bonding thing.
I can offer dozens of tales of seemingly friendly foxes finagling some foodstuffs from me. Also, I’ve rescued a handful of them, mainly in winter. Despite their legendary cleverness, I’ve seen foxes get themselves into the most hellish of predicaments, most often on ice floes.
Since I only recently told of the fox that all but snuggled up to me in Holgate, I’ll retell the time in late winter that I kayaked up to fox trapped atop a piece of thawing ice in Little Egg Harbor. It was during the time of rabies so I was on guard for any strange behavior exhibited by the animal, like climbing atop an iceberg to take a little ride.
In reality, the pathetic looking vixen was freezing to death, and could no longer balance atop the diminishing piece of ice. I paddled up, scaring her into the water – and instantly saddling myself with full responsibility for the immediate future of the creature.
Near death and barely able to swim, the downright doomed vixen grudgingly boarded my kayak -- after I almost overturned leaning sideways to offer her a climb-aboard point, low to the water. She barely hauled her self aboard – and quickly moved as far away from me as humanly possible (just an expression, mind you), all but collapsing in the hollow of my sit-atop. She was shivering uncontrollably under a cloudy sky.
As I paddled toward LBI, I could see her seemingly losing life, eyes closing. I reached over to put a towel over her. That snapped her awake, as she bared teeth and let out a weak yelp.
I paddled over and landed on some nearby undeveloped LBI meadows. Feeling the landing, the fox tried to gather some strength to disembark. She couldn’t. Just then, the sun came out, warm as could be. It as much as poured life on her. After a couple/few warm-up minutes, she suddenly sprung out of the kayak, as if launched by a fox rocket. A little wobbly, she zipped over into some meadow grass. No thanks or goodbyes. No matter. I ‘m sure she recovered nicely, as the rest of the day was downright mild – and marked the onset of a super warm spring.
SAND POUND IN HARVEY CEDARS: I have it on good authority that the Harvey Cedars beach replenishment project will begin this month. Mid-month might be the safest prediction. This could mean an entire shutdown of the borough’s beachfront, right through the schoolie striper season. That would be a significant loss to mainly anglers in that borough, though it won’t be a very long haul for HC regulars to find equipment-free water. And it’s sure isn’t a let-down to work Loveladies to the north or North Beach to the south, both super striper sections. Obviously, beach buggying on borough beaches will be banned once work begins.
As for those still fretting over the possibility of more Deep-6’ed government munitions showing up in the arriving nearshore sand, perish the thought. Although the ocean sand borrows area for the HC project is the same zone that regurgitated all those fascinating former explosives during the Surf City beach redo, the screening attached to the dredge piping this time around will have smaller mesh -- much smaller than even the smallest munitions that began sunning themselves after the SC work.
Being a fanatic collector of vintage and antique stuff, I was one of the very few folks hoping to find the provenance behind those fairly ancient explosives that caused such a public explosion on the SC beaches. Of course, even up-there officials, with all the hidden government data at their disposal (good choice of word, eh?), couldn’t ferret out the scoop on how truly massive amounts of military munitions were dumped so close to LBI’s beaches.
I at first thought the military stuff was stored (and ungracefully aging) somewhere up toward North Jersey and New York. The problem with that has to do with the very limited space for such material in the NY/NJ vicinity.
Within the NY/NJ harbor complex there are over 1,100 facilities, 720 piers, wharves and docks, including numerous facilities which have serviced military vessel for over 100 years. Obviously, no work is done on a military vessel filled with things that can blow in a flash. Again, one would think that a metropolis harbor zone like NY/NJ would have loads of space assigned to store military munitions. Turns out, it was just the opposite -- right up to the onset of WWII. In fact, it was in a near state of panic that it hit our government that there was virtually no munitions storage areas right where they were needed most, i.e. the largest dispatch point in then nation. Naval Weapons Station Earle, Sandy Hook, was hastily built in 1942.
Historically backing up a bit, the only real way to ready naval vessels for upgrades or repairs was to deep-6 whatever explosives were basking onboard. It might have only been a captain-to-captain pass-on telling of this really cool and calm Deep-6 zone close to the beaches of someplace called Long Beach Island LBI. But why so close in? The further out you go into the ocean, the more bump and bounce a ship hits, not the best thing when clandestinely – as in the dark of night -- disposing of moody munitions. And, yes, the military has been known to be a tad deceptive that way.
