This season marks 35 years since catching my first “targeted” striped bass along the beaches of Long Beach Island. It happened not long after graduating college, so the whole career path thing got a little sidetracked in 1990 with this new passion for chasing stripers. My younger years on LBI were spent chasing bluefish, weakfish and summer flounder from the back bays to the open beaches, but with the striper population at precariously low levels for much of my youth I never bothered targeting them; too much work, very little gain.
But the 90s changed that perspective for me and many other anglers who began getting into the striper fishery for the first time. And the number of striped bass continued to grow, until the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) ultimately declared striped bass officially rebuilt in 1995, ushering in a new era of striper fishing along the Atlantic Coast as fisheries managers boasted of a conservation victory of epic proportions.
In 2025, the ASMFC projections show that the spawning stock biomass will again hit that 1995 rebuilt level. However, we won’t be celebrating similar success any time soon. The new 2029 rebuild goal for striped bass is 125% of that 1995 level, meaning that in order to have a rebuilt fishery full of big mature striped bass capable of spawning, it has to be 25% higher than it is now, and from what it was in 1995. It’s a mark, by the way, that’s only been achieved four times in 40 years of striped bass management.
There’s a lot we don’t know about striped bass; “best available science” is what the managers often say when plotting a path towards conservation success. That’s why The Fisherman first partnered with the folks at Gray Fishtag Research back in 2019, in hopes of adding more data to the mix. Thus far the ASMFC hasn’t exactly been beating down our door to get a look at the information compiled through 6 years of tagging, but that doesn’t mean it’s not solid science that’s now available to someday gain a better understanding of striped bass. With a new benchmark assessment coming in 2027 and the historic rebuilding deadline just 4 years away, who knows if or when the data you and I have been collecting through striper tagging could be considered best available.
This Thursday, May 15, Gray Fishtag Research and The Fisherman Magazine will once again open up our annual spring tagging expedition to the angling public for StriperQuest ’25. Five boats in this year’s event will be deploying high-tech pop-up archival fish tags to track light, depth and temperature profiles over the next several months, but most of the StriperQuest field will competing to see who can catch, measure, tag and release the most striped bass using Gray Fishtag Research streamer tags.
The captains meeting is at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, May 14 at Gateway Marina, 34 Bay Avenue in Highlands, NJ; at least one member of each crew must be present to pick up tagging equipment. There’s a mandatory check-in on Thursday morning off Bahr’s Landing (display BOAT Number and radio check VHF 63) at 6:30 a.m., with lines in at 7 am. After the 2:30 p.m. conclusion of fishing, it’s back to Gateway Marina by 4:30 p.m. to turn in tag data cards and gather any awards. First place will receive 50% of the tournament pot, second place gets 30%, while third place crew collects 20%.
Most striped bass tournaments over the years have been based solely on quality (biggest fish, whereas StriperQuest is all about quantity (most fish). We hope that by creating the largest single day of striped bass tagging anywhere along the Striper Coast, that perhaps someday fisheries managers can better quantify and qualify conservation efforts on striped bass on the path to future rebuilding success.
