As I chatted with Wayne and Peter Hess, makers of Guppy Lures  at RISAA Providence show, they commented on how people always say nice things about SJ and our giveaways. That we never ask for nothing in return. Well, to be honest, people reading our publication, contributing content and buying SJ gear, inset that enough? We think so.

Then they stuck some plugs in my hand and said this is for your readers.

While we are waiting for Tommy to finish new issue of the Surfcaster’s Journal Magazine this weekend, lets have a nice giveaway of these two Guppy Pencils.

Two winners, each one will receive one guppy Pencils, courtesy of awesome Hess brothers from Guppy Lures

Enter the giveaway bellow

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Oh yeah….and this little announcement

See you at Asbury

New issue of the Surfcaster’s Journal Magazine should be appearing after this weekend. A show season has us a little backed up but we are making progress

Here is a 5 minute look at almost 40 minutes of  Surf Fishing 101 Videos included in the March issue of the Surfcaster’s Journal Magazine

I wrote about this product in the past, so some of you are probably familiar with it. We also shot a quick video. This is the most simplistically brilliant cell phone holder design I have ever seen. No more wondering if your phone case is sealed tight, its automatic.

Today we are giving one away to our readers. So here is the video on the product and bellow the video you will find the SJ Giveaway entry app for StormR Waterproof Cell Phone Holder

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Show season is kicking in the high gear, but the end is near. No doubt company reps are looking forward to weekends at home and some resemblance of resumption of normal eating habits. Yeah, I get that “pro staff” guys get hammered on fb by keyboard fisherman, but I got to tell you, they are probably worth their weigh in gold. Being able to attend multiple shows on a same weekend and have competent representatives at each event is not that easy for any co. My hat is off to all those for whom your “off season” is a busy season. Almost there boys. Two Sundays from now, on March 13 Asbury Fishing Club will hold their annual Flea market but this Sunday there are two pretty big shows on the schedule

First, Ward Melville Fishing Expo on Sunday at Ward Melville HS. This is now THE biggest fishing show on Long island in the winter and its FREE. Yeah, there is no admission charge, plenty of parking  and vendors and seminars up to wazoo. This is a fundraiser for Ward Melville HS Fishing Club, one of the very few HS fishing clubs on LI. How do they raise money if there is no admission? By having so many raffles it will make your head spin. So buy few waffle tickets and support the kids and you might win a VS reel, plugs, Flatlander bags, waaaaaay to many things to list.

The second show is annual Berkley Fishing Club Flea Market at Toms River in NJ, Sunday from 9-2. Admission is $4

I think this year is going to be the most insane plug spectacle of all time at Berkeley. Go to their Facebook page and see who is coming and what kind of plugs are they making. The level of the talent this year is even the above usual norm. We are having bets on which dude will sell out fastest….lol…i am sure the line to get in and get a first shot at prime plugs will be insane. As it was at Asbury last year..or Surf Day few weeks ago

Wait, you mean other shows other than Striper Day had lines to get in? And people were perfectly content waiting in line for a shot of sought after plugs? And at Berkeley they have to stay outside? I’ll be damned, I thought only NY guys had to stay in line to get into Striper Day.

