29 lb Striper in Chatham Yesterday

[Soundbounder]

local angler Dave (last name withheld) has just landed yet another keeper striped bass taken in the waters off Chatham.

The fish weighed 29 pounds and took a live eel fished at night!


http://boatinglocal.com/fishing/29-p...-cape-cod.html


Not too shabby for February

[COWYARD]

crazy right?.......dedication to say the least

[Greg Y]

I think its great he's getting those fish but if you had a holdover fishery like that wouldn't you want to minimize attention to yourself?

[Slappy]

that is a large winter fish! I believe that there are many more stripers around than people realize, but they aren't easy to find.

I wonder where that fish was going to spawn in the spring, I wouldn't be surprised if it is wintering down here and returning further north.

[rabbit]

For millenia stripers wintered over in most of our tidal rivers in New England and the mid-Atlantic. Then we killed them all. The only escapees in any number were in the Hudson and the Chesapeake ... waters too big for us to find and kill every last one.

[Bob Parsons]

Many of us have fished for hold overs in various bays and estuaries. What many do not realize is that not all of these hold overs are small schoolies. I had the opportunity to examine one area after a major winter kill. Two things I noted, one, there were a lot more fish in the area than I was even close to imagining and two, a number of them were over 30".

[Onshore]

You can see a picture and the whole story at: www.goose.com
Apparently, the guy who took the fish has taken others this winter too.

Thats a hellovafish for February on Cape Cod. I saw a 27 pounder taken through the ice on Follins Pond in 2004 and caught a few holdovers in Bass River and a couple smaller streams when I lived in So. Dennis.
Bill H

[Soundbounder]

There have been some large stripers taken from the Thames River in CT, over the years. Haven't heard of any this year though.

[Slappy]

from my experience legal fish are very common, so far this year 28% of the stripers have been legal. The ones I catch in the winter are rarely over 15#, but I do assume that a few large hang around all year.

[EricL]

Originally Posted by Slappy

that is a large winter fish! I believe that there are many more stripers around than people realize, but they aren't easy to find.

I wonder where that fish was going to spawn in the spring, I wouldn't be surprised if it is wintering down here and returning further north.

A lot of the adult females do not spawn every year. Biffer holdovers, such as those in the Thames, are probably not going to spawn in 2012.

Eric

[Slappy]

One thing that I have always wondered about is whether the fish that stay go through the motions of spawning. There is a good population of breeding size female fish, plenty of food, just not good spawning grounds. I have never kept a fish to check for eggs and wouldn't want to eat a fish that spent the winter in beantown.

It seems that hanging out in different places along the coast would be helpful to the overall striper population in that the fish would locate all spawning grounds that they could be successful at using.

I have never seen evidence of successful spawning in Boston, I have fished the rivers extensively and never caught a juenile striper.

[Onshore]

Maine has a spawning population in the Kennebec river. I talked to one of their biologists some time back and he said they will spawn in other rivers too if the winter over and the physical conditions are right there but, not with any consistancy.

Bill H

[EricL]

Originally Posted by Onshore

Maine has a spawning population in the Kennebec river. I talked to one of their biologists some time back and he said they will spawn in other rivers too if the winter over and the physical conditions are right there but, not with any consistancy.

Bill H

Bill is right on this. There has been documented natural reproduction of striped bass in the Parker river, for example, but it is exceedingly rare and there is no viable population there. Successful reproduction in areas other than the Merrimeeting Bay estuary (Kennebec system) is almost exclusively limited to estuaries in the coastal plain. Larval striped bass die when exposed to water salinites higher than about 10 ppt (sea water is around 35 ppt). they can take 2 weeks or so to metamorphose into juvenile stripers. Unless you have extensive low gradient, freshwater tidal reaches of river the larval stripers drift into the lower estuary where salinities are too high and they die. This is why no successful spawning has ever been documented in the CT river, Housatonic or the Thames. The larger females that overwinter in these areas are just taking the year off from spawning. Their eggs will develop to a certain point, but will not undergo final maturation. During the Spring the energy sources in the eggs will gradually be reabsorbed by the fish in a process called atresia.

[Kuskus68]

Originally Posted by Soundbounder

There have been some large stripers taken from the Thames River in CT, over the years. Haven't heard of any this year though.

The Thames used to be a mecca of big bass starting in feb fly fishing we would catch plenty of fish 30 to 40" every morning from the town docks!, in the early 90's all but gone now!

[browndog]

I've seen alot of female bass with eggs that are turning grren, I've always thought the eggs were dead. There's a local river where bass are seen daisy chaining every spring ,always took this to be spawning behavior. The area is more salt than brackish so probably not viable.