A Liability Insurance Plan is Good for Fishing

Couple of years ago, believe I arrived at Round Valley shortly after the snow stopped. A scene like this one always suggests a distant hope.

 Clicking on bruceedwardlitton.com/fishing will put you on my new website's fishing page. You can read the introduction, and then in the future, when you go to that page, simply click "Jump to Posts," which will take you directly to the posts. To access the home page, click www.bruceedwardlitton.com. From there you can navigate to other pages by using the menu at the top of the page.

Insurance is the chief subject of this post, and I can hear the groans already. It's worthwhile to consider, though, because it answers happens-chance with security. And things do happen out of our control. Most of us by far never get into serious trouble, but it could happen. 

My suggestion is the insurance plan of New Jersey Federation of Sportsmen's Clubs, a good one for the cost of membership. You're automatically enrolled. A good price, especially given that the publication you get every month, New Jersey Federated Sportsmen's News, is worth the price alone if you value excellent outdoor writing. 

I'll get to more about insurance and the publication in a moment. First, a little to catch up on. 

Last I wrote, I said I might have the new website up by Monday. It's Wednesday now, and I don't want to leave anyone hanging. I paid the subscription on Monday and connected the domain to my website today, since I had some questions I needed answers to first. And though I ran behind of schedule, as I had suggested in the previous post might happen, I hadn't accounted for the Domain Name System having to propagate. Even before I go public with the website, the domain has to also connect to DNS servers worldwide, and it can take 48 hours or more. I should have remembered that from when I connected a custom domain to the blog you're reading now, but I'm far from perfect at being the "webmaster" my wife now says I am. 

Have to get it right, though. And after I do go public, it can take another 48 hours or more before the website is accessible on Google and other search engines. So hang in there. We'll be on new ground soon. At least I sure hope so! I have invested a lot of time, and more often than not, it all feels worthwhile. I will provide that website address on this post and on the previous, as well as try and figure out a way to put it on the home page. That way, at least those of you who use the web version (for laptops and PC's) can see the address there.

I did fish on Monday. This past Friday, too. I haven't posted on either event, because I plan on doing that on the new website. It's possible I'll post about the fishing I did Monday, here. Wait and see how long it's taking for the new website to become visible.

About today's subject, four or five years ago, I felt put off by New Jersey Federation of Sportsmen's Clubs having raised the price of membership from $25.00 (opting out of the insurance offered for an additional $15.00), to $40.00 and insurance mandatory. That insurance, I imagined, is mostly for hunters, and I don't hunt. A friend of mine tells me it's mandatory for management hunts. 

But speaking of imagination, there's not only a lot I can imagine going wrong when fishing with friends, how many times has a friend--in fact--nearly taken the side of my face off by casting too close? I might end up doing the same to him. I pride myself on being a caring and careful sort, but you can't be too careful, and part of it is having yourself covered in case something does go wrong you just couldn't have helped...but are liable for. 

So for the low price of membership in NJFSC, the insurance is a deal. 

I'm not a public relations guy. I'm not making money on an affiliate link or in any way whatsoever, I'm just sharing with you my epiphany, my going from having no interest in insurance, to seeing why it's good for peace of mind. Peace of mind, after all, lends itself to care.

I believe in NJFSC, too. The club has a down-to-earth, fact-centered attitude connecting thousands of us. And the writers you'll read in New Jersey Federated Sportsmen's News are noted outdoorsmen. Vin T. Sparano, for example, is Editor Emeritus of Outdoor Life magazine, having served as Editor-in-Chief 1990-1995 of that magazine. He writes "Woods & Waters Notebook." Rick Methot writes humorous stories based on fact in "On the Road," having also written the outdoor column for The Trentonian many years and sometimes winning Outdoor Writers Association awards. John Toth is a noted conservationist and officer of the New Jersey Outdoor Alliance. His articles having to do with a wide panoply of conservation issues fascinate me because they are so well informed and detailed. Marty Boa writes the "The Sporting View," and I don't believe there's another writer on the planet who can offer you detailed, practical outdoor advice as well as he does. Lou Martinez we haven't heard from in awhile, but his articles have a spirit of comradery that is valuable for fishing and hunting. 

