by Steve McKenna
Surf fisherman Jos Huxley with a nice summer striper that couldn’t resist a 7-inch modified Red Fin.
Ask any surfcaster worth his salt, and he will tell you that catching striped bass from shore during the summer can be tough. Hot, sunny weather drives water temperatures up, way out of the stripers’ comfort zone, causing them to sulk frequently and feed irregularly. Poll that same group of anglers about the best way to catch these moody stripers during the summer season, and they will most likely tell you that casting live or rigged eels into the surf or fishing fresh chunks of bunker on the bottom are the only ways to go. Ask about artificial lures or plugs, and most savvy summertime surfcasters will tell you to wait until the fall.
If you are like me, however, and enjoy using artificial lures, then you might be unwilling to accept this “bait or nothing” decree. For the past eight seasons I have been using artificials exclusively in the surf for striped bass, even during the summer, with some excellent results. I have learned that you can find success using artificial lures in the summertime, but you have to know which lures to use and where and when to fish them.
Soft-Plastic Stickbaits
In the late 1990s, two of my fishing buddies introduced me to the 9-inch Slug-Go made by Lunker City in Connecticut. I found it to be a terrific striper bait. I tinkered around with it a bit and came up with a modified Slug-Go that was rigged with several Lunker City insert weights and two 7/0 Gamakastu octopus-style hooks. This combination turned out to be a super producer of surf bass from 14 inches to 40 pounds for me over the last several years. I was so impressed with its outstanding striper-catching abilities that I wrote an article for this magazine (“Live Eel Alternatives,” September 2005).
I have continually used this artificial and have had outstanding results, particularly during the summer. In fact, during the summertime it is my top choice and the first thing out of my bag in most situations. It is a great lure, but it has some limitations in fast-moving water. It does work well, however, in just about every other shoreline structure a surf fisherman can find. I like to fish it fast, casting it into productive water and letting it sink to a different depth on each cast. After letting it sink to the desired depth, I begin retrieving it at a medium-to-fast retrieve while pumping or “bouncing” the rod tip erratically. It is important though to position the rod at your side and parallel with the water halfway back on the retrieve. This allows the lure to stay subsurface, which I have found to be critical when fishing after dark. I found that stripers, particularly big ones, like the Slug-Go to be under the surface of the water, even if it’s an inch or so, after the sun goes down.
One of the author’s tandem-rigged Slug-Gos. Insert weights are added to help keep the bait under the surface.
I love the 9-inch Slug-Go in black but have caught bass on just about every other color that I have tired. I also discovered that during full or bright moon periods on summer eves that black will work just as well as any other color. During those bright full moon nights, I slow down the retrieve of the Slug-Go a bit and it seems to work better than the faster reeling I use most of the time.
Minnow Plugs
The Daiwa Salt Pro minnow should be in every summertime surfcaster’s plug bag.
My next favorite all time summer striper lure is the Finnish-type minnow plug. Some of the better ones offered are the Cotton Cordell Red Fin, Bomber A Salt and Long A, and Greenpoint swimmers. The Red Fin and Bomber are plastic, and the Greenpoint is made from wood and has a metal lip. I like all three in 5- and 7-inch models. All three come in a variety of colors and Greenpoint even makes custom colors.
My favorite of the three is the Greenpoint Sharp Eye swimmer because its metal lip can be adjusted to make the lure swim at different depths. Gently bending the lip up causes the plug to swim deeper, and bending it back allows the lure to swim near or even on the surface during a slow retrieve. This can be indispensable when fishing different spots where depths are varied, and having a thin profile plug swim at the correct depth is important. The Greenpoint swimmer can also be ordered in varied weights from 3⁄4-ounce to 3-ounce. I find this a lot easier than drilling holes in my hollow Red Fins and loading them with 10ccs of water, or living with the actual weights of Bombers.
Regardless of which one you choose, these swimmers are necessary during summertime forays to the beach. In fact, during the last few summers, I would not have done as well as I did if not for these lures. They have a slim profile, which I think most closely resembles the predominate baitfishes in the area – sand eels and spearing. There were times that I couldn’t get a hit on anything except a 5- or 7-inch swimmer. I found that these swimmers work well in an array of colors. My favorites for summer fishing are yellow, black and silver, blue and silver, green and silver, and gold and white.
