Plants blooming and fish zooming! What a great weekend it has been. Spring has sprung!!!

“In celebration of Earth Day please post a blurb about packing out what you bring in! Just did a clean up with the family at the Bridge. The amount of plastic and trash on the bay front is unreal. It’s mostly all left by anglers. ”
~ Ken Sullivan of Ship Bottom

Remember Fishing’s Two Golden Rules – 1) Pack Out What You pack in. If there isn’t a public garbage can (or in the event a public receptacle is full) bring your garbage home.

Early season fishing reports continue strong and we are set for a great back half of April. It’s the same story at early season spots in the back bay with anglers are enjoying the striped bass fishing. The nice run of sunny days as of late has the Barnegat Bay water temp (BI-BB area) at 50 degrees. Austin Pounds recently got into some striped bass on the fly. Store staffer Max has caught bass on lures during his recent trips.

Bait like bloodworms, clam and cut squid are getting bites as well as lures. The go to lures are be bucktail jigs and soft plastics. One of our best sellers for many years is the Lunker City Fin-s which is a killer bait on bass and weakfish. Also the Tsunami Swim Shads are producing.

This past week more weakfish showed as well as some black drum and speckled trout. Chris Bender stopped in the shop yesterday. While here he shared he’s catching specks and also having fun with bass. He also stepped into a new pair of waders and wading boots. He opted for the Frogg Toggs Hellbender Stockfoot Waders a great value 4 ply wader with double reinforced knees at $129.99 and a pair of Korkers Wraptr Wading Boot.

These new wading boots are outta this world! These $199.99 boots feature Krokers exclusive Wraptr Tech Armor. This ultimate one piece single seam design and compression molded construction solves the age old problem with all wading boots, seam failures. They are surprisingly light and like all Korkers boots offer the ultimate comfort, support and OmniTrax interchangeable soles!

Yesterday the Carolyn Ann III out of Barnegat Light reported a good day on the ocean. “Bob Wallace won the pool with a nice 10.5 pound tog and Jimmy Mac caught his limit.”

Other anglers aboard reiterated the trip’s success. Richard Ackerman reported, “It’s always a great time fishing aboard the CA3 with a super crew and friends.”

Matt Sorrentino was also aboard. He checked in his biggest at the shop, a 4.72 pound white chin and reported, “Slow start but we finished the day strong. I was one shy of a limit. Nice fish with a mix of shorts.”

Paul Haertel was also on the water this weekend. He shared, “Gave the trout and steelhead a break today (Saturday) and caught my limit of blackfish up to 8.5 pounds.”

It’s great to see anglers getting out on the wrecks with the nice weather. Land based anglers are picking a few small tog. We expect this to improve as the Barnegat Inlet offers prime jetty tog fishing in late April and May.

Long Beach Island Surf Fishing

The surf fishing along the Island’s beaches is dead! The water is just too cold for the bite to materialize. Last we heard it was 44 degrees. Those looking for a productive outing should turn to the bay side until the surf creeps up to 48-50 degrees. Once the water warms things will come alive.

Matt Polito was out on the hunt Saturday. He drove the beaches and looked for life but didn’t find anything. He reported, “I went of the search for a striped one or yellow eye. Covered lots of ground but no fish. All of the anglers I crossed paths with had the same report. NOTTA! Any day it’s going to happen.”

The LBI Spring Surf Tournament kicked off this weekend. Sign up now for the $20 event. And be sure to join the Fish Head’s Calcutta for $10. Half goes to the largest striped bass and half to the largest bluefish. Next weekend there is a one day surf tournament too.

Hopefully with our progression into mid-late April, the current warming trend and the increase in participation (especially with these two events) some reports will fill in. Soon anglers will man their battle stations as the bluefish invade.