I was told through something akin to third-hand account, that a naval officer told his grandkids of just such a covert drop-off near LBI.
KIDS SAY THE DARNDEST: Read the following email and check out the kiddy angle.
“Jay, Fished Brant Beach surf yesterday from 1 - 6 PM with my 10 and 7 year old daughters. No action until around 5. Then things heated up. 3 Blues at around 10-12lbs, and a striper @ 35". All on bunker. Fish were pretty far out. I had to go to a single pole because action was none stop. My girls had a great time. I heard my 10-year-old talking to the striper, thanking him for choosing our bait. Regards, Rick B.”
You gotta love the daughter’s approach of catch/thank/release (or eat).
While the adorability factor runs rampant here, I’ve seen many a professional largemouth angler kiss his catch right there on camera. Of course, that might very well be because the kissable catch is worth six-figures-plus in winnings.
And there’s nothing wrong with openly admiring your catch, though I’m thinking that repeatedly – and passionately -- kissing a stargazer is crossing the channel into some forbidden waters.
BIG BASS ABOUND: The big suds-based bass have gone bananas. There are now 20 bass over 30 pounds in the Classic! And the event still has five weeks to go. Somewhat oddly, there are more tourney weigh-in fish over 30 pounds than there are between the usually far more common range of 20 and 29 pounds.
If I had to guess at why the surfside stripering has gone big-time -- short of the fact to make it doubly obvious that I can’t catch squat on plugs -- I’d focus on the rowdy weather we’ve been having for weeks on end. All this sky stir has foiled the big ocean run bunker from balling up in the nearshore waters.
In recent falls, including last year when we had a near no-show of better bass in the surfline, calmer autumnal weather allowed the seasonal bunker school to orderly organize off the beach, from a few hundred yards off to many miles a-sea. During those ball-up times, the dinner bell sound made by millions of forage fish is a little too loud and clear. Surf bass toying with speedy mullet or downing the same old crabs readily zip out to join their buddies in bulking up on bunker calories. That left the suds striperless. This year, fall bass aren’t able to bunker down. Instead, they’re hitting the wave zones, looking for rolled foodstuff, like clams, crabs and anglers’ chunks of bunker.
A little more technically, I can also point out the long-term stock data indicating we’re just now getting to the fish that were born during particularly strong year-classes, in the mid and late 1900s.
I recently heard some gab about all the big bass – including the winter catches of 2007 -- being from the moratorium years. That’s a big stretch. Virtually every long-term study of stripers indicates that fish of 30 pound are about 15 years old. It’s hard to believe, of ye of long tooth, but the moratorium was over 20 years ago. Average striper weight of a fish 20 years old: 70 pounds. Now let me think back on all the 70-pounders I’ve caught. End of that chain of thought.
I should also not there are many 30-pound-plus fish being taken by non-tourney surfcasters plus (and it’s a big plus) many boat anglers are bailing bass, especially those using spot or eels. What’s more, some of the largest boat bass are coming from well inside the bay. Of course, the inlets are epicenter for the boat bass bite – as usual. Inlet workers are using spot, eels, plastic trolls, even jigging, I’m told stripers to near 40 pounds are quietly coming up. I say “quietly” because inlet anglers can be very hush mouthed about successes.
