Elizabeth River Microfishing

[ALK11]

Back from 2010-2014 I was a student at Kean University. The Elizabeth River runs through a portion of the campus and I used to always stop and look down trying to find some fish. I remember seeing schools of what looked like killifish and then once in a while something a little bit bigger. Back then I was almost exclusively a saltwater guy so I never fished the river.

Fast-forward to 2020. I haven't lived in New Jersey since I moved out in 2014, but I still spend probably about a month each year visiting. During this trip back I finally decided to head to my old campus and fish the Elizabeth River.

I really had no idea what it was going to be like and from my online research it seemed like no one really fished it. I used some tiny hooks and pieces of nightcrawlers knowing that would give me the best chance of getting something. I instantly found a lot of micros swarming my bait, but couldn't hook up. Eventually my first fish came up, a tiny little pumpkinseed. What followed was about 4 hours of wading the river and coming up with mummichug after mummichug. I wasn't planning on microfishing all day, but sometimes you just have to take what the water gives you.

I was surprised at the lack of biodiversity in the river, but from more research I think I found out why the river is like that. Seems that it has higher than normal levels of pollution and mummichugs are an extremly tolerant fish. Combine both of those things together and you get a small river overrun by mummichugs. Video link to the day is below. Hope you like it.

https://youtu.be/lx18lbi0q_8