“November is the brand new October.” When you’re a striped bass fisherman from New York or New Jersey, you’ve heard this phrase uttered in bait and deal with outlets, seashore parking tons, or amongst mates throughout an evening tide. Over the previous couple of years, from the South Shore of Lengthy Island to Northern New Jersey, the autumn run of striped bass appears to peak through the eleventh hour. Gentle water temperatures (by November requirements) have discovered acres of bunker parading west and south alongside the sand seashores close to the Massive Apple. There’s no telling for sure when the ultimate wave of bass will transfer by your space, however final week, with a robust easterly blow and pouring rain forecasted for Thursday morning, surfcasters on Lengthy Island took discover and hit the sand with excessive hopes for some motion in textbook fall run situations.
Our plan fell into place throughout my voyage throughout Lengthy Island Sound late on Wednesday evening. The group textual content Nick Cherkas despatched to me and Sean Conway learn, “Look ahead to seeing you guys tomorrow. I plan on being within the lot by 7 a.m.” The December new moon was approaching, we’d have the ebb tide on our facet at dawn, and a storm entrance shifting in from offshore. Every part was lining up completely.
Within the car parking zone, it was raining sideways. I took the ultimate swig of a sugar-free Crimson Bull and started to strap up my waders as Nick pulled in. Sean was working a bit behind, which was to be anticipated since he had an extended drive from the japanese North Shore, so Nick and I started the hike out to our first spot. We couldn’t have been strolling for greater than 5 minutes when, within the distance, a frantic scene started to unfold. “Do you see that?” I excitedly exclaimed with my rod tip pointed towards a black cloud of low-flying gulls and gannets immediately forward. Our leisurely stroll was a hustled speedwalk, and as we reached the seashore, a lineup of three or 4 surfcasters to our proper had been tight to fish. A couple of drenched anglers had been already heading in with their slot fish slung over one shoulder and surf rod over the opposite. There have been a handful of middle consoles braving the situations, every chasing their very own wolf pack of surface-feeding stripers across the inlet, whereas 100 yards to our left, bunker had been being pinned to shore in lower than 2 toes of water. I’m not an NFL participant, so I don’t know what it feels prefer to stroll out of the locker room tunnel through the Tremendous Bowl, however I’d think about the adrenaline rush feels one thing like this second. “That is what we play for.”
Given the situations and the presence of grownup bunker, we packed giant plugs and lures able to chopping by robust headwinds and digging into tough surf. My single-tube ODM bag carried a number of yellow and white bottle plugs, darters, needlefish, metallic lips, bucktails, paddletails, and minnow plugs. Nick and I clipped on minnow plugs to begin. The interior weight-transfer methods of lures like Magazine Darters, SP Minnows, and Shimano Present Sniper jerkbaits, would assist us to succeed in the fish now boiling 60 yards out in entrance of us. We launched our first two casts, and inside a number of cranks of the reel deal with, we each got here tight and landed over-slot stripers. I let loose a number of hoots and hollers that had been all however muted by the 35-knot wind and pelting rain. Two casts later, I received bit once more and misplaced the fish, together with my total chief. “Bluefish”, I murmured by clenched tooth. I retied, and once more, my 5-inch NLBN paddletail was stolen on the primary forged. In hindsight, we didn’t see a single bluefish caught all day, and my guides weren’t chipped, so I donated two lures because of my very own shoddy knot tying, which I attributed to already-numb, moist fingers and being overly desperate to get again on the market. “The place the hell is Sean!?” Nick shouted as we every landed and launched one other fish earlier than deciding to press nearer to the inlet.
It didn’t take lengthy to appreciate a transfer to the inlet was a sensible choice. It was a funnel for all of the bunker that had been being flushed out of the close by backwaters, and the water was way more turbulent. We found Sean had already made his method to the inlet, the place a lineup of 10 to fifteen surfcasters had been clambering over the jetty rocks (and one another) to land their fish. The swell was breaking proper on the jetty tip, sending partitions of sea spray over the heads of anglers fishing the outgoing rip. The three of us secured a spot alongside the within, the place a shoal had shaped because of storms like this one depositing a great deal of sand into the inlet. Because the tide continued to drop, waves broke over the sting of the bar and despatched blankets of white water speeding in parallel to the jetty. Any lure that landed within the frothy, tumbling wash got here again within the lip of a striper. By now, there was extra standing room on the bar, and lots of the casters from the jetty joined us on the base of the rocks to occupy that open area and fish the white water.
