06/24/2008 - Striper Fishing on Sykk Physh (Pics)

06/24/2008 - Striper Fishing on Sykk Physh

Well, this certainly was an on-the-fly trip as Joey spotted some fish working hard oceanside and filtered the intel to his network of other captains.
As word came in, the bite was on with a vengence!
30 pounders were being caught and released in hopes of the 40+ pounders crashing bunker like you'd weed through short fluke to get to the keepers!
We're hearing over and over about the chaos ensuing, and while Joey makes a run for his boat...I drive up from South Jersey to the Highlands ASAP!

Joey, his nephew Justin, and I get the boat slipped in and Joey heads to the bunker pods to net a quick 70 pieces before burying the throttle and heading out to meet up with Captain Dan of Reel Music Charters. It's already late with the sun sinking beneath the horizon and Joey is considered about the bite dying.

Rounding the hook, we immediately encounter a school getting blown apart...and promptly drop some live bunker on the pod. Immediate bite offs and bluefish raiding the baits...so we nix the pod and head to where the bass are proven to be. We cross paths with Dan making his way back to the marina as we're hauling south. The conditions are beautiful, nice and flat and we're making good time but the sun has already disappeared.

By the time we reach the area, it's dark...and we're not locating any bunker on the surface...they've already submerged and spread out. We marked bass on the fish finder constantly, and Joey eventually hooked up a striper and handed it off to his nephew Justin who landed the 20-25# class fish on his own! I had one runoff, which as is standard for me with stripers, pulled 10 seconds after the hookset.

After that, we struggled to even get a sniff...running over bass left and right, bunker scattered, bass scattered...but constant readings and no takers. We drifted around the area for a couple hours before heading back to port and pitching a few bunks in closer by the marina to finish up in hopes of some smaller bass being under the bunker schools stacked at the wall. No dice.

Another tough outing...and nothing worse than just missing an all out slaughter. An hour earlier and I think we would have had an hour of crushing them. As it worked out, we missed it all and just couldn't locate the staggered fish once the sun disappeared.

Ahhh stripers, continue their beating on me...if Robin had a monkey on her back with stripers until her trip with Dan...well King Kong is on my back! Haha
That's the way it goes sometimes...I'm determined to beat those mofos!

Big thanks to Joey for inviting me along given the short notice of the bite. We'll get em next time dude!


Here's a few pics from the evening...


Joey slippin the boat in...



Justin's ready!



Nice sunset brewing...



Leaving the marina...



And later..she's gone...and took the bass with her :(



Little Justin, tearin it up!



Get em dude!



Bringin em to the net!



Tough angle on the pic...but here's Justin's striper...almost as big as he is! Gotta love it! :)



Well that's all for now...just a quick recap of yesterday.
Hopefully these stripers will hang for awhile and the winds/weather will cooperate and that sick bite will return once more!
I'm ready! ;)

06/22/2008 - 1/2 Day Fluking on the Atlantic Star (Pics)

06/22/2008 - 1/2 Day Fluking on the Atlantic Star

Due to family obligations, I could only fish a 1/2 day trip today, so I joined up with Doug, Doug's Dad, and Jimmy to do a little fluking aboard the Atlantic Star in the Highlands!
Of course I didn't know what our plans were until 5:30AM that morning, so in true tourist fashion, I arrived at the boat promptly at 7:45AM for an 8:00AM departure! Haha
The boat was absolutely packed...which of course means a nice pool will be brewing!
I head up to the bow to meet up with the crew and am greeted by a few other NJFishing guys...I believe Tireman and his buddy who's nickname escapes me were up in the bow as well.

Tom makes his way out to the fluking grounds at 8:00AM as we're greeted by a light SW to West wind...conditions not looking bad, but we knew a bigger breeze was on it's way later in the day.
We setup on the first drift and had a pick of some shorts at first, then Doug hooked into and landed a nice 5lb flattie!
Moments later, I dropped a keeper (99.9% sure) about 3/4s of the way up...and then it went pretty much dead on the drift.
Tom circled back up and redrifted two or three more times, but it seemed to yield nothing more than some shorts and maybe another keeper or two.