When Oliver Shapiro served as editor, on one occasion, he asked us who write for the newsletter to create "thought pieces." As I've suggested, it's substantially more than a newsletter. One I came up with, "The Iron Bridge," is my favorite. Talk about distant hope. The piece concludes on us sportsmen possibly being the Iron Bridge to the future. 

I doubled the length of that piece and include it on my new website as my first Literature and Philosophy blog post, the title expanded. "The Iron Bridge: An Essay on Necessity." 

I hope it will go places out there in the world of the internet. But especially, better than cyberspace.

New Website and NJFSC   

 

What My New Website Will Contain

Photo shot of me by Matt Litton at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles this past June.

By clicking on bruceedwardlitton.com/fishing, you'll be on the fishing page and can read the introduction. The jump link ("Jump to Posts") will allow you to quickly access the blog posts in the future, bypassing the introduction you've already read. To access the home page, go to bruceedwardlitton.com. From there you can access other pages from the menu at the top of the page.

The past 14 years of blogging have been a relationship to my readers I'm not giving up. I'm only asking you to follow my new site. I'll type the link to it into this post as soon as the site is live, which might be Monday, but things have been behind plans of recent. I know many of you by name. You who regularly read the blog. Many more of you remain unknown to me, except that we're all readers, most of us anglers, and likely the majority of us New Jersey residents, so you're not as unknown to me as someone from another planet! 

The blog on the new site is divided into three categories: Fishing, Literature and Philosophy, Photography. I encourage you to explore the whole site, though if you're only interested in the Fishing blog category, you know what to expect, though I'll get to a new feature in a moment. There's also a Home page (Bruce Edward Litton); an About page with a very long and difficult essay; a Books page with another long essay about my coming book The Microlight Quest about trout fishing, the value of recreation, and the life of the mind; a Gallery mostly of photos from Round Valley Reservoir when low water created landscape photo opportunities; a Contact page; and of course, the Blog dropdown, including, separately, all the blog posts and those three categories. 

In addition to the same blogging I do now, the Fishing category will include, every two or three weeks, maybe monthly, an article originally published in New Jersey Federated Sportsmen's News. The link takes you to the New Jersey Federation of Sportsmen's Clubs website, because the News is available only to members. 

When I sell an article, I'm really selling the rights for its first publication and usually selling exclusivity for a six month period thereafter. After six months, I'm free to publish the article anywhere else, the copyright mine. In the case of The Fisherman magazine, since every article I get published there is published online as well as in the print and members-only issues, I not only don't want to make a mess of things by duplicating text to confuse the googlebot and getting penalized by turn; my genuine respect for the magazine's online coverage amounts to their efforts being more than enough. The Fed, as I affectionately call the News, does not publish articles online. Members get an electronic issue of the News in members-only PDF form. Naturally, many members know nothing about my blogging, as I don't advertise it, and besides, they're getting my articles freshly written. 

Although these articles are more and less evergreen, I believe a distinct value exists in getting word firsthand. As lasting as the value of an article may be, often the highlights involve local events that happened recently. For example, the first blog post of the new website's Fishing category is "Cold Snaps for Baiting Walleye." The original published in the Fed in 2019, a passage includes a quoted exclamation from one of the people at Dow's Boat Rentals about the overheated October weather. Spoken only a year prior, the words felt fresh in a way they don't now. That quote might also impart to you an epiphany of the life at Dow's, only now they're no longer renting boats to the general public. 

Besides being called the Fed, it's called the News for a reason.