Surprisingly, there have been just one or two tangles your complete time. The etiquette exhibited by this group was a nice shock; we silently labored out a casting rhythm utilizing a nod or thumbs as much as let the following caster know they had been good to go with out crossing strains. By means of the wind-driven rain, the one audible sounds had been high-pitched cackles and slipping drags. Guys had been catching on something and the whole lot—surface-swimming metallic lips, glidebaits, minnow plugs, poppers, you identify it, it was getting bit.
I wished in on the topwater motion, regardless that poppers weren’t being vacuumed as much as the identical diploma as subsurface lures. However after deep hooking a slot-size striper with a white, 2-ounce Wally’s Pencil Popper, I made a decision the very last thing I wished to be coping with in these situations had been treble hooks. As a substitute, I clipped on a white Yo-Zuri Hydro Minnow LC armed with two 5/0 VMC inline single hooks. With restricted area to land our fish, and waves crashing into us within the course of, this was the suitable transfer. It made each dealing with and releasing the fish simpler, faster, and safer. The plug change got here on the proper time, as a result of moments later, mid-sized bunker had been swimming proper between our legs, searching for sanctuary from their aggressors that had been stacked just a few yards out from the jetty. This wave of fish consisted of barely bigger bass, round 16 to 18 kilos, they usually had been blowing bunker filter out of the water. Any forged positioned on the bottom of a furling wave was acknowledged by a hungry teen-class striper. Sean, Nick and I’d have been completely content material catching a pair schoolies on Thanksgiving… however constantly catching fish of this class, this late within the fall run, was a blessing. Nevertheless, getting them again within the water shortly was my primary concern, and the treble hooks weren’t serving to that trigger.
By now, it was late morning and the wind had shifted from a stiff east blow to southeast, which introduced larger surf and created a pronounced bow in every of our strains, making it difficult to remain involved with our lures. At one level, I turned to launch a fish, and an incoming wave smacked me within the chest, soaking my heat layers and briefly lifting me off me toes. I shivered it off, laughed, and, within the curiosity of soldiering on with single hooks, determined it was bucktail o’clock. 5 casts of a white, 1-ounce Lifeless Reckoning Bucktail with an XL hackle introduced 5 fish at hand, and Nick and Sean shortly reached for the closest copy they had been carrying. What’s to not love a couple of good bucktail chew? Subsequent to paddletails and swim shads, I feel a bucktail gives the purest, most direct connection that lure fishermen can have with a striper; there’s no swivels, cut up rings, or exhausting plastic concerned, only a lead head and a hook shank. Our bucktails had been in a position to punch by the wind and reduce the bow in our strains, and the jigs had been incessantly taken on the drop—we had been coming tight earlier than even choosing up all of the slack line from the forged. The three of us stood shoulder to shoulder with 8 different anglers and wailed on stripers from schoolie dimension to nearly 20 kilos till simply earlier than midday.
With extra fish than we may have presumably hoped for over the course of 4 hours, I pulled out my cellphone to snap a number of photographs of the melee nonetheless unfolding in entrance of us. Whether or not it was because of my uncooked, chafed thumbs or a beneficiant coating of salt water and fish slime, the iPhone’s heat-sensitive contact display didn’t reply nicely. However I nonetheless managed a number of good photographs.
Because it seems, the Thanksgiving Blitz of 2024 wasn’t particular to our location on Western Lengthy Island. I later realized, after chatting with household good friend and proprietor of Turtle Cove Deal with, Kenny Lucano, {that a} related blitz occurred concurrently out east close to Moriches. Kenny stated the bass he and mates had been catching had been on the smaller facet, however nonetheless, it was a Thanksgiving morning for the books. Throughout Lengthy Island, these storm situations triggered stripers of all sizes to fatten up and feast with their relations earlier than it was time to go for house. Mockingly, 90% of Individuals would spend the remainder of the day doing the identical.
Like all good striper fishing story, this one ends with “we left them biting.” Again within the lot, Sean, Nick and I grinned ear to ear as we wished one another a cheerful Thanksgiving and parted methods to spend time with our households. Earlier than pulling off, I sat for a second in my truck, the place it was nearly uncomfortably heat and quiet. After hours of wooing, shouting, and whistling wind rapping in opposition to the hood of my jacket, the now mild pitter-patter of raindrops on the windshield was unusually deafening. When you’ve ever left a loud live performance and jumped right into a taxi cab or an empty automobile on the LIRR, you’re accustomed to this sound of uncomfortable silence. Simply then, “Gimme Stitches” by the Foo Fighters started to play over the automobile stereo; I cranked up the quantity, however the uncomfortable silence lingered. I feel it should follow me till someday within the early spring of 2025, when it is going to be damaged solely by the sound of crashing surf, a slipping drag, or the WOOO! of an exuberant surfcaster.
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