Given the results, Tom made a move up the channel a bit to see if there was more life up there.
Again, we get setup, I toss out a bucktail and 2 bumps and BAM I hook into and land a nice flattie also around the 5lb mark.
I ribbed Doug about possibly edging him out in the pool now and jeered not to feel bad, he might hold on to second place! LOL

Well Doug would have the last laugh...literally on the next cast, I distinctly remember watching Doug cast just prior to me so I flipped mine out a little away from him to avoid any tangles, Doug hits the bottom and seconds later hooks into a real nice one. I see that infamous Fenwick doubled over but the Avet is doing it's job and bringing the fish up...well at least until it neared the boat and that drag started screaming back down! The mate comes up with the net as Doug's bringing the fish back up to the boat and kind of humorously says "I don't really like this net". I started laughing, I think Doug might have thrown up in his mouth a little...neither of us is sure if he was serious or not! Hahaha So Doug gets the fish up to the surface and the mate does a great job netting him...as soon as the fluke hit the deck, I knew he was over and 10 and close to 11lbs...awesome fish!

Here's a shot of Doug with the slammer right after he caught it!



We redrifted the area another time or two as the wind started increasing, keepers coming over the rail but the bite decreasing a bit. Seemed like after the first drift they were on to us, and the same drift wasn't producing...that or they were moving through the area. Either way, the wind got to excessive speeds making for a fast drift, so Tom headed into shallower water for an easier hold on bottom. The boat picked at a some shorts and a few keepers over the next hour or so, but that wind was just fierce...really unfortunate we couldn't continue to hang in the deeper water where those big boys were roaming...but it was still a great day on the water!

We headed in a little after noon time, hit the dock and weighed Doug's fish in at the tackle shop.
Doug's personal best fluke came in at 10lb 11oz, nice job buddy!


Here's a few pics from the day!

Oh baby...she's a little packed today! No doubt the afternoon weather weighed on some minds, as the 3/4 day boats were empty. Of course, Tom always draws a good crowd as other 1/2 boats were also a little light.





Tom...leading the way!



Doug's pumped!



Jimmy's kinda ready!



The 1/2 day trips are short for me, and given Doug's slob fish...I was all about fishing, not so much about picture taking...so here's a few from the end of the day!

Bruce and the 2nd place pool fish, good for 1/3 of the pool!



Doug with his two big fish of the day!



Bruce and Doug together, pool fish.



Doug with the 1st place pool fish, good for 2/3 of the pool! Nice dude!



And a little white side action...




It was a great trip and an awesome time out there aboard the Atlantic Star. Been awhile since I sailed on her, but given my schedule today, it was the perfect time to jump on!
Of course, I don't think you'll get any argument from Doug on that either! :D


Until next time...

06/21/2008 - Fluking Raritan Bay

Quick little report, since I'm heading back out tomorrow.
Charlie, Lena, and I headed out to do some fluking today but ran into some pretty tough conditions with a virtually non-existant AM bite.
Lena landed the first keeper, with Charlie boxing two more shortly after her. I was sucking wind and keeperless almost all morning.
Fish seemed pretty lethargic as they weren't really hitting but more so just sucking in the baits and sitting on them...perhaps due to the recent South winds and early AM incoming tide.
As we neared 11:00AM or so, the bite started to pick up as the tide neared high.
As it turned, the bite increased and we started boxing some more fish...Charlie landing another keep and me with 5 keepers.
Headed in around 1:30 or so, filleted up and headed on home.

Worth noting, tons of bait around as fluke were spitting up sand eels, rainfish, porgies, and some sweet 6-7" whole squid (see pic below of the bloated fluke).
I dropped one of those squid right back down and landed a nice keep!

Beautiful weather out, but it looks like that South wind has either shutdown the bite a tad, or we just sucked at finding/catching them today...probably a 20/80 split! :D
Heading back out tomorrow to see what's biting!


Little bit of sunrise...nice way to start the day.



This puppy was bloated but he still ate some more when the PM bite turned on! Totally neglecting to take a pic of the squid he regurgitated.



Final catch for the day, 9 keepers.



Thanks to Charlie for taking us out, as always had a great time despite some sleep deprivation!