Some of you who follow my blog probably don't visit twice a week or weekly. Regularity lapses and a month-and-a-half might have passed. Members of NJFSC get the News monthly. It's always there for them at about the same time each month, and my articles aren't the only ones. As much as I'd like to blog one of the articles every two weeks on the nose, I know my life isn't regular enough to do that. Another reason getting the Fed isn't a bad idea.

I don't mean to downplay the added value of feature articles I'll post every month or so. I do want to show, however, that I'm not cheating the Fed. First and foremost, the particular features of mine they publish characterize that publication, not my website. First and foremost, I'm writing them for the Fed. Though I'm altogether in my rights to publish the articles as I please after first use, they would be in theirs to refuse to publish me, if I were to keep publishing articles I do for them on my site. If they were to disapprove, though my argument isn't done yet. Nevertheless, it's not an easy decision. Of over 4000 readers of the Fed each month, however, regular readers of my blog among them are only a small fraction of that number. 

A relative few of the formerly Fed articles published on my new website will find a lot of readers that have done Google searches. Most of them, it's likely, readers hearing about NJFSC for the first time, and some of them will go on the NJFCS website and learn about the organization. I plan on providing a link to the club's website every time I post an article I first got published there. A few readers may join. I'm certainly doing them no disservice in this respect. After all, you can read excellent writers for the Fed you might not read anywhere else, and they have regular columns amounting to interest generated every month. Secondhand exposure of my articles to the internet is a benefit to NJFSC if it generates additional membership, and I hope I've argued well that first use and regularity are values for NJFSC I can't replicate on my website.

About Litton's Fishing Lines, it will not only remain online; you can access any of the posts you want to visit. I will be going back to some of the older ones and updating them. My hope is that some of them no longer indexed by Google will be reindexed.

I certainly have enjoyed blogging on this platform. It's not only very easy to work with--easier than working on my new site--the Search Engine Optimization is fantastic. My posts rank well, and though most of my them are obscure by nature, dealing with important information that nevertheless doesn't make headlines, they get indexed and rank where at least some readers find them. 

How many readers would I have expected to click on the post entitled "Shipetuaken Creek"? It's been only a couple of years since I posted it, and I watched as Google searches mounted to a present total of 240, though 40 or 50 of those came from regular followers during the first couple of weeks of the post's existence. Shipetauken Creek is an obscure little waterway, and yet there are people out there interested in it.

 

The Book

Insurance

Delaware River Trout at Hancock: Centerpin, Spinning, Baitcasting, Fly Rod

Mark's best brown.

I really felt curious about the two Delaware River branches and main stem at Hancock for the fly fishing, but not only did I know little about that, I learned more about it yesterday than I had on my previous two Branch ventures. 

To begin with, I had gone online and scoped out what hatches to expect. From the readily available information, I bought a dozen tan Elk Hair Caddis dry flies, already having at least one Isonychia, a Light Cahill, and a Blue Winged Olive, though the BWO is size 24, not 22. It wouldn't be a bad idea to carry a few of each of them, and I'll probably splurge so I'm better prepared in the future. 

And yet, despite "being ready" for the river (I'll explain at the end) with the fly rod, I really began to feel the coming outing from the gut instead of the head. I just hoped the substance of my desires would prove out, and they did, because Mark caught fish, when a skunker under the general rubric of the outing as a whole would have really rankled. I bought three dozen nightcrawlers and intended to use them on my favorite St. Croix spinning rod, even if that would mean smallmouth bass, which I love to catch. Mark had armed himself the same, though he spoke of nothing but trout, and I felt impressed with the degree of focus he exercised out there.

In the pale predawn light--we had met in Flanders at 3:50 to drive up there--we passed over a bridge. It already felt like we had done something right by getting there so early after a two-and-a-half-hour ride, and events would indeed soon put the balance in our favor. From that bridge, the West Branch looked high and off-color to me. We found it had about two-and-a-half feet of clarity and generally appeared light brown. Not only that, but the choppy surface where we had elected to start fishing made me think slow-rolling--in this case rolling it a little fast--or putting a nightcrawler out there in any way conceivable for a big brown wasn't a bad idea. It would prove to be a pretty good idea for Mark, even though no two-footer got caught. There were no insects in the air. No trout rising, but from what I had read, one shouldn't expect a hatch until the afternoon. (As I'll tell, I should have been prepared.) 

