7 posts on myth-busting.
"Big bait, big fish" is the most repeated rule in striper fishing. In 241 Massachusetts stomachs with measurable menhaden, the length of the bass explains 2 percent of the variation in the length of the menhaden it ate. In the Chesapeake, the largest fish lean on bay anchovies. Big bass widen the range they will eat — they do not leave the bottom of it.
6 min read
Feeding-response curves for northeast piscivores flatten out exactly where bait is thickest, fish collected by angling had eaten less than fish collected by nets, and in summer water a young striped bass's stomach is half-empty again in roughly one tide stage. "Find the bait" tells you where to stand — it is a poor forecast of the catching.
6 min read
Striped bass stomachs sampled off Massachusetts contained zero menhaden in June and July, then 29 to 81 percent by weight in August and September. Here is what that means for when bunker is the bait.
3 min read
Every August someone tells you the bass shut off above 75°F. Tagged fish say otherwise — routine occupancy past 77°F, and in Chesapeake Bay an avoidance threshold closer to 81°F. Here is what the primary literature shows, including the warm-water fact that should change how you handle a fish.
5 min read
Somebody tested popular solunar tables against real catch records and they failed to predict success. A separate study on a lake with no tides at all found the moon effect peaking at full AND new — which rules out both explanations usually offered. What survives is smaller, and more useful.
4 min read
Two analyses from one Bay of Fundy tagging project looked for a tidal effect on striped bass. One found no depth difference between ebb and flood across over 9,000 detections; the other found detection independent of water level (p = 0.93). The same fish do move vertically, just on a different clock.
3 min read
StripedLines rates the water in front of you in five tiers, from Dead to Fire. It is a ranking inside one set of choices — not a probability, not a percentage chance, and not an expected catch rate.
2 min read
