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What is the best bait for striped bass?
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Bunker and Herring as Striped Bass Baits
Bunker (also known pogies or alewives or, properly as menhaden) are probably the number-one most common bait used for stripers, and herring aren’t far behind. We’re lumping these two types of fish together because they’re extremely similar and usually are equally effective.
The best time of day to catch striped bass is early morning from dawn until about 2 hours after sunrise and late afternoon from 2 hours before sunset until dusk. Fishing for striped bass can be even better in the hours before a major cold front or rain event arrives.
What lures to use for striped bass from shore?
1) First, get yourself a swimming plug, like a Diawa SP Minnow or Bomber A-salt. These catch fish day and night and will induce strikes from all sizes of fish. They are also easy to use. Just cast them out and reel them back at a moderate speed.
No matter how surfcasters discovered that yellow is a killer color for striped bass lures, the fact remains, if you don’t have a wide selection of yellow plugs, you aren’t catching as many striped bass as you could be.
What is the best bait for striped bass? – Related Questions
What months do stripers run?
Saltwater Stripers
These bass enter the San Francisco Bay area in the fall through winter and hang out until spring. During the winter, they cruise around the bays and deltas, chasing baitfish around. That makes them prime for catching.
What depth do striped bass eat?
Stripers prefer to feed in shallow water or in the upper one-third of the water column. They move to the most shallow water under the cover of darkness to feed on unsuspecting forage fish. Feeding continues as they move back toward deeper water when daylight replaces night.
What pound test should I use for striped bass?
The Solution. Line matters and Captain Mike recommends sticking with 10-pound or 12-pound test. Plus, it makes catching striped bass a lot more fun.
What color fishing line is best for striped bass?
A study performed at the Virginia Institute of Marine Sciences showed that striped bass see yellow and chartreuse better than other colors as they are smack dab in the middle of the striped bass’s visual range.
What size hooks for striped bass?
The size of the circle hook you use for a striped bass rig depends on the size of the bait. For larger baits, like live menhaden (bunker or pogies), an 8/0 circle hook is ideal. For chunk baits and live eels or spot, a smaller 6/0 circle hook will work. Smaller baits, like seaworms, can be rigged on 2/0 circle hooks.
Striped bass eat a variety of foods, including fish such as alewives, flounder, sea herring, menhaden, mummichogs, sand lance, silver hake, tomcod, smelt, silversides, and eels, as well as lobsters, crabs, soft clams, small mussels, sea worms, and squid.
What scent do striped bass like?
In recent years, casters dunking bloodworms at the Jersey Shore for early season stripers have been dosing their baits with FIN-essence natural scents, often the bunker, clam or shedder crab extracts; and for those soaking sands for flatties, it might be worth a little soak time as well.
Where do striped bass like to hang out?
Stripers love structure. Rock piles, bridge abutments, bulkheads, boulders, points, ledges, rips and drop-offs are all potential ambush points. The biggest stripers in saltwater areas are often caught on full moon and new moon tides when strong currents favor the most powerful predators in prime feeding areas.
What attracts striped bass?
This is especially true when schools of bunker are being followed by big striped bass. At this time, a snagged bunker will often be the only offering that will take a good fish. The same can be true with clams, bloodworms, cut baitfish, and other live or fresh baits.
What do striped bass eat for bait?
Striped Bass Baits
Live eels, spot, bunker, and herring will entice any larger striped bass to eat, but cutting fresh or frozen fish into chunks works well for striped bass of all sizes. Crabs, sand fleas, bloodworms, squid, and clams are optimized for smaller stripers.
If you want to catch stripers, all you need to know is the water temperature. It’s that simple. Stripers prefer water temperature around 55- to 68-degrees. If the water is too hot, they may feed shallow occasionally, but quickly return to the oxygenated rich, cooler water.
How do you rig for striper fishing?
How do I attract stripers?
Choose the right bait.
Live bait such as herring, menhaden, mackerel, eels, squid, clams, anchovies, bloodworms, shad, nightcrawlers and sandworms all make great bait for striped bass fishing.
The type of bait that will bring you the most success will depend on the location you intend to fish in.
Do stripers bite top water?
Stripers are definitely more prone to feed on the surface during these low-light periods. Overcast and particularly foggy days are classic topwater conditions. We’ve had our most consistent success during these sorts of days, particularly during the spring and fall months.
Do striped bass like high or low tide?
During the early and late season when the water temperatures are on the cool side (50 degrees and less), the outgoing tide will be the preferred tide. This is because the lower water temperature will cause the striper’s metabolism to be sluggish and the bass will not feed as often or travel as far for a meal.
Is it better to fish for stripers high tide or low tide?
They look to consume as many calories as possible while burning as few calories as possible, therefore they do their most aggressive feeding when their advantage over the baitfish is greatest—at peak tide.