As Mark had driven north in the dark, I had the unsettling experience of realizing I didn't remember putting my waders into the SUV. I had also realized I had no memory of even putting them in my car, though I was certain I had put them downstairs at home in position to put them in the car. When we got there, I just told Mark it was OK. I'd wet wade.

I wouldn't wet wade that early with temps in the mid-50's, though. I got ankle deep, but no more. Mark headed upstream where he got in position to explore the seam between faster main current and slower water nearer to the bank with his float. As the day would prove, he fished the sweet spot at the right time, using a centerpin outfit and live nightcrawlers under a 7 gram Raven float, catching two rainbows and a brown. Then he went downstream to an area I had already fished. There he caught another rainbow, and he told me it came from the main current. I had already drifted nightcrawlers through that current more than thoroughly. It's possible he had let his float drift further downstream.

A few other spots awaited us. I fly cast an olive Wooly Bugger into the East Branch, wet-wading in earnest now, where the water was clear and not moving so treacherously fast. We spoke to a couple of guys rigging up their fly rods, who told us extra water had been let out of Cannonsville Reservoir due to the drought, and that the West Branch flowed even higher and more off color the day before.

Wow, I thought. If things were different by a day, we might have been screwed. 

Neither Mark nor myself got a hit in the East Branch; the main stem would interest us more. 

Right in front of us the clear water--not quite as clear as the East Branch but clear--dropped off into depths of six feet or more, and the water moved slowly. I cast a Bomber Long A in a smaller size while wet-wading. I cast it shallow and deeper, and I didn't get a hit. I put nightcrawlers out there in that deeper water for what seemed a long time and didn't get hit, which astonished me. My guess is that the smallmouth bass population is very limited. Even walleye will take nightcrawlers, and I've seen pictures from Lordville. In that slow water, Mark's drifts by float amounted to yards rather than football fields. He had no use for the centerpin, using a long baitcasting rod and relatively light line. 

We watched a couple of drift boats operate by rowing back upstream and drifting down near to the opposite bank while keeping an indicator float in the water alongside and ahead of the boat. I suppose they suspended nymphs underneath. One of the lessons learned yesterday is that fly fishing can amount to drifting rather than casting on the river. We observed that there are definitely some trout out there. We saw two hooked. A nice rainbow got netted. Mark had said the other side looks better before the action ensued.  

We were just about ready to leave, when Mark said, "It's big!" I saw his rod bent double, but the fish turned out to be a sucker of about 20 inches. "I thought it was a big brown, but I wasn't sure, because of the way the fight felt." 

"Kind of like a walleye," I said.

"Yeah!"

One can only wish, but I wouldn't have minded catching a sucker.

We began fishing yet another West Branch spot where I cast the Bomber, catching nothing, though I noticed three guys and a guide in a driftboat coming to the ramp. They had jerkbaits tied on their spinning rods. 

"How many did you catch?" I asked

"Twenty-five or thirty," the guide said, "but we've been fishing since 5:45."

Another incident of learning; it left me perplexed as to why nothing hit mine. I should have tried another variety. I can just see my Rapala Sinking Minnow being more effective. I tried a nightcrawler, and at least when Mark came back from upstream--reporting his best brown of the day--I did, finally, have some action to report. At least I'm sure it was a fish that took line, and when I tightened up and set that hook, I felt nothing, reeling in nothing but the head of the crawler, the tail bitten off. If only I had let the fish take line longer. 

