Up Front Bait and Tackle

“We had an up and down month of October for striped bass fishing,” said Steve Haas over at Up Front Bait and Tackle, telling me on October 18 “The last three weekends of the month were washouts.” When it comes to the striped bass fishing October was all local fish, with the best fishing being in the back water areas of the bay, the rivers like the Passaic, Hackensack, Navesink and Shrewsbury, and around the bridges. When it comes to the bottom fishing October’s weather did not treat sinker bouncers well. Sea bass, tog, triggerfish, porgies and some winter flounder made up the bunk of the catch with was 75% sub-legal fish which had to be recycled. I asked Steve what he thought November would produce and he simply said that’s going to be up to the weather.

A call to Steve Haas over at Up Front Bait and Tackle got us several reports, as per most of or reports linesiders were at the top of the list. He told us the fishing was spotty early in the week, but really hit the proverbial fan after mid-week. That’s when schools of sandeels pushed into our northern waters around the Hook. A lot of the bigger bass were taking big topwater boats with some fish in the 45-pound plus mark and bigger. Steve also mentioned that the bottom fishing was decent with plenty of sea bass, however you had to pick through the shorts to get your ten keepers. Sinker bouncers also had some triggers, porgies, bonito and ling as well. Steve said it will be interesting to see what effect Sunday’s storm will have on the fishing.