Friday, May 25, 2018

Exposures - May 2018

If it were the yellow-eyed, gator Bluefish who won the coin toss of April 2017 for inshore dominance, surfcasters alike must unanimously agree that this year’s win landed “tails-up” in forthright favor of the winter-months-missed, migrating tribes of Striped Bass.  Much like the Blues of the year prior, flaunting the shallows of the shoreline this season were the splayed caudals of linesiders seeking-out prey seemingly everywhere, foraging on tides rising and ebbing, and later, at times, even biting on the tails of Menhaden that I first observed in local waterways as inconceivably early as February 28th.  In the weeks that followed that date, snow fell upon the backs of these surface-breaching Bunker on more than three stormy occasions, but their sudden arrival left me wondering just how far-off in time the ancient chase of scaly predators would be.

As with the inception of every first trip to the salt and every commencement of first cast, I found myself following in the footsteps of preparatory ritual.  Reels were cleaned, greased, and re-spooled, knots tied, and leaders strung as certain, recurring thoughts were finally and physically loomed-of and focused upon over the clamped jaws of a dutiful vise, specifically, those concerned with the whereabouts and timing of my quarries’ arrival.  Again, I was a man one-step closer to a briny christening. 

Like most things in Nature, there blossoms one day when suddenly something appears, and then there is no turning back.  This year, such was the mass-invasion of 34"+sized Stripers to our waters at about mid-April.  The all-important breeders of the genepool.  Not only did the average sand-straddling surfcaster seem to eat his cake and have it too, talk of the town was the once-in-a-lifetime landing of a jaw-dropping 58lb. river-migrating matriarch from the shallows of the Raritan on the month’s full moon.  Social media and staple fishing website forums each concurred to the consistency of catches.  Needless to say, just like the incalculable membership of this strong showing of April fish, an equally inestimable number of cameras and cell phone phameras were kept busy capturing the mesmerizing profiles of fish hoisted both day and night, sagging of stuffed white bellies while held outstretched or suspended in-arms before an angler’s approving smile.  This was it, and as angling author Ted Leeson wrote best, “something important had continued.” 













...a tight bond where two synthetic contenders are being drawn to join together in unison, to never falter or slip, whose embodiment represents the unification of  old and new, where the opposing pairing of nylon monofilament coils in a firmly-wrapped, knotted collusion to the polyethylene fibers of Dyneema-based braid, forming the essential unity which is the very physical link serving to connect this man to the faraway saltwater depths of my fevered passions.


My lifeline empowering me on this perennial quest for peace. 
I will vow to push forward for more, to endeavor, and ultimately, triumph as a man humbled by his surroundings, fully-aware that if a fish happens to flop upon the bubbling sand of the surf, then all the better for me. 




"You can’t catch fish if you don’t dare go where they are" - Norman Maclean

The season's first - oh so good!






What one cast giveth, another taketh away.  Simply said, a beachwalk find.


You may only be a surfcaster, but you are a surfcaster dedicated to experiencing the bounty of riches Nature serves for you to feast upon like that of a ravenous gourmand.




Let 'em go, let 'em grow