Hours had passed when we arrived back at the West Branch spot, planning on leaving it at 4:15. Mark got into position again, where, as events proved, he had left the sweeet spot suspended in time behind us. I noticed a trout rising persistently, and though I saw nothing but what looked like almost infinitesimal midges hatching for only a few minutes--a confusing situation--I believed sometimes a hatch just isn't evident. The trout splash rose, so I felt convinced it took something off the surface. A few other trout did, too. Mark upstream and difficultly accessible. I passed on getting the key fob so I could get my fly rod from the back of the SUV.

But clearly--in the afternoon, have a fly rod at the ready. Lesson learned.   

Brown from early in the morning.

Me wading the main stem Delaware.

One of three rainbows Mark caught.

Notice the centerpin reel, too.

Pretty Fish

Mark thought he had hooked a big brown.

West Branch Delaware at Hancock

Above Cannonsville

 

North Beach Sandy Hook Jigging Fluke in the Surf

Keeper fluke I took for dinner. I was careful about the reel, but I could have made a mistake.

Nice drive down, already 83 degrees shortly after 11:00. Sunshine, light traffic--not bad. I seemed to arrive on Sandy Hook sooner than I expected. 

I wanted to fish North Beach. Years ago, I tried that beach, impressed with how deeply it drops off. I rode all the way up to McFly's on the Hook, and bought some beef jerky there. Then I continued on my way. 

I soon found lot J, where nothing seemed to indicate North Beach, so I looked up on my mobile device how to get there. According to AI, I had to go to Lot I, which wasn't distant. And after I got there and unloaded, studying a publicly displayed map informed me that Lot J works, too.

Either way in, it's an arduous walk. I remembered something of that from before, but I didn't remember as much as it really amounts to. Still, it might have been only half a mile. 

You're walking in sand. I had taken my sneakers off and left them behind, and you know how dry sand is, if you've ever sunk feet into it. But even so, it was firmer than some dry sand is. 

Pretty hot, too. The temp was about 80 when I left my car. Cooler than back on the mainland, with the westerly coming across the bay, but not by much. 

I haven't done well for fluke in recent times. The best of the outings amounted to two fluke caught at Barnegat Inlet while fishing with Fred Matero last September, and I think I caught one little one each time I fished Island Beach. Those IBSP outings involved enjoying the beach with my wife and black Lab Loki. We didn't go there this summer, though. I left Bedminster confident, thinking I might catch a few, and that that would be enough. But when I started casting the surf, to the right of shallows with waves breaking on them, I felt as if I'd get skunked. I would have logged the trip in my handwritten log--I do every time I fish--but I was thinking it would be awful to post here about yet another skunker, especially when, all summer, I've been catching so few fish. Brenden Kuprel and I did well on that South Branch Raritan River float trip, though.

I walked a little further to the right and laid a cast down leftward. I think the fish struck on the initial descent, but in any case, I set the hook deftly and fought a 14-incher I didn't photograph, my camera in my backpack well above the waterline. But the next fluke came pretty quickly thereafter, hitting when my retrieve was almost done. That fish might have been a a half inch better. I decided to get a quick shot of that one.

Even further to the right of those shallows--they began to appear distant--I caught one about 12 inches long. All three of these fish hit the anchor jig, not the teaser. I was using a pink half-ouncer with a pink Berkley Gulp twister on it. My teaser--a Z-Man Elaztech straight tail.

I've often admitted that I get hunches that seem to put me on fish in a mysterious way. I'm sure many fishermen experience the same, but it's not talked about. The trip neared it's end with my upper back paining me. I had fished little more than two hours, but the pain I experienced concerned me less than what pain I might feel during the long trudge back. I was also getting feelings about the water right next to the shallows. 

Rather than ignore those feelings, I positioned myself and put a cast in the area that comprised the edge. I began jigging my rig back, felt a fish take it, set hard, and fought a pretty good-sized fluke, that head shake leaving me no doubt. When I saw it in the clear surf, I knew I probably had a keeper. This one hit the Elaztech teaser. It measured 18-1/16 inches.      

Maybe a half inch better than 14 inches.

Barnegat Inlet

 

Changing Color of Wacky Worm Made a Difference

Gen Wong and smallmouth bass.

