Thanksgiving is Thursday, November 26. It is my favorite holiday; surrounded by loved ones and giving thanks for the blessings we have, those we’ve received, and God willing, the blessings to come.
My wife Michele and I typically host a dozen folks for dinner, all crammed around our small dining room table with food spilling out across the dining room. Michele has a unique recipe that involves slicking the entire bird with a gooey paprika mixture, then cramming the 18-pound turkey in a paper bag (thanks to New Jersey’s grocery bag law, this gets tougher every year).
The turkey bag process is a two-person job, which means Michele and I will jam the stuffed and bagged bird into the oven around 7 a.m., at which time I’m off to the beach in search of stripers until early afternoon. If I’m not mistaken, high tide along the oceanfront is around 8 a.m. which is ideal; I hope to be offering thanks later, after carving the bird and toasting loved ones with a glass of hard, New Jersey apple cider.
On Black Friday, weather permitting, I plan to be back driving the beach again all morning. It’s a half-day of fishing, as we host a second wave of family that day for a feast of leftovers and potluck offerings, with in-laws, outlaws, and general neighborhood scofflaws celebrating together as one big happy family. With two full days of tryptophan coursing through my veins, it may behoove me to “walk” the beaches rather than “drive” come Saturday.
In the glossy section of this month’s edition, I wrote up a feature story called Exiting Stripers: Greetings From The Jersey Shore, detailing where, when and how some of the best striper action may be found, from Sandy Hook down Cape May, through December. No, it’s not a “spot burn” even though some Jersey Shore surfcasters would probably prefer that our November madness isn’t publicized at all. But the fact remains, New Jersey has become the epicenter for November stripers along the Atlantic Coast.
Much like our Thanksgiving guests coming from as far away as upstate New York, arms overflowing with goodies, our fall striper run is a moveable feast, mostly dependent on menhaden and sand eels, though rainfish and sea herring will play a part as well. There’s been a noticeable lack of adult, 1-pound bunker along the coast this season, and while fisheries managers might call that an “anecdotal observation” it’s one I’ve heard shared among both commercial and recreational fishermen alike.
When the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission meets in Rhode Island from November 9-12, I hope commissioners will recognize the ecological importance of bunker, particularly in terms of the health and availability of striped bass. I would be quite thankful to see sensible reduction in the coastwide commercial harvest of this critical forage species, what the late Dr. Bruce Franklin called “The Most Important Fish in the Sea.”
Where and how these striped bass will be spread along the Jersey Shore this month and into December is unknown. Raritan Bay saw an influx of good-sized stripers in early October, and in our October 12, 2026 fishing reports, South Jersey field editor Anthony Califano noted how Cape May received an early bounty of big stripers in the back bays. “Add to this an honest bass blitz along Hereford Inlet this week and it is already shaping up to be a good fall run in southernmost South Jersey,” he added.
Word of advice – the new moon of November comes on the 9th, followed by a full moon on the 24th. Based on my own logs and the big lunar tides on either side, I have Wednesday, November 18th – national Apple Cider Day – circled on my calendar as the day for epic striper fishing in New Jersey.
God willing, more blessings to come.