06/15/2008 - Striper Fishing The Sykk Physh (Pics)

06/15/2008 - Striper Fishing The Sykk Physh


Alright, so after an absolutely awesome morning hike with Tom Elefante, I met up with Doug and his buddy Jay for some evening striper fishing aboard The Sykk Physh with Joey!
The action's been GOOD, real good...and we were hoping to get in on it!
The weather looked perfect...hardly any wind, overcast with some passing rain and flat calm seas!

The boys getting ready!



The Sykk Physh!



Joey's ready!



Jay's ready!



Doug with a classic face...umm I think he's ready! Haha



Bunker already in the livewell, nice!



We break the marina...bunker all over...but this isn't where we're fishing! :)



We cruised out on the 20' Robalo with the throttle pushed to the hilt headed oceanside and pumped to go!
We arrive at the rocks with some sick bunker pods all over the place!



Oh my!



Joey is flippin plugs on his Cabo and hooks up!



Big ol' slob blue!



Action!



Little while later, I have a serious runoff...and let him go for about 15 seconds before setting the hook hard.
I have him on for about 10-15 seconds of all out drag ripping action with my rod tripled over...Doug looking on with a WOW expression on his face...serious fish and then SPIT...come back with nothing but the hook...and I throw up in my mouth a little. That fish was big, real big.


Then Jay had a runoff, but the fish spit as well before he even set the hook.



The ocean was nice, real nice...



Then Doug gets a runoff and lays the screws to one!



He's not sure what it is...not running hard like a striper...just comes in lazy...but then it surfaces!



Big ol' striper comes into the net, virtually calm as could be...likely full of bunker and just stuffed!



Oh baby, 41 pounds on the handheld!



Joey and Doug with one hell of a bass and Doug's personal best!



We ran around a bunch but struggled...well I struggled. I was getting twice as many runoffs as anyone else and went from 5 second countdowns to the hookset to 15-20 seconds to 45-60 seconds and kept coming up with spit hooks. I just didn't understand it and it frustrated the hell out of me...I felt like Scrubby all evening! Haha

Seriously though, I had 7 or 8 runoffs on the evening, 5 or 6 spit the naked hook or bunker back out...and 2 broke right on the hookset. After the first spit, I switched from 7/0 Octopus to 10/0s...and still couldn't get a solid hookset with BRAID and a 25-30' mono shock leader with about a 3' fluoro leader to the hook. After the second break, I retied with 60# fluoro but didn't get another hit after that as the storm rolled in.

Meanwhile Doug had a few run-offs and spits, and had another one hooked and to the surface when it spit the bunker back at him.
Joey managed to hook up twice with snagged and dropped bunker but they immediately broke the braid on his Cabo...12-14 turn Uni or a Palomar dude! :D
Joey also hooked two on his Chaos rods...landing one and handing the other off to me (no pics in the action, I wanted IN the water again!)


Then the fog rolled in from the north and a sudden shift to east winds put it right on top of us with increasing seas!



Here it comes!



A few sunset shots as the action died down...



And the fog rolled in...



Sinking slowly...



We headed back north to try to locate some more bunker but the seas just got plain ugly.
We took an absolute soaking on the way home but managed to get there in one piece!


Here's a few shots back at the marina...


Group shot...



Doug...



Jay...



And I...





Well it was definitely a fun trip, but a shame that weather rolled in on us like that...and even more of a shame that I lost so many fish...UGH! Stripers drive me NUTS!
We knew we had a great shot at beating our personal bests on this trip, and Doug pulled through as he always does! :)
I was sucking wind while Jay just had a rough time even working up the hits.
Joey got us on the fish, just was a tough bite with all the available bait but had we landed half the friggin hits I had...we'd have limited with ease.
I need to regather my thoughts and per Doug's recommendation I'm going to switch rods...and maybe take a chainsaw to my current striper rod! Haha
Going to go with something a bit meatier and shorter next trip and see if I can get a little more leverage...but with braid, I just can't imagine *needing* it.
Ah well...next time we'll get out there and beat em down!
Big thanks to Joey for running us out there, was a great time and I think we all definitely want to get out again SOON to take advantage of the sick bite that is going on!


Until next time...