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The season is here: The doors have been reopened every day at Gibson’s Tackle, Wes said. The freezer is loaded with new, 2010 bait, and live green crabs and bloodworms will be stocked soon. The crabs, bait for blackfish, were the one bait anglers asked about, but the worms will be able to be dunked for striped bass. A few customers on Sunday tried to catch blackfish or stripers along the back-bay bridges and ocean-front jetties. Stripers could certainly be in the mix if anglers found a warm-water eddy up the rivers, such as when they fished for white perch. Perch were sometimes plucked from the Tuckahoe River on grass shrimp. The surf was too cold, and Wes would be pleased if stripers began to be beached from the wash at the end of March or beginning of April. Stop in the shop to check out the rearranged displays, including the ones for bucktails, hooks and rods. A few new items came in, including Wizard hooks, an economical alternative to more expensive hooks such as Gamakatsu. St. Croix rods will now be carried at the store.
Capt. Joe Hughes from Jersey Cape Guide Service, affiliated with Gibson’s Tackle, took his first shot of the year at striped bass on a trip during the weekend, fishing on the back bay, he said. No stripers appeared, and he wasn’t completely surprised, because waters were cool. But the weather was so nice that he fished. His first bass of the year are usually knuckled in during March. That could happen late this season, because of the unusually cold winter and more snow than usual, but there’s no predicting. He probably won’t fish much locally in the next week or two, and he’ll continue offering until early April traveling charters to the Florida Keys that he’s been running through winter. But catch the March Special on striper trips: no fish, no pay. Be the first to catch a striped bass this year. Charters cast Clouser flies or soft plastic lures to the linesiders, working the line very slowly through the waters. Joe often fishes for the year’s first bass on high, outgoing, warmer tides at places like the creek outflows or near the warm waters of the Beesley’s Point power plant. But other tides sometimes produce, depending on location. Warmer tides that coincide with mid day around 1 or 2 p.m., when the sun has had time to heat waters, can help. Striper fishing usually becomes consistent in April in the bay, and bluefish usually arrive in the bay in late April. Stripers will continue to bite for a moment, but blues usually take over the angling sometime in May for some weeks. The tough fighters are a blast on light tackle, and afterward many of the blues depart for the ocean for the summer, though some remain in the bay. Flounder season opens Memorial Day weekend, and the flattie fishing is often best in the early season in the shallow, warm bays of South Jersey. The holiday boat traffic fails to affect the bottom-hugging flounder, and book that weekend’s trips now before they fill. That angling can sometimes drill fun mixed bags of species, or it can sometimes produce the best flounder fishing. For now, Joe will keep offering either the Florida trips or the striper trips. If anglers want a spur-of-the-moment getaway to the Keys, that’s available. Weekend packages are available to the Keys that arrive on Friday evenings, fish all day Saturdays and part of Sundays, and return Sunday evenings. The Florida trips fish from the back country for species such as redfish, speckled sea trout and jacks to the ocean side for bruisers such as king mackerel, cero mackerel, sailfish and blackfin tuna. See more info on the Traveling Fisherman Charters page on Jersey Cape’s Web site. Also see Jersey Cape’s blog that includes blogs and photos from past Florida trips.
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