The Red Fin can be modified in several ways to make it a better and more versatile summer producer of stripers. First of all, the stock hooks on the Red Fin are not the best and I have had them straightened out by mid-sized stripers. As a result, I have found VMC treble hooks to be a proper replacement for the originals. I like 2/0 or even 3/0 sizes for the 7-inch plug. Select the 4-Extra strong hooks. The Red Fin comes with split rings, and I find them to be alright. A lot of guys, however, switch them out. They use stronger ones made by Wolverine, Owner or Rosco in size 5. In addition, the 7-inch Red Fin can be easily weighted. Weighting it with 10 cc of water allows the plug to cast better, and fish better in rougher water. A weighted 7-inch Red Fin also has much more stability in current than the stock model. To add water weight to a Red Fin, simply put a small hole in the plug up near the top of the head with a small drill bit and hold the lure under the faucet until the water level is up to the middle hook hanger when the plug is held vertically. Most Red Fins are semi-transparent and you can see the water level when the plug is placed in front of a bright light. A graduated syringe makes weighting a lot easier if you can find one. Then glue the hole or get a nail, heat it with the candle and reseal the hole by smearing the plastic of the lure over the hole. All these modifications give the surf angler more confidence that the plug won’t collapse if a big bass grabs it. I once caught four 40-pound bass on the same 7-inch Red Fin modified in such a manner. This size Red Fin works well after dark and is at home in inlet situations.
Another trick that a surf fisherman can do to a 7-inch Red Fin is to leave the plug stock but change the original hooks to 1/0 VMC 4-extra strong. Smaller hooks you say? Well, by performing this alteration the plug becomes much lighter. It won’t win any casting contests, but it will catch a lot of bass. The lighter Red Fin will ride on the surface throughout a slow retrieve. The bass just can’t seem to resist a long, thin-profile plug moving tantalizingly on the surface. Strikes are unbelievable. I have seen a Red Fin modified in such a manner outfish everything else on several occasions. It is a great daytime plug also. When everyone else is throwing topwater poppers or Danny-style plugs during the day, clip on the light Red Fin and hold on. It’s a winner and is always in my bag when I’m fishing the summer surf. As for Red Fin colors, “bone” is the best in my opinion, followed by everything else. Black or “blurple” works well after the lights go out.
Sand Eel Teasers
The “Swim Eel” by Tsunami makes an excellent striped bass lure.
I found minnow-style plugs to be extremely productive when used in conjunction with a 4-inch Red Gill teaser.
The Red Gill is a rubber copy of a sand eel. Sand eels have been prevalent in our waters for the last three years, and the stripers have been feeding heavily on them, particularly during the summer. These lures were very difficult to find in recent years, however they are once again being imported from the UK and sold in the States. Several sizes are available, but I have found the 4-inch “Rascal” model to be the best for teaser rigs.
Presenting a small, thin rubber lure to stripers is done via a dropper rig. You can use this rig with a Greenpoint, Red Fin or Bomber swimmer, but it also works with other artificials. The main lure, plug or even metal acts as the vehicle which allows the fisherman to cast the lighter Red Gill out a good distance. Most of the time the striper will take the smaller Red Gill, but occasionally you’ll hook a fish on the larger offering. Double headers also occur, and if two larger fish are fooled by the rig, things can get mighty interesting. I pretty much use this set up throughout the season because it is so productive. I use it with metal-lip swimmers, tins, bucktail jigs, and have even used it with rigged and live eels. The rig works wonders when there is any type of small bait around. It has a tendency to interest smaller bass, but every once in a while you’ll hook a larger bass that‘s feeding on the small spearing or sand eels in front of you. I took a 30-pound bass last November on a black Red Gill teaser when I would have bet the rent money that the larger fish hit the larger plug. I have caught with just about all of the Red Gill colors, but my favorite is all-black, then all-white, and on brighter nights, yellow/orange. Unaccountably, the more natural-colored Red Gills don’t catch as well for me, even though they are dead ringers for the real thing.
Metal-lip Surface Swimmers
The next artificial that sees a lot of action during late June, all of July and August and into September is the Danny-type surface swimmer. Summertime bass are basically nocturnal feeders. Very, very rarely will you catch bass during the daytime at this time of year. The water around the shoreline does cool down a bit after dark and bass, big and small, poke around looking for an easy meal. I fish around the rocky shorelines of Rhode Island and southeastern Massachusetts a lot during the summer. In those areas there are lobsters, bergalls (cunners) and small blackfish. The 6- or 7-inch Danny-style metal-lip swimmer fished around these boulder fields closely imitates this larger forage. I have found summertime stripers to be suckers for these. Fish them slow around the rocks, mussel beds and in white water, if there is any.
