The striper bass is an inshore fish that rarely travel more than a few miles from the coast. However, while they can be found as much as 60 miles (97 kilometres) from the coast when migrating, you are best to focus your efforts on the inshore areas.
In fact, one does not even need a boat to catch striper bass. They can be caught by casting from a dock or from a rocky outcrop. In some rivers, good numbers are caught so far upstream as to make it likely that they remain there the year round as can be found in the Alabama river system. It is not uncommon to catch striper bass weighing as much as 40 pounds (18 kilograms), some 300 miles (483 kilometres) from the ocean.
Striper bass are found along the shore line until spawning season. The best places to find striper bass outside of this time is along sandy beaches, in shallow bays, along rocky stretches, over submerged or partially submerged rocks and boulders and at the mouths of estuaries. When the tide is high, striped bass often lie on a bar and when the tide falls, they drop down into the troughs or move farther out. They also prefer the cover of floating rockweed.
Best Spots to Find Them
The best spots along rocky shores are in the surf and in the wash of breaking waves behind off-lying boulders or where a tidal current flows most swiftly past some jutting point. In the mouths of estuaries they are apt to hold to the side where the current is the strongest, and in the breakers out along the bar on that side.
In shallow bays, they often pursue small fry among the submerged sedge grass when the tide is high, dropping back into the deeper channels on the ebb. And they frequent mussel beds, both in enclosed waters and on shoal grounds outside, probably because these are likely to harbour an abundance of sea worms.
Striper bass prefer the temperature range from 70F (21C) degrees down to 43F (6C) degrees. When the temperature falls, they withdraw to warmer waters or they may just lie on the bottom in a more or less sluggish state. Temperatures above 80F (27C) degrees will result in their death.
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