Yeah, I am being sarcastic. Today is not a good day in my world. We spoke to every single college on LI that had any type of venue for rental. Not a single one had a big room/gym AND a theater for seminars in close proximity. I guess jocks and conferences don’t mesh well. Hotels? Check. Every single one. Did not realized that Huntington Hilton, although they had that big room for vendors only ,have very small rooms for seminars, like really small.I am sorry for me not knowing this but I am usually at vendors table at Fisherman Show. Btw in case any of you are interested having your daughters sweet 16 or you just want to throw yourself a big birthday bash at Hilton, that empty room will cost you about 10k to 15 k without food…. in January!!!…and that is only for one room..I’d “lol” if I thought it was funny. How about giant sport complexes, you know like indoor soccer fields and such? Check. Did you ever see the size of their parking lots? What is that like a joke or something? But then again, only 22  kids are on the field for a soccer game so how many parking spots can they need? Please don’t say firehouse or some dimlit VFW hall. SJ is a little classier than that, besides those places get crushed by flea markets shows, never mind Striper Day. So all the colleges are out, as are hotels and sport venues. Public HS do not lease their space (why would they, they just ask for 8k in property tax every year from every resident..need more? raise taxes). They don’t need a stinking rental. Catholic HS? Still working on it but one snowflake and they shut down the school and the event. So Tommy and I went to see Suffolk CC in Brentwood . Right off exit 53 off LIE, GIANT venue, almost 10 times Hofstra. We would only need about 2/5 of space, would have to carve out a seminar area on the floor with curtains and pull bleachers to create seating. Yeah, everything we said we rather not do, but hey, we are out of options. Additional 150 theater on premisses. Like Tommy said, if two months ago someone offered us a 150 seat theater  we’d be “hell yea” we don’t need anything bigger. But after you guys packed a 350 seat Hofstra Theater we know we need to think bigger. It could work I told Tommy who was a little hesitant….ok more than a little. He Liked the tight feeling of Hofstra, he Loved the ability to show movies in dark pro theater (suffolk big theater is a walk across campus., no good), he just Loved the vibe and “feel” of Hofstra. If you know Tommy, you know that dude is all about the feel of things, its reflected in his designs. He was freaking out if Suffolk cc is too big, too kind of “trade show” and not enough “surf dude show”. Well no need to worry about that after today. Suffolk CC gave us a cost estimate and its “only” 4 (yea, you are reading that right) four times cost of Hofstra.

So I do feel today that I failed you for the first time since starting SJ. But I really did try and I really did give my all in effort to find, bigger, affordable venue so NY guys can have a show of their own. But its not meant to be, and as Kenny Rogers sang, “You Got To Know When To Fold Them”

I am folding my cards and I will never, ever ask why LI does not have its own Surf Fishing Show or why is the Fisherman Surf Seminar admission $25. If I was The Fisherman I’d change $50.

Welcome to life on  Long Guyland  my friends

Surfcaster’s Journal Crew will be at Ward Melville and Berkeley Flea Market in NJ. Stop by and renew your subscription. If you signed up at any of these shows last year, its probably expiring

New issue of the magazine will be coming out in about a week, along with 4 new Surf Fishing 101 videos

Have a Great Weekend

I am drinking tonight. Not everyones taste buds can take it, but mine seem to agree with it

Here is another video in Surf Fishing 101 series, just in case you missed it in the pages of SJ

Needlefish, metal lip swimmers, darters, Redfin and bottle plugs are almost always in my night bag with the exception being those night when I fish shallow sandbars in which case bottle plug might be supplanted by a surface swimming metal lip. All these lures, except surface metal lip swimmer, benefit greatly by a sweep, current or any type of moving water. This is the typical content of my bag when fishing sandy beach at night. If I am fishing close to the inlet, where there usually is strong current present I will load up my bag with more darters and heavier needlefish, which tend to work better in faster water then lighter ones. The surface swimming metal lip will usually be the casualty and its left behind. They tend to wiggle excessively in these same fast waters. The problem presents itself (and by the way, this is why you can never have enough lures) when you walk a hundred yards into an inlet and onto an inlet jetty. Here you will find a strong rip at the tip and much deeper water. Your needlefish and darters will be marginally productive if at all. Your surface metal lip swimmer would be useless here as fish are almost always hugging the bottom but you sure could use some sub-surface metal lip swimmers. Few of those 9-inch Tsunami shad and heavy bucktails coupled with pork rind would also fit this location well. Inlet jockeys often fish with nothing but bucktails and assorted leadhead with rubber all night long. Maybe you should ask your buddy if you could borrow his golf caddy for a night to carry your lures? Trust me, there is nothing funny about trying to load up a bag for every possible situation. Particularly, shallow water/deep water scenario during the same trip presents the most difficulty. No wonder suitcase size surf bags are gaining in popularity.

