Burning the Calendar

When you say I want to catch striped bass and bluefish in the ocean from the beach, know that by doing that you have unleashed a whole set of unseen forces that will conspire against you.  The job, family, and home and self preservation will immediately hold you back, provided you are into those things.  If you somehow manage to get past all that and actually get to the beach, atmospheric and oceanic forces will beat you even more.  They're too far out, too much bait and not enough fish, went to the wrong spot, tide changed and they turned off, and on and on . . . Or you will experience what we are going through right now, which is what I call burning the calendar.

Following bass blowing up on Mother's Day, the 13th, there's been nothing but a spell of poor wind and water conditions that have continued to waste precious calendar time.  There are only so many days for the spring season to happen, as it is with all seasonal activities.  S wind upwelling came on Monday and lasted through half the week, dropping the water to maybe even as low as 49F.  That shut it down.  Then the W wind never blew after the S.  Instead, a front passed at a perpendicular angle, and the wind went from N to NE, crossing up the S swell.  That did a great job of warming the water up very quickly to more of a late-June temperature, but unfortunately for fishing it prolonged a blah mix of swell and the water stayed rough and not good.  There was a report of action to the north, but locally it has been much less than stellar.

Where was the W wind?  No W wind followed one of the larger and formed true S swells in some time.  Instead the wind switched to N and NE following a waffling cold front.

As of tonight, Sunday, a week after a taste of white water bass action on Mother's Day, the pre-Memorial Day Weekend forecast is looking pretty lame.  More lingering onshore wind, more lingering SE swell crossed up by the wind, and blah sky conditions with chances for showers.  It's not that it can't happen, it's just the forecast conditions are far less than ideal.  What would be great is for a nice cold front to come through with a few days of dry NW wind to clean the water up and turn it green, as well as flatten the surf.

It looks like more time will be spent stuck in this lousy 'flow' of weather.  The italicized print from the 21st-29th is the forecast as of Sunday evening.  Notice the 13th, the good day, followed a pretty good W wind that dropped the surf.



The only thing of note I saw fish wise this week was a combo of an upside-down spinning reel and white rod.

Hopefully something happens this week that breaks a long spell of mediocre that, in my opinion, has been affecting the area in regards to the fish and the surf.  That something may be Memorial Day Weekend intoxication events, but I'd prefer it be that and some great fishing or waves that finally clean up.  I was reminded today that shark season is soon approaching, so if there continues to be nothing interesting going on, I will provide shark calendars for June, July, and August in the next update.  I've only been doing it for a few years (since 2010) so I don't have a lot of data on it assimilated into my brain, however, it seems the best fishing usually coincides with the schedule that will be provided.