Delaware and Raritan Canal Near Manville

The Delaware and Raritan Canal, in my experience, is best in fall and winter when pickerel respond to crappie jigs or shiners live lined next to and among deadfalls and brush. But largemouth bass--even rare smallmouth bass--exist, along with uncommon walleyes at the locks (nine locks, I think), muskies that have either entered from the Delaware, or are among those stocked by the state and in some places stocked trout. Of course, carp, bullheads, and channel cats are present and the one-time state record grass carp came from the canal, not to mention panfish, crappies and I've heard of a northern pike caught that either someone placed in the current or a great flood like Hurricane Floyd's transferred from the Raritan or Millstone River. During the summer I tend to find fishing slow.

Today I snapped a Senco off on a submerged branch not having a weedless hook, determined to fish Wacky-rig. When the branch swooshed back, I saw a good sized pickerel had followed my worm and dashed off leaving a boil. What I didn't see was the tip section of my six foot Ugly Stick slipping into the canal just as the line snapped. I used the remaining fastened sections to sift among thick poison ivy and see if it had fallen there. I searched the area meticulously until satisfied it went into the canal where I couldn't see.

I've noticed dingy, turbid water recent weeks driving by. Not thick-muddy, but pretty bad and I don't know why. Fish have to feed, however, and I feel confident I could have caught at least one during this search for a truly large fish--including pickerel (my worm rattles left in a tackle box at home). 

That rod went a long way with me. We don't know how much we value something until it's gone. I got over it quick enough, but it stimulated some thought on the necessity of loss, loss not just being an inconvenience, but ultimately productive for human life, however painful. We die and make room for new lives. That's the ultimate end. And look how some of the greatest contributors to the human race are not appreciated until after their deaths. It's terribly unfair to them, but they did not want to be forgotten. 

 

They wanted to be remembered because the value of their lives could at last be realized to a degree much greater than others knew while they lived. And in some respects greater than they themselves knew.

Got a photo of two sliders with 15 inch shells.

Mount Hope Pond Anticipations

Nearly all the bass I've caught on the Chompers worm I keep mentioning have taken it on the initial drop. This afternoon's first bass, about a pound a half, hit as I retrieved it with interspersed jerks, intending to get it in--though rather slowly--for its next descent. Right in close, inside the shadow line, the bass engulfed it.

The next measured 17 1/2 inches, well over three pounds. I casted the worm about two feet outside the shadow line, in about 10 feet of water; the bass hit on that initial drop. Accuracy is often very important at Mt. Hope, but this was an easy cast.

Since this largest bass here yet hit in deeper water, I switched to a Senco. At least with this type of worm I can tell when it reaches bottom even without added weight, and as I've stated before, it sinks faster. The line goes slack on bottom contact. I wait a moment, then begin a slow retrieve with occasional pulls to make the worm flutter, rigged "Wacky." Nothing.

Nonetheless, I feel closer to that possible truly large bass. I hear enough stories out and around and think that most of them are lies. Like the guy that drove up today. He looked at my Wacky worm and said, "You catch them on that!?"

"Yeah." I knew instantly I didn't care to speak to this guy.

"I fish spinnerbaits!" He said. "Last year I got no bass here less than four or five pounds."

"They're big here," I said, walking by him without stopping. Only fools catch no bass less than four or five pounds in New Jersey. 

Party Boat Fluke Fishing (and Lakehurst Largemouth)

If you go for fluke on a headboat this time of year, bring a surf rod and bunker snag. I felt I was close to hooking a striper in the 40-pound range. Someone in a boat next to us caught one this large.

Follow my vignette and get psyched. Just as important as technique. But when you hook up, don't let line rub against the boat. Better to fish behind the drift, not underneath the boat. My son lost something really big that cut the line on boat bottom. Fluke hit squid (don't set immediately, feel into the hookset), but I caught one of mine on a three-ounce bucktail not tipped with any bait.

Boy Scouts has its priviledge, and I have to say I'm pleased once again to be involved in the organization after camping on the 7430 acres of Lakehurst Naval Air Engineering Station this weekend. I have never heard so many whip-poor-wills calling all at once in all my life as they did very early this morning. I'm not sure I've ever heard any in New Jersey before.

We began with a fluke charter on the Suzie Girl out of Belmar. Everyone caught fish. But out of a group of maybe 30 of us, we brought back about a dozen keepers, the largest at five pounds. My largest went maybe an eighth of an inch under 18 inches, quickly tossed over the side unceremoniously. 

What else can you do but refuse to fret when things get real edgy with big possibilities? I caught a bunker on a two-ounce bucktail tipped with squid. Quickly, I tied on a 7/0 steel hook, put it through the lively bunker's back, heaved it out with my 11-foot surf rod, and let it swim off. This way I got in a half hour trying for a big striper, which the head mate thought definitely cool, but it didn't work, even though big fish definitely swam down under nearby.

