Quote:
Originally Posted by sternline
If that 3-mile line is not enforced, we will pay a big price. Now, thanks to the ban, we have lots of bass inshore where small boats, not to mention surf fishers, can enjoy these great fish. When the stripers are migrating they pour into our inshore waters except when the bait isn't here. The problem intermittently last fall and a lot of the time this fall was the absence of bunkers. Even when the stripers were here, they were often feeding on rain fish or sand eels and wouldn't look at a jig. To have those really great fall days, we need to save the bunker, which are in serious trouble.
BTW, I was born in 1934, and I'm thrilled by the NJ striper fishing we have, thanks to that great victory. So forgive me if I sound a little preachy.
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Gonna respond to this and your other part re: Russell's book separately sternline.
I respectfully disagree with your bolded statement above. Are you referring to peanut bunker or adult bunker?
Whatever the case, we have had MANY falls when there were no bunker present; peanuts, or adult sized bunker and have caught fish on jigs and plugs from the boat, especially when these fish were feeding on sandeels. We had literally SHOALS of sandeels present this fall, and getting these fish to bite jigs was extremely difficult. Bunker are not the main reason why bass migrate inside the 3 mile line in the fall - there are other reasons.
Yes, they usually get finicky and border on going on lockjaw if the PRIMARY forage is rainfish, but most of these bass we had this fall were sandeel-fed. In recent years, especially 2010-2012, and in years like 07-09', we had the sandeels big time and caught the bass extremely well both from the boat and from the surf. This year? I just don't get what happened. Fish were there, sandeels were there, and getting them to bite a jig from a boat was difficult. FWIW, as soon as we put sandeel imitations in the water while trolling, we would double and triple up so it makes little sense.
As I implied above, sandeels are the primary forage for fall bass and their location is usually where the bass congregate and migrate to. Bunker have little to do with the fall migration.
Now why did a good amount of bass migrate well offshore of 3 miles? Simple. Their migration pattern changed again this year. Huge bodies of bass that set up off LI and gorged on sandeels for WEEKS usually stream southward along the Jersey shore, off between 8-15 miles (as they take a direct path from central LI) to their wintering grounds to the south. They eventually work their way inshore somewhere between Cape May and the Delmarva. It's like that in the fall, and it's like that in the spring when the smaller fish (not the hogs!) migrate back and forth. (FYI - Cape May boats that are still at it are destroying the bass right now!)
Years that those migrating bass don't set up off LI, we have similar fishing in our area (Fall of 11' is a prime example) that they had on LI this year.
Yes, there is bait offshore,, but these fish are taking a "highway" south and are using that offshore route (well past 3 miles, sometimes up to 20 off) to get where they need to go.
