Striped Bass: Public Hearing

Public Information Document 

Gave Bedminster Pond a Try

Open Water in North-Central Jersey

With Daylight Savings Time, I had time to fish after work today. Other days, I don't get off until 7:30. Thirty-nine degrees out when I arrived at Bedminster Pond before sunset, I had earlier thought that I seem to have always avoided fishing here when it's below 50. Sometimes a bass will hit a spinner when the water temp is down in the 40's. I thought of that shallow bottom absorbing abundant sunlight and warming a little better than the air temp. And then I got there and cast for a half hour or so.

Best moment involved a split second when my favorite rod, a St. Croix medium power, released vivid memory, the feeling of its effectiveness during the normal season, the pride I take in it when I'm regularly catching largemouths over three pounds. Actually, that memory came more from the years I fished the banks of certain ponds. Good ones where I can count on bass that big. Since I've been fishing lakes more in recent years, I probably catch more of my bass on my medium-heavy Speed Stick. 

I was just thinking at work today that when I retire, I want to fish especially one of those ponds I used to fish.

 

Light-weight spinner I built from component parts. The hollow nickel beads are light, but I managed 50-foot casts.

18-Inch Largemouth

Gave the KLG a Shot

The river ran a little high. I could see that, but someone told me 225 cubic feet per second. He said normal is about 175. Also told me the water temp was 45, which is up a notch from winter conditions. 

As a graph inclines, we're on the way up.

I had thought of trying a larger plug, but I kept with my one-inch Rapala Countdown. Not that it caught any trout, but I got a little more practice with it. I told my wife,  who I walked with, "A try at the fish is never wasted. Each teaches you." 

So that's it for trout until April 1. Unless you fish a spot like the Ken Lockwood Gorge, always open. I plan on trying for bass until then.