The 6-inch Beachmaster Danny is my first choice when encountering this type of shoreline structure, and I have also done well with the original Danny swimmers by Dan Pichney and Don Musso. If you can’t find those three, don’t despair as there are quite a few plug makers out there who make a surface-swimming Danny-style plug. RM Smith, Big Fish, Afterhours and Gibbs are just a few that offer productive Danny-style plugs. Whatever plug you choose, just make sure that it swims on the surface throughout the entire retrieve. Most will swim correctly but some will not. It is a good idea to check nighttime plugs during the daylight and tune them accordingly. As for colors, I have caught on many different shades and have pretty much settled on white, black/purple, chartreuse/parrot and yellow.
When I approach and fish boulder fields, I will try lures in all or most of these colors. I do not subscribe to the dark night/dark plug, bright night/white plug theory. I have beached quite a few quality stripers on bright yellow or parrot-colored plugs on nights so dark you couldn’t see the proverbial “hand in front of your face.” I think a summertime surfcaster has to be willing to try different lures in an array of colors. By all means, experiment.
There is another type of surface swimmer that I use frequently during the summer. It is very similar to the Danny in that it swims on the surface throughout the retrieve. The “Surfster” style plug works wonders during summer forays to boulder-strewn inshore waters. I have caught some nice bass around Narragansett, Rhode Island in August, a month when it is traditionally very, very tough to catch big striped bass no matter the method you are using. I like the Gary Hull model but have used other Surfsters made by Bob Hahn, Troublemaker and Lemire. For some reason, Surfster-style plugs are not as popular as the Danny plug, but if you look hard you can find them. My all-time favorite and most productive summertime Surfster color is, hands down, chartreuse.
The Sharp Eye Swimmer from Greenpoint Tackle Co. is a great example of an effective metal-lip surface swimmer.
Eel-Skin Plugs
The next summertime producer we will look at is sort of a half-and-half offering. The eel-skin plug usually starts with a wooden, metal-lip swimmer. This plug is generally sold with a small groove cut around the head of the lure. This groove will ultimately hold a skin from a dead eel. The eel skin is turned inside out, fitted over the plug and fastened to the groove with 50-pound-test Dacron line or dental floss. Most eel-skin plugs come with one or two hook hangers. After the skin is fastened to the plug, two holes are cut in the bottom of the skin so the barrel swivels can pop thru and one or two treble hooks can be attached to the exposed barrel swivels by either split rings or by cutting the eye of the trebles. I prefer the later method. No tail hook is necessary as you don’t want anything on the rear of the plug that would interfere with the tail and its action. Now you have a real summertime killer of striped bass. In fact, I use it all season long.
Lordship lures provides a step-by-step rigging tutorial on their website.
My favorite eel-skin metal-lip swimmers are made by Lordship lures and Beachmaster lures. I like their eel-skin “junior” swimmers as well as Beachmaster’s smaller “spin” eel-skin model. Others by Tattoo, GRS, and JnSki work well too. If you can’t find one on the tackle store shelves, then you can make one easily by taking a regular Danny-type or Junior-type metal-lip and cutting a small groove in the wood with a triangular file. I have done this in a pinch with excellent results.
Eel-skin plugs work well in all surf terrain but really shine when fished in inlet currents. I do most of my surf fishing in boulder fields, but I do spend time fishing river mouths and breach way outflows. The eel-skin swimmer is indispensable in this type of structure. Cast the plug out up current a bit and let it drift out a good distance. Engage the line and feel it drum in the current. Believe me, a striper cannot resist these plugs fished in this manner. I have taken all sizes of bass up to 40 pounds on eel- skin metal-lip plugs and will not leave my house to go fishing without one. Eel skins work best after dark and are well worth the effort of finding a good eel-skin supplier or skinning the eels yourself. The later can be a messy deal, but an eel skin on a metal lip makes a very, very special and productive striper lure, particularly in the summer. I also use the eel-skin plug in conjunction with the Red Gill teaser rig for a very deadly combination.