Spring is around the corner- How about a thread on Spring striper tactics... What gets you your first large of the year??
For me, its cocohoes and redgills or small bombers depending on the wind and location. Usually I will use smaller diameter leaders maybe 20lb test flourocarbon. Then around early June, I up the anty and break out the big guns/plugs, 40 or 50 pound test leaders..

How about everyone else??? whats your go-to spring lure??

herring!!!

little soft plastics, like the cohoes, the little gs shad bodies, and sluggos and fin s fish all paired with a 1/2oz jighead.

i love the yellow and the olive baby mambo minnows too.

i use my fresh water rod. 8 pound test and a bit of 12 or 15 mono for leader.

fun times:)

and my fish are never large. a keeper to me is large in spring.

Honkin big topwater plugs...pikies, dannys, pencils...in herring sorta colors

jigs and pork, eels, eels, eels

Live Herring!
What else is there?????

Gorilla's in the mist.

i like to hunt down Eben and see what he's doing and where he's doing it.

Bassassasins and herring (if I can get em)

Spring is for trout ! for which I use yellow rooster tails . striper season starts in late May early June . This year I may not start stripers till Sept . I have a trip for salmon in July which is going to take away alot of my away from home time that Ive built up .

Soft platics, small poppers, bucktails/grubs, and deadly #^&#^&#^&#^&'s.

alewife or white colored fin s shads 5 inch on 3/8 oz jig head fished soow

Last year I caught many schoolies in the canal with 3-4" Storm shads.

Pencil Poppers, Jig and Pork, Bombers, Needlefish, Fin S Fish, and Eels

Sluggo's, FinS, Storms, thats all I need.

I fish at the crack of dawn

Small spoons, lots of plastic, light line and gear.

Live Herring they die they get chunked or yo yo jigged :devil:
soft plastics: fin S, ledge runners, storms, red gills, bleached red chenille flies with a hit of peacock hurl for the head (worm hatches :humpty: ) and casting eggs, assassins, small bucktails, small pencils, small amber colored swimmers, dannies

soft plastics....kastmasters...small stick baits

What is considered "Spring Fishin"?
I don't usually fish for bass until June/ July. I start fishing all together around Mother's day, but I am mainly targeting big blues, in which case I use a blood soaked sneaker or anything else I might have lying around the truck from the previous season. Stock rotating.

It seems that herrin are becomin less of a nessecity to catch big fish in the spring time.

big pencils and live herring. can't friggin' wait!!

BIG mackerel and herring color darters and dannys. BIG herring shaped tins and spoons

A fast sinking line and a 8" mantis shrimp fly. Mantis shrimp come out of the mud in early April. Last year I caught/ate several large bass that were full of mantis shrimp. Fly on the bottom in 30' of water just twitching around.

A 25# fish caught in the last week of April 03, had 10 recently eaten shrimp that were at least 8-10 long. A few still had a blue tint on their claws. Her belly also contained mussle shells, a few rocks and a 12" Tautog and a handfull of mud. These bass were grubbing in the mud for food. Mantis shrimp live all over the world, close to a hundred different species. Our local shrimp like the mud and only come out to eat and spawn.

Check out mantis shrimp on the web, they are very cool animals.

Live Herring or Macs trolled deep!
Kind of tough for you SURF guys to TROLL live bait from shore:laughs:

Excellent replies :D

I should clarify about what i meant by the cocohoes in the spring..there is a well known early spring schoolie spot in south county and cocohoes reign supreme... Thats where I would be using those. Now, if I was to fish where the herring might be, well, thats a whole different story :humpty: Darters, Bombers, and this mongo plug a member here gave me called a Cowboy:humpty: yeeee haw :ss:

There is a big squid run from the last part of April thru May.The bay is full of them. Hmmm.... I'm surprised nobody mentioned squid.:gf: oops!

I think for the Newport crowd, the Squid thing is a bigger deal.. Over here across the bay, herring are a more of a draw for the bass than squid. I might be wrong though... This year I want to learn more about bait cycles to help with predicting where to fish and what plugs to use to represent that baitfish

Hey, Joao...ixnay on the idsquay :smash:

Or anything that vaguely resembles idsquay....:p

Dang ..hammered by Crafty twice in 1 day! :uhoh: All I meant was that over the years I've noticed that in the spring , stripers seem to go for one thing -squid and herring.:angel:

Originally posted by Pt.JudeJoe
There is a big squid run from the last part of April thru May.The bay is full of them. Hmmm.... I'm surprised nobody mentioned squid.:gf: oops!

Thats what the jig and pig is for!!!!

I think squid is an easy bait to overlook at times...

Rip Splitters with a No.7 pork Rind:eek:

pink poppers,darters work real well in the spring when squid are in the canal

Originally posted by chris L
I fish at the crack of dawn

I like to fish in the crack of yer pants. :beat: :beat: :beat: :as:

I've had good luck with the 3 to 4 inch storm shads but will try the fin-s-fish this spring as well.

Crazy joe cocahoe rig and bucktails and dead freezer burned eels this spring:D

Originally posted by Pt.JudeJoe
Dang ..hammered by Crafty twice in 1 day! :uhoh: All I meant was that over the years I've noticed that in the spring , stripers seem to go for one thing -squid and herring.:angel:

Nah, Joe, I was trying to say you're right on the beans - but I guess it's not a secret anyway...:hihi:

In fact, there's a couple of spring spots we oughta hit that I've been thinking about a lot lately - and one of them is that spot where I found some very nice bass feeding on 'foot-longs' last year early in the season ;)

Season starts up early here like end of march- april the flats in the bay warm on a low tide an on the top u can get em pretty good wit bait. used to be a pretty good secret but its blown up the last few yrs.then they go up river to spawn an thats when i have fun wit jigs.the warm land mass against the cool ocean makes a eerie fog seems to be pretty regular the last few yrs.Thats why i call it gorrila's in the mist got my best fish that time last yr.An my buddie got a 60#er.come june its a fish per herring routine till the bunks show up then large fat bottom girls on big pencils. My favorite.

Eben Keep a log. the information u will gather from it later in life will be invaluable as ur memory will fade.Things change from yr to yr but overall U'll see the patterns develope an U'll be a much better student of the sport.

Cocahoes to start, then Storm 4" pearl wildeyes, then a Kastmaster, then plugs.

Nib, yes I keep a log. each year I buy a new notebook and keep adding and adding to it as I fish....The Key is to understand bait cycles.. if you can understand what the forage is, i believe it becomes alot easier to catch big bass-