It happens at the beginning and end of each season; debate begins as to whether it’s going to be an early or late season. From social media to tackle shop chatter to just good banter between fishing friends, the story goes pretty much the same with junk science applied to short-term weather trends and statements made as to how the season will begin or end. What I have found in my many years of fishing and working in the fishing industry is that for the most part, when you look at the long-term averages, there is little variance from year to year.
What I have long theorized here is that anglers first and foremost need something to talk about. They want to sound smart to their friends and be able to say, “See? I told you this was going to be an early season!” But what they fail to consider when making such broad predictions is that migratory fish don’t move based on micro events but instead on a macro scale. Larger events such as the location of the moon and the angle of the sun, combined with an innate sense of the world around them trigger large-scale movements. I feel that striped bass, for example, don’t simply hang out on your local reef waiting for the water temperature to drop one degree to decide to head south, they “know” when it’s time to move on based on the celestial events. However, we as humans for the most part have lost this connection and are more susceptible to immediate and easily quantifiable triggers such as cooling water temps. Might a specific water temperature trigger a fish to feed or become more active?
Absolutely, but I feel it is far less of a factor on their coastwide movements than we give credit for.
So, what does this all mean to you right now as we head into November? Easy, and it’s how I approach fall fishing in that it is likely the fish are available to be caught far later than we might believe. While water temperatures might make catching them more difficult as it gets colder, they are likely still there. On both ends of the season I have evidence to this fact presented to me by those who rely less on fooling fish with lures and bait to produce success such as divers and commercial net fishermen. Again, using the striped bass as an example, but this also applies quite frequently to blackfish, free divers report seeing vast schools of fish long before any rod-and-reeler hooks them, and much later in the season than they’re reported to be “biting.”
Hopefully I didn’t lose you with all that and you’re still reading on as the fishing has been pretty solid leading up to my typing away on the computer here today, and I’d like to think it will still be so when this goes to print.
Blackfishing has been very good this fall. In Massachusetts and Rhode Island where the season does not close in the early fall, as soon as anglers changed gears and began dropping crab baits down to their local reefs and rockpiles they found cooperative fish. Many, many catches of fun, easy fishing were reported with plenty of keepers to be had. The same was said in Connecticut as soon as the fall season opened on October 10 with some of my network proclaiming the best fishing they had ever seen. While I cannot claim quite as good of success, my early fall outings did produce fillets on each and every trip with a number of keepers returned to the water and plenty of shorts to keep me on my toes. Early tendencies were for very good action to be had shallow, but once again I pose the question, “Is anyone even trying deep early in the fall season?”
That said, expect better action to be had on the more popular blackfish fall spots in deeper water as the season progresses if for no other reason than the shallows getting picked over. If you have a shallow spot that sees little to no pressure, then by all means fish shallow! My two largest blackfish to date were landed in November in water less than 10 feet deep, and they came from a spot that very few anglers target. I have done quite well on my kayak in November as well, working the hard-to-access spots that keep many boats at bay but which I can sneak into with my yak. Much like the concept of an early or late season, we are far too quick to apply junk science when looking for a reason to explain good or bad fishing, failing to consider potentially obvious alternate factors.
Striped bass fishing is also well under way as I type and should still be as such when you read this. While Long Island and spots south consider November to be a prime month, Southern New England can be difficult-yet-productive for striper anglers. Fishing is undeniably inconsistent in November, and it’s easy to call it quits when you have one or two slow outings. However, like I noted earlier, there are almost always fish to be had and at this time of the season, with fish schooled up for the migration south, action comes in waves. It’s a matter of long between those waves that seems to keep us going as one off tide is easy to overlook, but five slow days makes the cold feel colder and the gas prices – assuming the dock is still open – hurt even more.
Set your expectations appropriately in November and you’ll fare far better. Target locations where striped bass congregate like the large reefs, rips, and rivers where fish are likely to stage up as opposed to hoping to stumble across fish in open water. Rivers will also have the potential for larger food sources as adult bunker find winter hangs, and juvenile river herring move out. You can also expect to see sea herring moving into these areas and hickory shad could very well be present as well. This all leads to better potential for success, and what’s better than being on a great bite in November than to be the only one on the school?
Last up this installment I’ll throw out the deep water bottom fishing option as boats begin heading east for cod, black sea bass and porgies. While few private boaters make these runs these days, there are plenty of charter and headboat options to consider. This fishing is usually better earlier than it is later with the eleventh month providing some of the best action of the year as fish are moving both out and in across the fishing grounds. Black sea bass and porgies are on their way out to where they spend their winters, while cod are moving in towards their spawning grounds. Recent years have also seen a resurgence of pollock catches in this timeframe with at times boats absolutely bailing these somewhat locally forgotten fish. I have also seen some great catches of haddock around Block Island in November and December, a species that of late is seen as far more of a Gulf of Maine species than a local target.
Lastly, and this isn’t really something you can predict an encounter with unless you really dig deep into the reports, there is a run of weakfish that happens every year south of Block Island in late November. The bite usually only lasts a few days, and most years by the time word gets out it is over. What is happening here, as best I can theorize, is that there is a population of weakfish that move out from Long Island Sound to their wintering grounds on the continental shelf, and they move past Block Island for one last good feed. With angels drifting clam baits for cod and black sea bass, they cross paths with migrating weakies and a cool little bonus fishery materializes. I don’t hear too much talk on this subject, but it has become something I cannot overlook year to year and something that perhaps this year I’ll be lucky enough to partake in.