At the naval base, Bass Lake, again not a lake, but a pond of about 10 acres, actually looked very promising with its large stand of dead timber in the water, although almost all of this lay out of casting range. I caught two bass, one of them at least a pound, within a couple of minutes of getting to the site. The first thing I did, I tied on a Senko-type worm and started casting. I ended up catching six more bass yesterday evening, the largest just over a pound. Brian Shultz, one of the Scouts, caught a 13-incher from the dock.

I resolved to let those eight bass be it for me, and to let one of the boys borrow my rod the next day. Sure enough, just as I got out of my tent, I heard a lot of commotion, looked, and saw a very good-sized bass flopping in the sand on the small dike. I ran for my camera and measuring tape. That's a nice bass a sliver under 19 inches for Anderson Matinho. Anderson caught another close to a pound, and lost one the boys asserted was larger than his first.

Windy Lake Ames Near Hibernia, New Jersey

--Is not a lake, but a 16-acre pond, mostly very shallow, with a lot of weeds, but not nearly so thick as I feared. Several years ago, returning home from a nearby Scout camp, I saw a group of ice fishermen out, and stopped to check out the scene. They had caught a couple very small pickerel, so that's always been my impression of Lake Ames since. But before I went on Blogger this evening, I did a little web research, and at least the pickerel reported were slightly larger, with a report, also, of a 24-incher, and a four-pound largemouth.

I set out along the west side, cast a spinnerbait in that tiny cove, then headed into the woods. I came upon what I thought was the Hibernia Brook, and saw that Oliver Shapiro, in his book Fishing New Jersey, minced no words when he suggested wading this area. I had brought along both old sneakers and shorts, but just wasn't motivated to change. 

And as it turned out, good thing. I ended up hiking entirely around the pond and through some briars, my long pants helped. On the way I discoverrd a second brook, all the way in back. I'm not sure, but it seemed more tannic than the first, and just as large. Both of them beautiful mountain streams. I got some good casts from the east side for a stretch, and then, as I headed on down toward the dike, I saw skunk cabbage crop up, and remember thinking, "This means the ground will be spongy at the very best." 

It was worse. But rocks interspersed deep muck; I attempted to balance my steps on these uneven stones. Very suddenly, I lost control. My senses, just as suddenly, came alive like lightning. For a split second I felt very young again, like a mountain goat on rocks. I knew two things very vividly: I didn't want to break bones, and I didn't want to thoroughly muddy my dress clothes and return to work like that after lunch. As it turned out, I danced over another five or six yards of uncertain rock supports--and didn't leave a spot of mud on my clothes.

Finally--I walked along Green Pond Road for a stretch--I got to the dike, and discovered the best water to fish just as I ran out of time. I would have switched to a plastic worm. The water here is perhaps eight feet deep, and I did actually sight a bass. This will be worth fishing some cloudy afternoon, and perhaps in the fall with live shiners. Today the sun was bright as can be, although a cool wind tore through and shook up the surface so that a spinnerbait, it seemed to me, could have been effective, reflecting scattered light beams. I walked to my car with a satisfied feeling of discovery, which had come so close to having been denied. 

Mt. Hope Pond Still Promising

Some days don't start off right, and although I arrived after noon at Mt. Hope with little more than a half hour to fish, all morning I had been off kilter, and remained so. As briars seemed to grip at my dress shirt much more than usual, I swore under breath, and getting in among the tangles along the bank, I muddied my dress pants. But I wore hiking boots, no doubt about this.

I saw an 18 inch largemouth cruise in heavy sunlight and blazing heat on the water. Indifferent as a zombie, it mingled with small sunfish that took no alarm at all, sure evidence that this bass gave off no aggressive vibes. Surely I'd get skunked today.

During the dreggs of summer dog days--unless you thrive in intense heat--under brilliant sunlight largemouth will cruise a pond's shallows in full view. All I know, and I don't know all the variables, far from it, is that unless damselflies and dragonflies are present, hunting smaller insects related to aquatic vegetation that meets water surface, I haven't been able to coax such cruisers to hit. I thought this would be today's situation. Mt. Hope's shoreline drops sharply to 15 feet and more of water, no shallow flats for bass to cruise and attack those damsel and dragonflies--at least smaller bass do this where they're available.

But within ten minutes I had my first bass. I casted my Chompers perfectly next to overhanging brush, some of that brush in water, except that my line get caught by a thin branch. No more than a couple seconds elapsed, and the line suddenly took up the slack swiftly. I felt my mood shift. Despite the branch, when I set the hook, it gave. I found on inspection afterwards that it didn't even nick the line. This bass weighed at least a pound and a half.