I favor the big smallmouth bass of Lake Hopatcong. That's not to say I don't favor other species, like walleye and hybrid stripers, but it's to say in part that when I think of big smallmouths today, I wish I had caught some yesterday. By big, I mean 18 inches and better. 

Largemouths? I love them, too, but I have a long standing disagreement with the Lake Survey Maps Guide. On a scale of 1 to 4, 1 being abundant and 4 pretty much being absent, Largemouths get a 1 for their showing in the lake, smallmouths only a 3. I like to think smallmouths should get a 2.

Or at least that my catches should continue to make it seem that way.

What's the odds that we just happened to cast in all the wrong places yesterday? That the fish were there among the docks and willing to hit, but we just didn't get our lures to them? After all, we hadn't been fishing more than a half hour or 45 minutes when a guy in a bassboat approaching us and fishing the same row of docks--as we went around him--boated a largemouth of at least two-and-a-half pounds. 

I fished Wacky, a crayfish color with fleck, on the light side and quite visible in the relatively clear water, in the shade or in the sun, and Brian Cronk and Gen Wong tried various Chatterbaits, jerkbaits, and plastics. 

Other fishermen have been doing well with bait. That means live herring. Jimmy Welsh at Dow's told me he's catching them, and Eddie Mackin's Rippin' Lips Guide Service told Brian yesterday they got 20 hybrids. 

I've caught bass around the docks as late into the season as a late October day when temperatures didn't even rise to 50. Getting skunked--Brian and I caught nothing, though Gen's little bass meant the boat didn't get skunked--seems strange. The lake's water temperature was 70.5 in the morning when I took it, and the air rose well into the 70's by 1:30 when we got off the lake. 

But it happens, and part of being an angler is dealing with it. It can seem ridiculous when you stand outside yourself and observe the apparent folly of your struggle. Why's fishing worth feeling any qualm? Besides, it's over and done. But fishing is no ordinary pursuit. 

Even though only fishermen know that.

Yesterday was a Sunday, however, which might at least give the illusion of an explanation. Even when my son and I fished on a Saturday or Sunday during late October and fished docks after fishing live herring into the early afternoon--and caught largemouths as big as 18 inches during more than one occasion--fishing pressure had diminished by that late in the season...or at least it wasn't as heavy as it was yesterday. I even wondered if the pressure has increased since a decade and more ago. Besides, the lake was surely hit hard on Saturday, too, so all these dock spots we fished had been hit hard the day before. 

All of them, I'm sure. We had guys in bassboats meeting us from both sides. Pressure can really shut it down, but again, we did witness that nice largemouth get caught.

We wouldn't go without having a couple nice fish on ourselves. We just wouldn't get those fish in the boat! With time running out and my upper back beginning to pain me, we fished a little cove. Gen had switched out his Wacky worm of a color that resembled my crayfish color. The water there was stained. "I don't think the bass can see it," he said of the worm he removed. 

Since I'm as slow to take advice as I am to make a change, I didn't immediately switch out my own. 

He caught that little smallmouth. I felt delighted it was that, especially with the bottom being muddy. Not five casts later, he hooked a nice bass. I watched as he played it, and I was about to get the net and pull its handle into place. 

I began routing around in my bag for the same worm Gen had taken. He hadn't brought any along. I had packs upon packs of Yum Dingers and some Shim-E-Sticks, and it frustrated me that it took some doing before I found the right one. He said something again about the need for bass to see the worm, and I pointed out they can feel it. To that, he said, "If they can see, feel, and smell it, you're three times advantaged," and I knew I could only get that worm on the hook. I couldn't argue against what Gen had just said. 

I couldn't argue against the "intel" we got from Joe Santiago, either, Gen having keyed his number by mobile device. I won't tell where the spot is, but it's very interesting and convinced me Joe knows his stuff. I've fished the lake for more than two decades, and I didn't know about the spot. There's another one I do know about Joe spoke of in some detail, which I haven't tried yet. 

