Before I became obsessed with collecting firewood, i was a fanatical fisherman . I still go as much as I can , but don't own a boat anymore, so don't get out as much as I would like. Got out yesterday for the Striped bass run in raritan bay, decent day with 5 keepers between 15-20 lbs.
That kind of fishing i almost as fun as CSS'ing a cord of straight grained 16" ash Gone on the barbecue this weekend ?
I cooked some last night in a lemon butter sauce with Panko breadcrumbs. I saved a piece with the skin on it to but right on the floor of the wood oven.
Great catching! 'Cos with 5 in the boat, it's no longer "fishing"- Striped bass is my personal favorite eatin' fish! And catching, too. I will NOT copy and paste these pics to my dad's email. He would be heartbroken. He fishes Smith Inlet where the Potomac meets the Chesapeake(Northern Neck of VA), and there's NOTHING there yet.
Late Spring, early Summer, then when the water cools down up into Nov, Dec. problem is, there are so many dead zones in the Bay, bait fish schools are down, plus they dredgethat inlet every couple of years, destroying any sea grass/ bottom vegetation that provides the cover so inviting to bait fish. But the deoxygenated areas of the Bay seem to be the biggest, agreed upon reason...
Used to be un real fishing on that inlet in the '90's... We could fish in the winter, a 1/2" of ice on the deck of our boat, killing 26"-36" "Rock" fish (what the locals out there call the sweet Striped Bass). You could actually bring in a 26" and leave it on the deck, and if you brought up a 34"... 30 minutes later, the smaller fish could safely be returned to the water to swim again!
Great pics on the boat WoodovenAT . Some great looking stripers you got there. I bet they were tasty....
Never known an untasty striper.... Not untasty "Stripper" Ashwatcher.... Sorry, WoodovenAT, trying to help Ashwatcher get accustomed to stuff. Plz forgive my intrusion. Although, I hold that my "Striper Scampi" dominates!
I believe WoodovenAT mite eat the Bass regardless of the striped color... Just hope he's not a Stryper fan...
I'm a Striper fan, not to big on Stryper , led Zeppelin is my favorite band ,followed by black sabbath,iron maiden,AC/dc , pink Floyd . As far as strippers go, I'll not comment... Lol
It seems like every year the menhaden boats get more and more before they reach the raritan, back in the late 90's you could practically walk across them, the schools were acres wide. Now your lucky to get them tight enough to even net.
We got 4 on bunker, 1 trolling manns stretch 25's. Bunker heads seemed to work best. We tried live lining the bunker first, but they just wouldn't commit to eating the whole fish.
Used to love Striper/Rockfish fishing when I lived around Baltimore. Fished the Chesapeake and Delaware Bays and caught many a Striper or Stripper as we used to call them!!
