Delaware River Stripers

[reifer350]

I am very interested in fishing the Delaware river this year for stripers. I've been fly fishing for two years all over the Lehigh Valley and Poconos. Up to now I haven't even tried to tackle what the Delaware has to offer.
I haven't been able to find many resources for fishing running stripers with a fly though. Any knowledge or resources out there?

 

[Fishidiot]

Reifer,
Welcome to the PAFF forum.
I'm not a De River regular so will leave specifics to folks who know that water well. I'd imagine Sandfly could give you some good answers. Almost all my striped bass fishing is done at the Atlantic beaches. Anyway, the "D" certainly gets stripers, I would think the prime months would be May and June; I'd also imagine this is mainly a boat fishery but there are probably some places where one could wade or shore fish. The fish run pretty far upriver. A 9WT fly rod with an intermediate line would work and the same baitfish patterns used for stripers throughout the salt would probably do the trick in the D river. It's worth exploring.


Edit:
Here's the PFBC Biologist's Reports on the striped bass in the DE River. I'm a big fan of these Biologists Reports - lotsa info about fish populations.
http://www.fish.state.pa.us/images/reports/2010bio/6x06_23dela.htm

 

[jayL]

They are in the lower skuke in april, so I would imagine the D would start heating up about then.

 

[beeber2]

As Fishidiot mentioned, May and June on the D are good. I've caught schoolies all summer into fall. Having a boat or floating helps, though just wading works too. The larger specimens are great fun on a fly rod. Most or all of the better fish were caught in low light conditions.

I have seen some real bruisers cruising but it's a challenge to get them to bite. I was wading and caught a real nice 20+ incher just before the jam 3 or 4 years ago.

Just put on a clouser and have at it. You'll get some smallies too.

 

[reifer350]

Beeber2, thanks for the tips. I'll be adding more clousers to my tying list for the winter.
What are the best places to find the stripers? Are they predictable or will they be anywhere?

 

[afishinado]

Here is some great info posted by FBC Mike on stripers in the D:


http://www.paflyfish.com/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=4515&forum=2&post_id=42267#forumpost42267


http://www.paflyfish.com/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=6034&forum=2&post_id=59109#forumpost59109

 

[skiltonian]

i may get some slack for this, but Bill from Anlers Pro knows the river pretty well. His deal is fishing the new hope dam at night swinging big flies.

 

[Heritage-Angler]

skiltonian wrote:
i may get some slack for this, but Bill from Anlers Pro knows the river pretty well. His deal is fishing the new hope dam at night swinging big flies.

Keith - Why would you get slack for this? Bill has always been great to me, and I've sent many people to him (from all over the country) that were looking for hard to find Sage rods. Without exception, all those people were thrilled with the service from Anglers Pro, and spoke highly of Bill...

Now if you're talking about swinging anything near New Hope, we'll that's understandable. :lol:

 

[sandfly]

He learned from Ken Shramm (rip). we fished the wing dam at night by swimming out to the rocks for stripers. kenny do nothing fly (the origanal gurgler) and white deceivers worked great for the big ones.

 

[Fredrick]

Here is my expierence with D stripers so far

 

[jayL]

It was nice of that giant-handed person to hold the fish for you.

 

[Fredrick]

My hands Kinda look like GFEN"S in those pics LMAO

 

[gfen]

C'mon, I wasn't even IN this thread!

Needs more tattoos, sorry.

This coming warm season means I need to really fish the Delaware.. While I know all teh good bits are either north of me, or south of me, the damned thing is only 30 minutes from my house.

I like strippers. And stripers.

 

[jdaddy]

Ya, that and the salt thing. I really want to do the salt thing. Got awesome rod for it and plenty of rooms in Atlantic City for free. All I need is some skills to go with it.

 

[gfen]

So, wait... Salt Water Jam accomodations by jdaddy?

I'm first!

 

[sandfly]

Count me out in Atlantic city, now if you go to seaside park or there about I might be interested.

 

[sandfly]

Go out in the evenings early may and fish either a childs play herring or a eel pattern near the surface. the big boys like big bait.

 

[osprey]

I like the fur strip eels........nice. I've heard or read about the eel "hatch" how much weight of an outfit do you need to cast those babies?

 

[gfen]

Man, that's a massive Deceiver, but you gotta realize that its mostly fluff and should cast pretty easily.

 

[sandfly]

Osprey- I use a 9wt for them normally
Gfen- the bigger and fluffier the fly the more you need to add weight. I wrap 0.30 lead on the front hook a lot