What is the best way to catch Striped Bass in the New Jersey surf?

Answer 1

I fish on the Long Island surf, but I'm sure it's the same way in Belmar, Sandy Hook, etc. First of all you will need at least a good quality ten foot pole and a big enough reel to handle 20 pound test line. Baitrunner Shimano 4500 is good. As bait, use whole clams or cut bunker fish. If you use bunker, you will also catch bluefish. From my experience, bluefish only hit clams in the backbays never in the ocean. Tide is not as important as one might think. What's important is information. With Striped bass, you need to find the hot spot on the beach. When you fish, look around and see if anyone is picking up any fish. If so, keep that place in your memory and fish it next time you fish. Bass like to stay on the same piece of beach structure for at least a few days before they move somewhere else to feed.

Answer 2

Al McReynolds pulled this World Record striper from the Atlantic fishing at night off the Vermont Ave. jetty in Atlantic City following days of September Nor'easter storming in 1982. The fish was taken on a 5 1/2-inch long Rebel Black-back silver minnow plug on 20-pound test line. It took one hour and 40 minutes to land the fish on the slippery jetty. The fish measured 53 inches in length with a 34 1/2 inch girth, and was estimated to be 20 - 22 years old. Its 78 pound 8 oz. weight earned it the IGFA all-tackle record!

Why change something that apparently worked.
On 1 pole use a 5 1/2-inch long Rebel Black-back silver minnow plug on 20-pound test.
On another pole tie a nice fresh piece of Clam and cast out as far as you can, have a beer and wait. Good luck.

Answer 3

Striped Bass are easy to catch. I use a large white Jig twister tail.
cast it out and swim it back slowly and if there are stripers in the area they will strike it.

Some Stripers have been known to feed on liver and anchoves from the bottom, but I do better with Jigs.

Here in Georgia at Goat Rock Dam we wait till they start generating water from the dam and then above the dam not below we start casting our Jigs and have landed anywhere from 4 lbs to 16 lb stripers. It is a huge fight and very much a ball of fun.

I have had 20 lb test snap because they were so big I couldn't get them out. The current is fierce and that adds to the tension.

All of the local boys in Harris County know the risks of fishing above the dam and it is very dangerous. If you fall in, your stuck till they stop generating there is no way out of the trap against the gates.

Now they have fenced it up making it harder to fish, but we still climb the fence and go down there because the fishing is like nothing in this world catching 22 lb Stripers.

Now below the dam, you can use small Bluegill or Bream hooked through the tail and throw him out with no weight attached. Let him drift naturally and watch what happens.

Fishing for Stripes is not hard you just have to know whrere they are and they especially love running water that's why the Chattahoochee River in Georgia stocks some the largest Stripers around.

Once the horn blows and Georgia Power starts generating it's on.
Once the water stops moving the Stripes quit biting and the reason is as follows:

Bait fish that are small cannot swim up current once the generating starts, so the big Stripes just swoop in and feed on them before they are sucked down the turbines. The bait fish struggle to maintain their level and the big ones snatch them up.

This is why generating water from the dam has yielded some of the biggest Stripes in Georgia and that is no lie!

I once went Jug fishing for Catfish at Lake Harding in Georgia, using Clorox Jugs. We had fifteen Jugs in the water put out just after midnight. One hour later, a huge splash and we had fourteen Jugs left and one was missing.

I have never in my life seen a Catfish submerge a gallon Jug and not surface again. That's is just one story to let you know how buig Catfish get in the Chattahooche to make things simple. their big enough to swallow a man.

Answer 4

The best way is to go in the morning or evening. You can fish the bottom with salted clams (which smell terrible and make your hands stink) but are quite effective. I have had the most luck using a 5in rapala slash bait. This is a shallow diving crank bait and I landed 6 keepers this fall with the same lure. The most effective color seemed to be black and red. I fish the jetties of over in the squan.