My daytime bag is packed with poppers, pencil poppers, surface metal lip swimmers, bottle plugs and tins. Redfin is there on occasion but since I use it in the same manner I use the metal lip swimmers, it’s often left behind. What you won’t find in my bag is subsurface metal lip swimmers, which I find to be poor producers during daylight hours. Lets be honest, besides few magical week during fall run the daytime fishing can be extremely tough. Even the deep-water spots are usually devoid of fish, as high temperatures and boats zooming over their heads chase the fish in to deeper waters. About the only consistency that I found over the years during daylight hours was by concentrating on fishing white water. Of course, casting into an acre of menhaden that is being mauled by striper and blues is certainly a nicer occurrence but unfortunately, those things don’t happen too often.

The reason I find white water so appealing is twofold. First, every wave that rise over the sandbar stirs the bottom underneath, exposing sand eels, crabs, sand fleas and other crustaceans. Your friendly neighborhood striper holds all these tasty morsels in a high regard. This highly oxygenated water stimulates feeding even during the warmest days of the year. The second reason I go out of my way to fish the patches of white water is the tendency of white water to mask our lure. Stripers and blues often follow the cresting wave, or swim right through it and feed in the foam, feasting on disoriented baitfish or unearthed crustaceans. Once the foam has dissipated, they retreat to deeper water. This is why your lure will get annihilated in the foam more often then in flat water. They know they have a limited time to feed in that particular wave sequence and your lure is wiggling, sloshing or popping in the foam. They’ll hit it first and ask questions later. Hey, they can always spit it out if they don’t like it. Unfortunately, they did not count on sharp hooks.

While speaking about the white water and wave periods I should mention some things that many surfcasters take for granted. First, all waves are not created equal. If the waves are large with a short “period’ or duration in between the waves, you will have a hard time working any surface lure as wave will fold on it frequently. Under these conditions, I always elect to go with a bucktail, tin or a bottle plug, and bury my lure underneath the waves. On the opposite side of the spectrum are lazy waves, one that roll slowly over the bar like a slinky, with a long period in between them. You will not be able to employ the white water strategy effectively under these conditions either. I find that forceful white water is much more productive and makes fish much more aggressive then when flat water is present.

One thing many surfcasters lack when casting their lure towards the coming waves is a lack of focus. They try to make the longest cast possible without regards as to where in the wave period it will land. This is a big mistake. You should never let your lure land in front of a folding wave. If it does, the wave will fold on your lure and your will lose contact with it. No contact means no fish, as simple as that. By the time you regain contact your lure will be far from its original destination, and you will be ceding some prime real estate to a wave. Timing your cast so your lure lands behind a wave will eliminate this problem and will help you catch more fish. How can I be certain? If you time your cast so your lure lands in the water behind the wave it will land in the…white water, of course.

Few times a year, particularly during fall months you might encounter a riled up water, courtesy of a nor’easter that is moving up the coast. You might drive to your honey hole, see the crashing waves, feel the stinging rain and decide to head back home. Fishing rough water is not everyone’s cup of tea but it can be a very rewarding experience. As I am writing this the first nor’easter of the season is building outside my window. Winds out of northeast are currently sustained at 22 MHP and gusting to 40 MPH. And it’s just a beginning! Yet I salivate at prospect of fishing this evening. If you concentrate at the onset of the storm, before the water is too riled up and off color and still weed free, you might encounter some phenomenal fishing. Large stripers will often charge beach, cruising effortlessly though big swells generated by a storm. Yet smaller baitfish will helplessly tumble through the turbulence akin to a sock in a dryer. That, and the fact that game fish might sense that feeding might be difficult for the next few days when the water turns to mud is what often makes bass and blues put on a feedbag. When it comes to choosing a lure for fishing during these periods two things should be foremost in your mind. First, how does it cast into a howling wind and how quickly can you bury a lure underneath the waves. You can eliminate these issues by fishing close to the mouths of inlets, where waves generally do not build up as much as they will on open beaches but even there, two plugs will get most plays from the veterans. Because of its ability to be cast into a strong wind and still be kept in contact after it enters the water, bucktail is always the first lure out of my bag. If you are not reaching the fish, you might try a heavy tin instead. The second lure that I always carry for these types of situation is a bottle plug. Cast it into the wind and quickly jerk your rod to dig the lure into the wave. It is a phenomenal producer under these conditions, particularly when there is large baitfish present in the surf. Don’t fret too much about your casting distance or lack there off. The same wave that is pushing your lure backwards will also be pushing the baitfish right at your feet. Do think how you are positioned on the beach in relation to wind, current or sweep. My favorite scenario is to have a wind come diagonally onto the shore, while the current and the ebbing tide is flushing the baitfish out of the bay in a same direction. This way the wind will push in the bait tight to the beach and increase the current speed or sweep. The reason I don’t mention other lures is because most cannot hold their own under these extreme conditions and will get tossed around. You will consequently lose contact with them and most likely go home fishless. Don’t fight the condition or argue with the fish about what they should eat. Feed them what the conditions are calling for and your bent rod will tell you when you got it right.

