White Perch Everywhere Today

(L-R) 1-10 bass, 1-4 bass

I consider it somewhat of a miracle that I was able to boat any bass today, what with the proliferation of white perch that kept chasing my crankbait. Besides the two keeper-sized bass pictured here, I only managed to get five others in the boat, and they all were dinks.

On the other hand, I caught 18 white perch before I simply quit setting the hook when I felt another one hit. They just wouldn't leave the crawdad-with-orange-belly Bandit Footloose alone that I was throwing. By the same token, I couldn't even get a pass at any kind of topwater, the Rapala X-Rap Subwalk, or any other color of Bandit, including the firetiger model that worked so well for me last Saturday. Besides the seven bass and 18 white perch, I managed to boat four small stripers before calling it a day at 12:30 and heading for the marina before any rain fell.

All my fish today, except for one of the small stripers, came from the front stretch of Albright's. That last striper of the day came from the mouth of West Neck. Water temps everywhere today ranged from 84 to 86 degrees.

I had to check in with my boat mechanic this evening because of a little problem I had when I got ready to leave Albright's and run back to West Neck. The outboard fired as usual, and after letting it warm up a few seconds, I tried to take off, but all I got was some sputtering. After repeating the same process three or four times, everything worked as normal, and I was off and running. When I got ready to wrap up in West Neck for the day, I decided to run the boat a bit and see if I could clear the problem. Everything was working right when I quit, but I checked in with my mechanic, just to give him a heads-up that I may be asking for his help soon. I likely will know for sure come Saturday whether another phone call will be necessary.