Before docking at Dow's, we tried a rocky spot Brian knows about, which I also hadn't known about. It's a really nice looking spot for smallmouths, and I felt chagrinned that in all my years fishing the lake, I had never taken notice of it. But that's how it is with coming and going. When you're near the dock you don't investigate. At least I don't, but it is a form of laziness. Or just plain comfort: When you're headed out, you've got a distant goal to satisfy. When you're headed in--you're done.

Not yesterday. We fished that spot thoroughly, and Brian got a fish on. I saw his rod bent and tip jerking. The fish hit a jerkbait.  

 

Brian Cronk fishes.

Nice Smallmouths

Catching Some Little Ones As If One Might Be Good Sized

Fred Matero with one of his two little Harvey Cedar's fluke.

We had a serious problem with northeast wind yesterday. First thing we did on the island, after stopping at Fisherman's Headquarters, where I bought some hooks and sinkers, was grab a look at the surf, and it was all a rage. I hadn't expected it to be so bad. Next, we rode all the way to Barnegat Light and got a look at the jetty. The end of it appeared unfishable, waves breaking all the way across, and all the way back our way to the middle, water was on the rocks. If we were to go out there and fish that middle portion, which is the least we'd have wanted to do, we'd have probably got soaked. Not only with the temperature not quite 70, but with a backpack I want to keep in good condition, Fred's gear, and our preference for accessing the rocks without need of cumbersome Korkers cleats, though we each had a pair of them in Fred's SUV, the rocks weren't something we felt eager to hike out to. In fact, we abandoned our plan to do that altogether. 

We went to our bayside spot. I cast a jig & Gulp, with a Z-Man Elaztech tied above that jig on a dropper loop. I wasn't expecting anything, but last Fred fished here recently, a 20-incher got caught, and he had one on, so I did make the best of each cast. And on one of them, I got hit right in close before I would have lifted for the next cast, lifted to set the hook, and had what felt like a 16-inch fluke on for a couple of seconds. Fred witnessed all that, but I told him the same anyhow, and he said, "You never know. When the guy hooked the 20-incher it felt like nothing till he got it to the surface and it ran."

I finally got my rig snagged, broke off the jig, and switched to bait in vague hopes of a nice tautog. It's rare that a really good one gets caught here, but the place draws a contingent of regulars that fish here all the time. Maybe they're just hooked, regardless of what gets caught, and what gets caught, in fact, are always little fish. But the jetty isn't too far away, and keeper tog do get caught on it. Sheepshead, too, though the sheepshead are relatively uncommon. So, who knows? I had it in me to give it a sincere try, more than I did last time. And I did hook something somewhat nice, like a 12-inch tog, big enough that I had to work the reel & rod hard to keep it out of the rocks, which I failed at doing! It got snagged in such a way that I could feel its body pulsing--not exactly a "little" fish--but I still couldn't get it unsnagged, not even by giving it slack for long periods of time.

In the meantime, one of the guides on the Tica Fred was using for baiting tog broke. The ring had popped out of the metal frame. He told he figured he could glue it. Told me about the brand he'd use, though I forget which epoxy. Then things got worse after he continued to use it and that ceramic ring broke. He felt disappointed because he's going to Florida soon and wanted to use the rod there. But he told me he had been looking for an excuse to buy a new Tsunami rod. I told him I had bought my Tica to replace a Tsunami. I didn't tell him this, but yeah, a Tsunami that was of the same size as my Tica. I couldn't remember, though, and still can't, what went wrong with the Tsunami. 

At the end of our excursion, we would stop back in at Fisherman's Headquarters, where Fred left his Tica to be repaired, because there's no point in trashing an otherwise good rod because of a 20-dollar fix. It will take longer to get done than when he leaves for Florida, however, so he has his excuse.  

