Waking up every morning, looking outside trying to figure out if we are doing shorts or pants today season is in full swing. Some of the trees are dropping leaves and pine needles. I’m not looking forward to raking those up this year. I am in the “we don’t rake for the sake of nature” crowd, also known as eventually the leaves will blow onto the property next door anyway mantra. I’m kidding, we live in the woods so we do not rake leaves. That is futile on so many levels out here. You just learn where the leaves don’t gather, plant grass. That doesn’t work either. Choose your battles with nature wisely. I prefer mine to be on the water. What are we fishing for today?

The striped bass are schooling up thick in the waterways around the Delaware Bay and along the coast of the bay. The inland bays are seeing great action as well. That action has been fun with swim shads or bucktails. You can throw bait but lures are more fun and schooling bass are a little like a blitz. The fish will hammer anything that resembles food while feeding in a school. Then they will fight over that food. One reason to throw lures on a leader with a teaser or a tandem set-up — you’re catching two fish at a time. Yes that is fun, but can be a little annoying trying to land two fish not swimming in tandem.

We were picking up short striped bass the other day at Fresh Pond in Delaware Seashore State Park. That water is not fresh. The name is misleading. It is brackish. The ponds are full of all kinds of fish and wildlife back there. It makes for some fun exploring.

Fishbites earthworm formula has been working excellent catching all kinds of fish: bluegill, spot, croaker and white perch to name a few around the inland bays and Fresh Pond. I’m not surprised to see small croaker in Fresh Pond, that should become an interesting land-locked stock for this winter. The freshwater earthworm Fishbites formula works well in brackish water, too. I highly recommend anglers try it out before the water temperatures really drop for winter. The bluegills were going bonkers for it in every pond we fished from here to Connecticut.

Bluefish and large striped bass made an appearance inside the Indian River Inlet the other day. Random schools popping up is fun for many anglers. Not so much for the ones that hear about it later and go the next day to see if they are there again. Some days the fish show back up and some days they do not.

Weather has been a factor for the past couple weeks, and more is coming this way. Just get out and fish. They don’t care if they get wet, you shouldn’t either. Getting to the water might be an issue with all the storm surge on the beaches. We have been fishing inland mostly.

The crews are daily moving sand to the northside of the Indian River inlet to protect that area from the ocean. It’s wild to watch the commentary online from armchair engineers. That new dune in the northside parking lot might be a little foreshadowing of 50 years from now. At the price of $25 million so far, that is some expensive sand for such a temporary use.

Get that fall gear ready and tuned up, the striped bass fall run is already starting. Maybe we will get a traditional “rocktober” this year instead of November.