As I was preparing for my seminar at RISAA show this weekend on identical topic I came across this article that I wrote a long time ago so I figured I’d share it with you. Thank you all who attended the RISAA show this weekend and thanks to RISAA organization for putting on an awesome show

Choosing a right lure Part I

It is not a secret that a surfcaster is faced with ever-changing conditions in which to he casts his lure. Not only do these conditions change daily and are influenced by wind direction, its velocity, current and fluctuation in tide levels but these conditions often change during a single trip. One minute you are casting your lure towards a distant sandbar at high tide, finding placid conditions and gentle surf. Few hours latter, as water level drop, you might find scenery that looks much different, with white water rolling over now shallow sand bar. Or you might find yourself casting a Bomber in an inlet, canal or breachway at slack water, admiring its movements as it slithering slowly through the water. An hour later, you might find this same lure getting swept by the current too fast to be effective. As you can see, the conditions on any particular beach are constantly changing, and a surfcaster must be aware of them in order to adjust his lure selection and his lure presentation. If you are presented with a sandbar that is high and dry at low water, and will preclude the fish from coming into the through you might have to leave in search of more fertile grounds. Donning a wetsuit and wading onto the bar is another option, but please understand that although many people boast about this, few actually do it. Even a sandbar that appears subdued at slack water can get nasty in a hurry if a wind blows against the tide.

Before we delve into particulars of each type of structure, I must make you aware that this article is presented in general terms. Every lure that is on the market today can and will catch fish even when used in manner and under conditions it shouldn’t be. You can toss a Redfin into a Northeaster’s gale, have it land ten yards from you and catch a fish. But just because you can do it doesn’t mean you should. I believe that mark of a good surfcaster is his ability to find a correct lure that will be most productive under the conditions he is faced with. You might raise few eyebrows by casting a pencil popper at night and catching fish, but I can guarantee you that you will get outfished by someone who will be using a lure that is better suited for fishing at night. If your purpose is to amaze and shock people while fishing, go ahead and knock yourself out. Most of us however have a precious little time to devote to the sport we love and we will try to hook as many fish as we can during our time in the suds. God knows that getting skunked is not an exception in this sport, particularly if you are aficionado of artificial lures.

Many surfcasters fall in the trap of falling in love with a particular lure, and you’ll often see them casting it into the surf without regard to conditions in which they are using it. Now, there is something to be said about one having a confidence in his lure. I think its imperative that a surfcaster has a high degree of confidence in a lure he is using but he also has to have knowledge of its ability and its limitations. In fact, I think so much of it; I devoted an entire chapter of my book, The Art of Surfcasting with Lures to its importance. But most seasoned surf veterans also know that their favorite lure will often be ignored when used under less then optimal conditions.