Here’s the big bass in the ongoing Long Beach island Surf Fishing Classic:
1. Michael Kane Doylestown, Pa. 42.69 bunker Loveladies
2. John Parzych Trumbauersville, Pa. 38.69 bunker Holgate
3. Mike Greene Ship Bottom 38.44 bunker Ship Bottom
4. Kenney Depierro Yonkers 36.94 bunker haven beach
5. Scott Simpson Hairvesport, NJ 36.81 bunker spray beach
6. David Bell Manahawkin, NJ 35.25 bunker Ship Bottom
7. Timothy Stumpf Elkins Park, Pa. 35.25 bunker Surf City
8. Richard Metzger Collingswood, NJ 35.19 bunker Beach Haven Crest
9. Joe Carmelengo Long Beach Township, NJ 35.00 bunker Brant Beach
10. Tom Law Sr. Beach Haven 33.00 bunker Spray Beach
11. Ed Lapp Hatboro, pa 32.56 bunker haven beach
12. Joe Carmelengo Long Beach Township 32.13 bunker Spray Beach
13. Robert Muller Park Ridge, NJ 31.88 bunker Peahala Park
14. Linda Hollins Riverton, NJ 31.75 bunker Ship Bottom
15. Bill Montrey Manahawkin, 31.56 bunker Harvey Cedars
16. Edwin McGlynn Beach Haven, 31.50 bunker Beach Haven
17. Jeff Suwak Medford, NJ 31.50 bunker Beach Haven
18. Brian Dalton Tabernacle, NJ 31.25 bunker Brant Beach
19. Brian McAllister Middleton, Del 30.88 bunker Loveladies
20. Darcy Kolodziej Ship Bottom 30.38 bunker Harvey Cedars
SPOTTING STRIPERS: The reason the baitfish spot (technically Leiostomus xanthurus) are the current bass killer is partly because more folks than ever now use them – after hearing other anglers are banging the bejeezus out of bass by swimming then. More so, spot are spot-on for serious bassing. Stripers unquestionably have some unspoken fondness (bordering on an obsession) for these round, soft and, seemingly delectable forage fish, a type of croaker. But is it taste or sound that makes swimming spot overwhelmingly attractive bass?
As with so many liveline baits, like eel or bunker, or herring, it’s astounding the way even spot instantly lose their bass appeal when they give up the ghost – or even most of the ghost. An exhausted or dead spot quickly loses its drawing capacity. That would imply that there is a sound, of sorts, given off by a wounded fish. It begs the question of whether or not various bait fish give off unique distress signals.
While fish don’t have ears, per se, they have something way better. Both sides of a fish are vibration receptors of the highest order. The lateral line seems to be the repository for this mechanism, which can pick up the slightest cry of a wounded fish -- or, just as importantly, the potentially deadly pulsations offered as an attacking predatory fish approaches. On many occasions, I’ve seen small bluefish take off in terror well ahead of arriving slammer blues. There was no sight involved, just a vibratory read that the cannibals were coming.
Somewhat similar is the way the distant communication sounds of approaching dolphin can all but empty the water of any and all fish. In fact, it is believed that attacking dolphin turn a fish’s vibration receptors against it. By bombarding a target with high-pitched sounds, sensory overload fully disorients the meal-to-be. There is some amazing footage of a dolphin on the tail of a fleeing mackerel that suddenly begins doing abrupt circles instead of maintaining a beeline escape route. It’s a pure case of death by sound disorientation. Get this: The military has long been studying a dolphin’s ability to disable a target via sound. Of course, at the same time as those dolphin sound studies, the U.S. military resorted to heavy metal music to capture Panamanian dictator General Manuel Noriega in Panama. It would have been a lot cooler had they used high-pitched dolphin sounds, driving Noriega to do circles on the floor – a lot like Curly of the Three Stooges.
Anyway, a few tackle shops are carrying live spot. Per above, it’s very important to keep them well aerated and ready to rumble the minute they’re dropped overboard.
Can a live spot be used to fish the beach? Absolutely, though long-distance casting them is way too traumatic. You need to choose a safe tide and hit a choice jetty with spot in tow. The trick is to remove a single spot from your buggy’s livewell, transfer it to a 5-gallon bucket (with some seawater in it), haul the bucket onto the rocks and carefully dorsal hook it right before gingerly flipping it into some ripe water. I always like the leeside of the jetty end. Spot are not major swimmers when compared to bunker or (especially) herring but they’ll still snuggle up to any outgoing current and cover some ground when needed.
By the by, spot arrive locally much the way mullet and bunker do, as larvae or post-larvae, pushed from the ocean and into the backbay by winds and currents. However, spot may also arrive as part of a northerly or westerly spring migration from deeper waters. The spot caught by hook-and-line in the upper part of Barnegat Bay are much too large to be young-of-year, indicating something of a local breeding stock that moves east and slightly south in the winter. The species is actually very understudied.
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