I caught some little fish as I continued to fish as if one of them might be good sized, and I enjoyed it. I guess when you're open to the water in front of you, what comes out of it, in fact, feels good. Fred had told me about a spot in Harvey Cedars, and that it would be best to fish it before the tide gets low. Since the tide was on its way out, I felt ready to go, but I gave our spot my blessing, as if, just maybe, it would yield a nice one some day. 

The Harvey Cedars spot has no tog and sheepshead structure. It's open water of at least six feet, near the Intracoastal Waterway channel. Fred hadn't been there in years, but he's caught small fluke, weakfish, and I believe he said cocktail blues. Today, we get some bites from small stuff that resulted in Gulp twister tails being bit off. I got a couple of hits on the Elaztech teaser I think were small fluke. You know that's where the hit came, when the Elaztech is no longer straight but pulled down into a curve on the hook. And by fishing the cove pretty hard, Fred ended up with two small fluke. 

Black Seabass

From the spot where we caught a number of small ones.

Bergal, also known as cunner.

Northeast Wind Probably Not as Bad

 

Feeder Creeks Make Low Water an Opportunity

Nine-inch pike hit large Smithwick plug.

Yesterday, on the way to Round Valley Reservoir for a dog walk and photo shoot with my wife and black Lab Loki, and on the way back home from the same and ice cream at Polar Cub, I thought hard on what to do about fishing today. When we drove the bridge over Rockaway Creek, I took a good look at that stream's low level and knew exactly where I wanted to fish. Somewhere along the Passaic River by walking the bank. 

After we got home, I texted Brenden Kuprel, asking him if he'd been fishing it. He got back in minutes, saying he'd caught a small pickerel and had a blowup on a Whopper Plopper. I told him I'd be fishing it tomorrow and that he's welcome to meet me there if he wants. He told me he wasn't sure what he was doing tomorrow, but one thing and another happened, and today we decided on meeting at a bridge over the river. 

The river gets some pressure there, but as Brenden put it, mostly "within a hundred yards of the bridge." We headed downstream, and our passage was probably possible only because of the low water. A lot of little creeks feed into the river, and getting across them is probably impossible when water is higher. With us included in the river's ecology, those creeks protect the resource, and make low water an opportunity. 

But what happened to make today opportune? Well, it was the fish Brenden didn't hook. The one that went after his spinner with more than a little drama. He cast a big Colorado-bladed inline spinner, and I saw the blowup on it, too. I think the fish had to have been at least five pounds. Likely more than that. We fished the area thoroughly, catching a few little nine-inch pike apparently stocked recently, and made a mental note to fish the spot on the way back. 

We must have worked our way downstream a half mile or more, before we turned back. That involved crossing at least a half dozen little feeder creeks. Avoiding deep mud in the process. Once, I stepped onto a log  in the mud, then tried to leap up a bank, falling instead, so that my face got planted where my feet would have gained traction, Loki the black Lab licking it profusely.

Good dog! I got up as if it were nothing, because I could walk straight, nothing turned in the wrong direction. Other little creeks I cleared as if I have decades of good balance left. 

Before we began making the march back out, I had almost hooked a pike that impressed me as being about 18 inches long. I had my drag set light. I loosen drags at home to take the stress off them. Perhaps they'll last longer. But then I have to remember to tighten them down, or something like today's lost pike happens. I tried to set the hooks and my drag screeched, rather than the hooks actually getting set. 

Back at the spot where Brenden got hit by the big one, I caught yet another little pike, about a foot long. Brenden had caught another little nine-incher and a couple of little yellow perch back along the way. 

It wasn't an outright skunker. The pike we caught were too little, but at least they made their presence known. Above all, the big one that blew up on Brenden's spinner. And the one I had one for a second would have been OK catch, too. I've never caught a pike bigger than 20 inches from the Passaic, but I always find the river compelling. So does Brenden, who lives near the river, and has caught four pike better than 10 pounds, so far.    

Large tree virtually growing out of the river.

 

Passaic Pike