By November the Jersey Shore belongs to
the surf caster. The beach chairs and sun
worshipers have been replaced by beach
buggies bristling with surf rods and
fishermen clad in waders and dry tops.
Every day is different the last like
every day at right now the bird play was
so intense and you know if the fish are
there with it that's that's you know
naturally a plus. The baits been around
like yesterday by 7ish or something is
starting to break down a little bit. It
kind of like stopped a little bit but
early on it was like guys was running
after the birds.
My first five fish yesterday were right
with him and then after that it was like
you know a pick. You know this spot this is
Gilley's.
Guys are running!
Are we ready? Yeah I'm gonna gear up but
you guys get after it. Don't let me be that guy!
The weather may be unpleasant and the
fishing inconsistent but the New Jersey
striper season often saves the best for
last
and no one wants to miss out. The fish
have been on sand eels so everybody
pretty much is using a slim metal jig
just like that. It's gonna look just like
a sand eel when it comes through the
water and also to help your chances use
a little teaser. This is a red gill the
nice thing about the teasers is they're
a little bit more realistic looking than
the metals so you have the long casting
advantage of the metal boar and then the
realistic look of the teaser. So you
really improve your chances of getting
getting bites. There is gannetts sitting out there.
That's a pretty sunrise man.
It's a beautiful morning is right.
With a cold wind whipping over the dunes we took our positions among dozens of other
surf casters.
You got this guy from Massachusetts who can't cast straight.
Sal's in! Might pay to put on a soft bait.
Sal's a hero!
Well there's sand eels are around so you want
to use slender metals, the AVA jigs are
popular with a green tail. Traditional
tin squids some guys are throwing soft
baits and tsunami eels and the hogys.
You got to mix it up but the bait is sand
eels and you want to use to the worse
and artificial that are gonna imitate
that baitfish that's around if there's a
big bunker around you're gonna use
bigger plugs. So this is the bait sand
eels though everybody's throwing stuff
that looks like a sand eel.
Hopefully these fish are going to turn
on too. There's a lot of bait a lot of bird
play. Well they're in tight? I was in
what's tighter than I thought your or
had followed it in.
While I was throwing this thing out on
the shipping channels and almost quit on
this cast. Literally came right up right
hit right there. Come on you little fella
I love the color of these fish in the
fall. Look at the light on these fish
little kublah but beautiful fish end
of the season here we are in end of
November.
yeah so there's definitely a little bit
of a slow pick on the beach today seeing
plenty of birds picking so there's
definitely plenty of bait around on the
bait that's around this year is sand
eels which is a good thing I think the
one thing that the surf fishermen down
here in Jersey really liked about sand
eel bites is that it keeps the fish in
one place for a decent amount of time
when you have peanut butter or mullet or
larger baitfish like that they tend to
move pretty quickly and they bring the
fish with them the sand eels hunker down
in the sandbars especially somewhere
like Island Beach State Park and they'll
hold the fish around for a couple weeks
guy behind me just hooked up to his
third one in the past couple of minutes
I haven't had a bite yet but I'm seeing
some fish swirl definitely in the right
spot so just a matter of time
Wow they're in tight.
the color on these fish is awesome
that's what it is they've been working
the sandy botoom for a while so they
just lost most of their color what's
wild about it it's been a really slow
slow retrieve I would say that the
really slow retrieve but this guy just
engulfed it all the way down there you
go a little fella right now I'm letting
it almost bounce along the bottom
Perna's putting on a clinic Jimmy right
now is in through his he's got two. Wait
if he's not on the board yet. Is Jimmy on the board yet?
Look at the size shad he's got. Oh that's
a big hickory shad! Look at that.
Sal is throwing it like what we are
throwing to the shipping channels Sal is
flipping it not even 30 yards in front
of you. Every year it seems to be
different out here this year we finally
got sand eels they took residence the last
few weeks prior to that we had a lot of
rain bait and we had some albacore very
few blue fish this season and the
stripers just started showing up in
shore only the last week everybody was
anticipating the end of October and then
even into early November but that didn't
really materialize the boats did pretty
well offshore
some were out as far as almost a
three-mile when they unfortunately it
never happened on to surf which can
happen but we're anticipating maybe some
sea herring into next month and get some
bigger fish. Everybody last week has
switched out to some lighter tackle 9
foot rods 8 foot rods the fish are
smaller so the guys are throwing you
know the sand eels are around are
throwing Ava's metals of all sorts and
then the soft baits like tsunami eels
the hogy eels a bunch of soft baits
could work some paddle tails Kettle
Creek makes it a little paddle tail
that's been effective so we're imitating
that bait that's around and that's
what the fish are targeting.
Jimmy's on the board boys Jimmy's on
the board. yes Virginia there is a Santa
Claus! So my secret was I I saw the guy
on the beach was catching the most and I
crept up and right next door so that's a
fail-safe strategy if for not making
friends then for at least catching fish
little bit better one
and you definitely wanted that little
sand eel pretty pretty fish
and look at the sky look at all those
purples in there and dreams beautiful
a little bit of action this morning yeah
yeah we've had fish we're you know
lighter today than they were yesterday
everything seems to be working metals
and soft baits so
we're almost December it's fun exactly
yeah
yeah you know you don't have too many
days left it'll be show season and we'll
be dreaming about fishing
the fish weren't large but each one was
healthy feisty and had a belly bulging
with sand eels we weren't looking for
trophies just for the chance to say
goodbye to the stripers at the end of
another season and when any bass could
be your last of the year it's perfectly
acceptable to celebrate even for the
little ones
