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Long Beach, New York, located in western Nassau County, offers the surf caster ready access to productive waters for surf-casting throughout the striped bass season. Understanding Long Beach's basic fish holding structures coupled with a knowledge of striped bass migration and movement patterns will increase your chances for tangling with Ol' Lineside along this stretch of the south shore of Nassau.

Background

As a resident of the south shore of western Nassau my first forays into surf-casting were at the beach closest to me, in this instance Long Beach. As a matter of course, with today's busy schedules and family obligations, finding the time to go surf-casting is not easy and one may only have a two hour window for fishing including driving time. As an example, during the fall run, this could be a 5 to 7 AM dawn patrol session and then it's off to work. Well, for residents of the western south shore of Nassau under these time constraints a trek to Long Beach may be all it takes. We all relish the trips to Montauk, other east end hot spots, and western Suffolk County beaches and during the fall run most Nassau based surf-casters visit these locations. But we've also got to put our time in at the surf-line line on a day to day basis to consistently catch fish and that typically precludes too much time driving around and thus the need to fish locally.

Structural Basics-The Long Beach Layout

The basic fishing structures in Long Beach include a gently sloping sand beach featuring sand bars, cuts in the bar and troughs between the bar and the shoreline. Punctuating the beach are periodic rock jetties spaced approximately 700 feet apart starting at Pacific Boulevard in the east continuing west into Atlantic Beach. Lido Beach exists to the east of Long Beach and features a sand beach and associated structures with a few sporadic jetties.

The previously mentioned sand beach structures exist between the jetties at Long Beach and vary in their extent and presence over the course of a fishing season. Some beaches may have a pronounced sand bar with cuts and a trough in-between the bar and the shoreline while another beach may have less fishable structure and be relatively flat. Enter a Nor' Easter now and then to rework the sand and you will be required to scout the beach after the storm to reacquaint yourself with the current beach conditions. The pocket of the jetty typically refers to a relatively deeper water basin or trough, the "pocket", immediately adjacent to the jetty near the shoreline. Additionally, deeper troughs usually exist parallel to the jetty on either side of the jetty which allow water that has been piled onto the beach by wave action to drain from the shoreline back towards the ocean. Similarly, the cuts in the sand bars serve the same function, creating the notorious rip tides to be avoided by swimmers, but loved by the fish as bait is flushed out towards the ocean.

Depending on the tide, wind direction and current fish will position themselves within or move through the structures in search of, or waiting on, bait fish. Actively foraging fish will cruise the troughs, set up just outside the bar on the ocean side of the cut facing into the current, or will press fish into the pocket up against the jetty and shoreline when feeding. Knowledge of these fish movements in relation to the structures will help you locate fish.

Working the Structures

Few jetties in Long Beach are actually able to be fished from as they are not "flat topped" so from a safety and mobility perspective I recommend wading out next to the jetty to a safe depth and then fan casting away from and parallel to the jetty. This position allows the surf caster to work the trough parallel to and past the jetty, potentially reach to the ocean side of the sand bar, and work the trough and jetty pocket in front of the bar. Another set up involves working the center of the beach, generally in-between the jetties, in a position to allow you to work a cut in the bar, the trough in front, or depending on the tide and water depth, reach the ocean side behind the bar just outside the cut. Of course if fish are present, visible and actively feeding you simply follow the fish. Your actual ability to fish the structure will be dependent on the wind, wave height/surf conditions and water depth at the time you are fishing so always think safety first.

Winds and Tides

If I could choose a preferred wind condition for Long Beach it would be slightly onshore out of the south or a light westerly or northwesterly wind. My experience in Long Beach indicates these to be the productive wind directions and generally fair weather conditions. A slight chop on the water helps hide your presence and disguise the lure to entice reactive strikes. Strong wind out of the north or northwest or east/northeast indicate clearing or stormy conditions, respectively, and fishing productivity is usually not as good. Strong onshore or east winds can bring in large swells, long shore currents, and weed and if you have the time it is best to head east and fish Jones Beach, Gilgo or Cedar Beaches in Babylon, or further east to Robert Moses State Park, especially if weed is the main problem.

The ideal tides are typical of most south shore beaches and in order would be the ebb and flood with dead high slack water and dead low being least preferred. Dead low tide in Long Beach during a spring tide cycle can find you in water so shallow you can actually wade past the jetty tip- not a good position to fish the structures. Depending on the structure present you may need to fish at a time when enough water is on the beach to make the structure "work". The part of the tide cycle that is most productive will depend on the season and the specific beach you are fishing thus take good notes to help identify a pattern.

Lure/Tackle Selection

You have the option of using your imagination here but I would recommend sticking with the basics. Jigs, tins and spoons, bucktails, swimming plugs and poppers are standard fare. During the 2001 season swimming plugs such as Yo-zuris, redfins and chicken scratch bombers and lipless crank baits such as Rat-L-Traps were particularly effective for me. In prior seasons super strike poppers have been very productive. Make sure your lure size matches the bait size throughout the season-typically smaller in the spring, increasing in size through the fall run as the bait fish size increases, and down sizing again late in the fall to season close. Of course there are variations in this theme and fisherman much more experienced then me will utilize other lures and techniques so always be open to learning from others. Of note is that larger lures generally produce larger fish, so when the big cows cruise the surf line you may want to be slow rolling a 7-inch redfin or swimming a large atom plug through the key structures previously described to temp the trophy striper. Conversely, when the schoolies are raiding the surf line 5-inch bombers, small poppers, tins, spoons and bucktails will do the trick.

As for tackle to handle the south shore surf my experience indicates a 10 foot medium action rod (graphite to minimize weight), 15 pound test line, 30 pound leader with a barrel swivel and duo lock snap, and a quality reel such as a Penn 7500 SS or equivalent is required.

Typical Fish Migration/Movement Patterns

As you probably agree, anytime is a good time to go fishing as long as the conditions are right, but as with any beach on Long Island that you fish repeatedly over time you will notice seasonal patterns developing. The actual timing of the pattern will slightly vary from year to year and will be dependent on water temperature and other factors such as the movement of bait fish. In Long Beach, the times I have learned to look forward to include the first two weeks in June and the months of October and November. Of recent note this past December, due to the unusually warm fall, was the phenomenal action involving both large and schoolie stripers which continued right up to the end of the month. As for the question of what time of the day generally fishing prior to and through dawn puts you on the water when the fish are usually active.

One other unique aspect of Long Beach is the opportunity to fish at night due to the fact that the beach is open and the lights along the board walk allow for some illumination as opposed to being on a dark beach with no lights. During the summer you will not likely be the only one on the beach as I have been fishing at midnight with a suprising number of people still walking or enjoying the beach. Additionally, I will note that on a few dark nights in Long Beach I have encountered some of my biggest fish, which have gotten the better of me and my tackle (i.e. please ignore the man in waders dropped to his knees crying at the surfline).

Put it All Together

Hopefully the topics covered here put together will allow you to enjoy what Long Beach has to offer to the new or seasoned surf caster. Please remember to leave the beach as clean or cleaner than when you arrived and practice catch, revive and release to insure the continued success of the fishery. I would like to think that us fisherman lead by example, most of all to the young fishermen who look up to us and follow our actions, and I'm confident we will.

Kurtis W. Stokes

(Thanks Kurtis, that was excellent - I'm sorry it took me so long to get the page up, it got lost in mounds of pages I've been planning on putting up...but it was certainly worth the wait! TimS)