I fished at much faster pace, getting all the way up the shoreline in almost half the time as usual. Most of the water drenched in sunlight, I had less of it to fish, focusing on shaded areas. I tried a tactic that makes sense, and seemed to make the difference, casting the worm just outside shade, in sunlit water, so that a bass present in shade sees the sunlit worm very clearly, and dashes from the shade to grab it, the way that striped bass stay just outside illumination from docks during bay summers, and crash the baitfish drawn into light. Near the very end of my jaunt, I picked up one more just over a pound. 

Round Valley Reservoir Last Stop

Last I looked, the Ranger Cove area from the dike and beyond, including the pond in that area, are closed as of this evening until fall. Wanted very much to give it a last try, and drove over on the suppositiion that I had over an hour and a half until 8:00 to vacate the premises. Over in the far corner, I noticed the sign directed all to leave at 7:00, and remembered, of course. I did follow the rule, but plenty stayed over there until after 8:00. I kept within the law, hoping that some day it will change, and meandered over to the reservoir corner between the launch ramps, knowing that 10 foot depths exist almost within casting range, and some vegetation.

In the pond I caught three largemouth, one about four or five ounces over a pound, the other two about a pound. All struck in the first corner, which served me well this season. I worked my way along the treacherous rocks for a stretch; weeds grow out in batches for six or seven yards, and no doubt bass haunt them. I lost a good one--but nowhere near five pounds--to one of the thick clumps. It buried its head into it, and while I pulled all out, it still managed to loosen the tensiion on the line enough to throw the hook. Bass dig their heads into weeds like that so the connection of line to the hook is no longer direct and tight. They don't think, "I've got to slacken this line," they just dig into cover, but by effect they do slacken it. This is why I use 15 pound Power Pro braid in Lake Musconetcong. Braid stretches less, and 15 pound test you can really horse. The way Lake Musconetcong used to be--weed heaven--often I would almost break my rod, but boat a bass or pickerel. After this episode in the weed patch, I casted to the spot again after one cast away from it, had another take, and missed it. I think a lot of commotion often does the opposite of spooking other fish.

So. Coming off the dike, through the official fence, I noticed that corner invited me, unoccupied. Without much hope at all, I knew a bass cruising the sparse vegetation in the relative evening shade bore some possibility. Since the surface had completely calmed, I opted for the more subtle and slow sinking Chompers, rather than a Senco. Soon I landed another one pounder, then a nine incher, and an eight incher that attacked some tiny baitfish near my feet, so I just pitched my 7 1/2 Chompers and yanked it up, to return it unharmed, myself a little embarrased.

I'm a longer way from that five pound plus bass now. I've heard nice stories about the pond, and not only have I lost that to absolute reality, regulations, it gets tough now with the heat, and fewer days of persistent low pressure. Without a boat in New Jersey it's tough, if not impossible, to catch big bass consistently. I checked out Split Rock Reservoir on Friday to find three marginal spots to fish from shore. From a boat the place is obviously Paradise, although I have plenty experience with boats to know this can be tough, too. It would be nice if more shore access to places like Round Valley and Merrill Creek were permitted, especially with low water conditions existing at Round Valley now. But with the present state of our society, attitudes are such that regulations tend not to be made to make it nice for recreationists, but to control us from the point of view of suspicious regard.

Long Branch Stripers Vacate for Evening

A full day, and I'll awaken later this morning in an awful state of longing for the day I make enough money on my writing to sleep in at will, but I have to tell you, when I wake up early to fish, I never feel the despair I have to walk myself through before and as I leave for my job. I'm not just saying that; it's true in fact.

Round Valley Pond resulted in two bass, the first eight inches, the second 11, both on that Chompers model. Lost another 11-incher right at the bank, missed a hit, and had one drop that didn't feel like a sunny pecking at the pecker. For so much sun on the water, I felt satisfied, a little proud of the bass for getting out in it. Blazing hot, 92 degrees registered on the way there.

This about does it for Round Valley, since the Rangers Cove area will be closed Memorial Day until the fall to shoreline anglers who don't want to pay a fee. 

I missed the 40 and 50-pounders at Long Branch by a couple hours, busting the bunker again today. I was ready with snag trebles for the bunker, pencil popper, and bottle popper to boot (but not break). I put out fresh clam and bunker. No action at all on the clam, the stripers really took off. Low tide, but no sand bar at Long Branch. 

So what's the difference? I don't know if there is a difference, I wondered about it--obviously a difference exists with sand bars. At those magic moments of gathering dusk I put my hopes down. What's the use of excess desire when you know chances are you're skunked, as far as stripers are concerned? The ignorant are full of hope and prayers. 

But the bunker had at least drawn interest from sharks. I'm not sure what they are. That stripe reminds me of cobia. I got a good look into the mouth and saw no teeth. I checked out the dorsal--spiny. So are these spiny dogfish as I suppose? If anyone knows, please comment (it's lonely writing this blog!). I caught three from about three feet to 42 inches. That largest put up a good fight.