Many anglers say that they have better luck catching stripers at night or in low-light conditions.

Striped Bass Fishing

The Striped Bass are a voracious fish. They feed on a wide variety of prey fish including alewife, anchovy, croakers, channel bass, eels, flounders, herring, menhaden, mummichogs, mullet, rock eels, launce, sculpins, shad, silver hake, silversides, smelt, tomcod, weakfish, white perch, lobsters, crabs of various kinds, shrimps, isopods, gammarid crustaceans, various worms, squid, soft clams and small mussels to name a few.

Food of the Day

However Striped Bass focus on one kind of food at a time when they’re in an eating mood. It’s unclear how striped bass communicate their food of the day to other striped bass. If they choose to eat crayfish, then they’ll ignore any other type of popular bait. This makes catching them a little more difficult for novice anglers.

 

For example, if you happen to come across the striped bass in estuarine locales at night there’s a good chance they’re eating sea worms, which is a plentiful food.

Night is truly a good time to catch Striped Bass

Finding their food of the day is not a big problem as they have a large range of food they’ll eat. The best way is to simply try each bait type until you succeed in landing a striped bass.

Pay careful attention to where they are and perhaps you’ll have an idea of what they’re eating.

 

The best water temperature for catching striped bass is when the ambient water temperature is between 57°F to 68°F/14°C to 20°C.

Striper Fishing Rods

These fish can grow to 50lbs so a heavy duty rod is needed.

For saltwater conditions, make sure it’s a saltwater rod that’s between 6.5 to 7.5 feet/2.3 meters long.

 

A Daiwa Coastal inshore saltwater rod will do the job, as would an Abu Garcia Ambassadeur.

striped bass fishing rods

Striped Bass can be found in both freshwater and saltwater so it’s important to choose your bait appropriately.

For those trapped in reservoirs like Lake Texoma, freshwater tackle is sufficient.

For fishing all other habitats like the ocean, brackish water and streams, saltwater gear is needed.