Storms and stripers are married in an eternal embrace.
I love a late summer or early fall storm that stimulates good surf fishing. In fact, I drool over nor’easters, but please, no hurricanes or severe thunderstorms. Actually, I’ll take a good rain storm that shakes up the ocean and moves the bait anytime. Yes, I hear those of you who abhor the wind and rain in your face, and prefer better weather. I get it. It’s uncomfortable, cold, wet, and if you go home fishless, it’s like a punch in the gut. Well, that’s too bad for you, but better for guys like me because the beaches are dotted with fewer anglers and the fish are chewing.
Consistency
Obviously, people are free to approach hobbies and sports in any manner they like. A person can, for instance, play tennis once a week or every day, bowl in a league or take the kids twice a year. There is no right way or wrong way. However, a problem arises when a bowler who bowls once a month expects to average 250. What I’m saying is, each of us needs to find a niche in a hobby that satisfies their interest level and fits their schedule. In surf fishing, those of us crazies know we can’t expect to be consistently successful by only fishing on bluebird days. Most of us have found ways to deal with challenging weather, including good outer wear that keeps out most of the cold, wind, and rain, a safety belt over the top and around waist, and experience that helps us understand the benefits and hazards of storm fishing.
Then & Now
The lore of surf fishing is replete with stories of secret spots, secret lures, and secret information about everything from fishing spots to waders. The irritation about so-called secrets among fellow surf rats reaches a high pitch at times. For example, in the late 1970s I fished with Bob Krause and Fred Schwab. We were catching stripers from 20 to over 40 pounds in club competition. Several fellow club members; one with a pram and one with a spot light, cruised down Fire Island Inlet swinging the light from side to side and hollering that they knew we were there. We backed up into the reeds and mosquitos and they never found us. I guess it never occurred to them that they might have been more successful fishing the inlet instead of playing detective.
Today as in yesteryear, most of this chatter is banal chit-chat or about envy. There are no secrets in this modern era; at least any that last longer than a New York minute. The age of social media, cell phones, and many forms of instant communication exposes information just about as fast as it is generated. Nowadays, it is impossible to keep a run of fish quiet and so I pray it happens on a big public access beach that provides enough room to fish in peace.
What’s The Big Deal?
How does a storm stimulate good surf fishing? Oh, let me count the ways. I hope I mention them all, but I’ll probably forget a few. I think I can generalize by equating it to a chemist mixing a series of substances. In some cases, the reaction is immediate, but there are other times when the chemicals stratify when introduced and seek their own levels. Then, when the chemist stirs them together, a cascade of reactions begins.
Let’s start before the storm. Most storms follow a period of calm and stable weather. During stable weather, the water stratifies into layers so that the shallows along the shore are warmer than the water on the surface off the beach, and the offshore surface is warmer than the layers beneath it. Plankton stratifies in the cooler and nutrient rich deeper water along with small fishes that eat plankton. If stripers and blues do find them, the bite will be offshore in deeper water, and generally go unnoticed. The winds of a storm generate waves that act like a giant stirrer and mixes the layers sending plankton and baitfish scattering in all directions, including toward the beach.
Also, on an east wind, bait deep in the south shore bays is pushed closer and closer to the inlet with each outgoing tide. After several tide cycles, some bay bait becomes staged at the mouth of the inlet, while some of the offshore bait is pushed shoreward by waves. It isn’t a guarantee, but sooner or later migrating fish or resident fish will smell the bait and attack. However, this is not usually a widespread event and one beach may be hot while another is barren.
Cover Vs. Structure
Some anglers confuse cover with structure. Structure is irregularities in the bottom. It could be a bar, rock pile, boulders, wreck, or the lip of the beach. Cover is anything that makes fish and bait feel more comfortable such as marshy areas at high tide, waves, a raft of weeds floating on top, or even cloud cover. It might seem strange that predators such as stripers and blues react positively to cover, given they are bigger and less vulnerable. However, it’s ingrained into their instincts from a time when they were newly hatched and vulnerable. Even as adults the instinct persists, but they become less reluctant to enter very shallow water when it’s windy and cloudy. That’s why, night surf fishing is generally more productive than daytime surf angling. Have you ever heard the expression, under the cover of darkness?
With that being said, don’t underestimate the cover provided by clouds. Most predators shy away from bright light most of the time. Fish like stripers and blues have eyes that gather much more light than ours, and although this allows them to feed accurately at night, it’s stressful in bright light. However, they have to eat and will feed in bright light if they are hungry and the food is abundant. Indeed, clouds provide cover and special feeding opportunities. Clouds also diminish or eliminate the shadows cast by predators that baitfish otherwise notice. Thus, it is easier for predators to sneak up and attack when they don’t cast shadows.
At Your Feet
I have had stripers and blues of all sizes swim between my legs during storms. The cover of clouds that reduces light, and waves and wind that dampens other sounds makes them comfortable. Add some bait and they will feed in water so skinny that they are half exposed. I recall fishing during a storm on a mussel bar along a north shore beach. Stripers fed on the bar even though the water was only ankle deep. However, apparently, they needed more cover, so although I saw their dorsal fins and backs out of water between waves, they only fed under the cover of white water when waves broke across the bar.
Bait Vulnerability
| MENTAL SIDE |
| Ross Squire, former President and current Vice President of the New York Coalition for Recreational Fishing once said to me, “The hardest part of successful surf fishing is the mental side of the game.” He’s right. What he didn’t say was that mastering the mental aspect of the sport is the only real secret that persists. When a surf angler combines mental agility, sound use of gear, an understanding of fish and bait behavior, the effect of tide and weather, and then embraces the joy of fishing during the height of a storm, he or she can become a great surf angler. |
Storms and their waves, along with stronger currents in inlets and lateral sweeps in the ocean, makes bait easier to attack. Bunker, herring, sand eels, mullet, spearing, and anchovies all swim well, but not with the speed and power of stripers and blues. I have caught fish numerous times during storms at the lip of a beach as 5 and 6-foot waves collapsed onto the slope, ran up the slope of the beach, and then ran down under the incoming wave to the lip. There is an edge at the lip, the water is skinny, discolored, and the turbulence is extreme, yet stripers can handle it and swim easily along the lip sucking in shrimp, worms, sand fleas, or baitfish tossed around in the turbulence.
This turbulence is often so severe that a human would drown in seconds, but predators like stripers and blues simply laugh at those conditions. Therefore, during storms, finish your retrieve to the beach and onto the slope because that might be the place where the bulk of the fish are feeding. Many anglers accelerate the retrieve during the last 50 feet, all but eliminating the chance to catch fish feeding below their lure at the lip.
The Savvy Angler
How then, does the experienced and accomplished surf rat take advantage of the storm?
These are the weapons available to the angler.
- Experience: the accumulation of information that guides decisions.
- Mastery of tackle: The consistent ability to select the best lure, cast well, and retrieve properly.
- Mental Mastery: The ability to focus and perform consistently given the factors at play during a trip and do it without emotion. Example, don’t use a lure because you like it, use it because your knowledge and experience suggests it’s the best choice.
- Storms: Understand how the elements of a storm provide enhanced opportunities to catch fish. These include cloud cover, wind cover, bigger waves and stronger currents that push bait around and create feeding opportunities.
- Structure: Understand how bottom structure produces eddies and edges where bait tries to hide and avoid predators, but where waves, wind, and current push them around.
- Cover: Understand the role of cover in the feeding dynamics that create bites during storms.
Find your comfy fishing spot. Calm or stormy, fish your own way, but understand, storms and stripers are married in an eternal embrace.
