Finding Stripers in Oyster Bay and Cold Spring Harbor
Since we had mentioned the "bass under the blues "theory in our last report, I thought it appropriate to jump ahead several years to a point where the theory was inadvertently put to the test! We had moved to Mahwah, which added almost thirty minutes to our trip to Bayville, so we began looking for a spot, which was in the one-hour travel time. The new area put us in close proximity to the Throggs Neck Bridge and from there it was just a matter of finding a launch site, no easy task where waterfront property was almost exclusively residential.
Thanks to the River Rats, I was made aware of a launch site that put me in striking distance of another great location on the Western Sound. In addition to fishing the river, some of the guys would go to the City Island section of the Bronx and fish the tidal marsh that bordered the western entrance to the island. It's a rather unique section of New York city, and in a sense, reminds one of a small New England town. It's often said that a realtor would starve there since most properties are sold by word of mouth and often to the children of residents who are starting their own families.
I knew of the area since as small boys we would go there to fish from a pier at the eastern end of the island. If I'm not mistaken, we took two trolleys to get there! In any event, City Island was bordered on one side by Eastchester Bay and it was there that we located our launch site. Old, rusty, and decrepit come to mind in describing the place. It had once launched seaplanes but that was a long time ago! Nevertheless, it served our purpose and provided an ideal location to wage our assault on the Sound's bass population.
On one occasion, my neighbor, who is an accomplished fly fisherman, expressed an interest in trying the sound for bass on the fly. With my “vast” knowledge of the area I quickly assured him that we would murder the fish with no problem. We ran across the sound to one of my former haunts in cold spring harbor and proceeded to lash the water into foam with the outstanding result of two short bass on the deck! When all else fails we did the smart thing and moored the boat and went to lunch. After a leisurely lunch and short walk in the historic town of Cold Spring, we returned to the dock to resume our search. As we approached the boat we struck up a conversation with a charter captain who had just completed a trip and was securing his boat. After complaining about our uneventful trip and the lack of action, I asked him if he had any suggestions for us. With that he looked past us and pointed to a huge area that was alive with bunker and bathtub-sized swirls! “You might want to try that spot,” he laughed.
It didn't take long for us to hop on the boat and slowly motor out to a spot where we could begin a drift toward the boils and swirls. The wind was up and it was tough for me to leave the console and fish so I stayed on the engine and let my partner have a shot at them. By now we could seen that we had a large school of teen bluefish which in turn had pinned a huge school of bunker against the beach in two to three feet of water! My friend threw every big fly he had without a bump so he went to the old standby of snagging a bunker and letting it swim into disaster! On occasion I would leave the console, make a short cast, hook a bunker and put the rod in a holder before running aground. On occasion I would be able to hook up, land a blue and get back to the controls before winding up on the beach. However most of the time I had to watch, as line would peel off the reel, the rod would bow and my fish would get off. On one occasion, after I had lost a good blue, but still had the bunker head, I let it sink to the bottom, maybe three feet. Then I got back to the console to get us out a bit further, and watched as the reel screamed and the line started off across Cold Spring Harbor. After a bit of scrambling I was able to boat a bass of about twenty-five pounds, which had picked up my bait just under the blues. While I had read about that occurring, it was a first for me. However that info did not go to waste since we subsequently put the technique to very good use in the in sight of the Throggs neck bridge! But that’s another story!