Although water conditions are often a primary consideration when choosing which lures to use, they are not the only one. Which baitfish is a primary focus of stripers and blues is also an important factor. Not only when choosing the size or color of a lure, but more importantly, the manner in which the game fish will be feeding in. I am not a big color freak by any definition. I fill my bag with lures that are yellow, white or black most of the time with few offbeat patterns that I swear I like more then fish.

Manner in which the fish are feeding holds more importance to me then any color, shape, size or how far can I cast a particular lure. Yes, we all encounter days when a long cast are necessary to reach the fish feeding on a distant sand bar but most of the time, even a novice surfcaster can reach productive water easily. Too many surfcasters chose a lure based on the how far they can cast it when other considerations should be given more importance.

Veteran surfcaster knows that game fish will feed on many different types of baitfish throughout the season and that they will change the manner in which they are doing it. With that in mind, shouldn’t we change our lure presentation in order to better match this occurrence? I think so. A pencil popper that was such a productive lure for you when big stripers and blues were crashing adult menhaden might not work so well few weeks later when game fish turn their attention to bottom hugging sand eels. Even the slob of menhaden cast into a surf during mullet run will often be ignored by blitzing fish which are zoning into the mullet which travels just under the surface. With that in mind, pay a close attention to the manner in which the fish are feeding and then choose a lure that you can present in a specific part of a water column.

Now that we have this covered, I feel I can dispense some general advice on which lure to use under different conditions. I have to mention that each location on the striper coast has its own little quirks, its own way the water moves around or over the structure, In fact each spot has its own most “productive window”, time when game fish will populate because the conditions are right for feeding. Unfortunately, I cannot help you gain this type of specific knowledge. The one and only way of learning this is to spend time on this particular beach and fish it during all different tide stages and wind directions. You might be lucky and have a friend who will call you once he does all the reconnaissance work and finds a fish. Even if he does, you’ll still have no understanding of why a particular bite occurred. You might know what the productive tide/wind conditions are on that beach but it is he who will posses knowledge and be able to apply it to any location he chose to target. You can try combat this by getting a really good phone so you never miss his call but I can assure you, no one shares information with those that don’t put their time in on the water.

Kidding aside, the easiest way to learn water in front of you and consequently apply this knowledge in assisting you in picking a most productive lure is to take water movement (current speed, wave formation and wave period) coupled with wind direction and velocity, sprinkle some primary baitfish presence into this and it will give you a great starting point on which lure to use.

I categorize my lures into two groups, surface and subsurface. Then I refine my final selection by considering if I will use them in the daytime or at night. Yes, some lures are equally effective in daytime and nighttime but most are not. Since I refuse to carry the entire inventory of a small tackle store in my surf bag I must make some (hopefully) intelligent choices. For example, needlefish and darters are always included in my night bag regardless if I am fishing rocky beaches of Cuttyhunk, MA or sandy beached of Long Island, NY. As productive as they are for me they rarely see the light of my daytime bag. Do they stop catching fish once the light arises over the horizon? No, but they are much less productive then most other daytime lures. Again, you will have to answer to yourself,” how many lures am I willing to carry?” The second question you will ask yourself is,” what do I leave behind if I take these lures?” One constant thing in my bag is lure that I always carry at least a dozen of, in different sizes and colors. It never leaves my bag regardless of conditions, locations or time of the day. Daytime, nighttime or time in between, a bucktail is always in my surf bag. Does this mean I will use it during every trip? Not necessarily but I need to have them with me. Its like a child that clings to its security blanket, I need my bucktails in order for my bag to feel complete. Before you start thinking that I have some strange fetish for these hairy lures, let me put your mind at ease. The reason for my strong affection for these lures is that they work in just about any conditions, just about any situation, from the first day of the season till that last striper kicks his tails and leaves towards Delaware. They work great in fast deep water, fast shallow water, under moderate surf conditions and particularly well under big surf conditions often associated with big storms. About the only time I find them not that productive is in the areas of shallow, or non-moving calm water. Then again, if these are the type of water you fish, find another location or get really good at tossing live eels.

I don’t post many videos here that are not original SJ creation but this I consider Must See material!

Grab a cup of coffee and soak this up!!!