Fish Soft Plastics Deep for Summer Stripers

As water temperatures rise, bass will seek deeper water. This statement is true for the entire striper coast. In my home waters of Boston Harbor and the North Shore, this usually begins to happen around early July. Although there has been some great blitzes (from what I hear) in my area recently, I can guarentee that the best way to target bigger fish is to get down deep, preferably anywhere from 30 to 60 ft deep. One of the best ways to target these fish is with soft plastic shads, such as the Tsunami or Storm shads.

Although stripers will frequent water deeper than 60 feet, I find that targeting them becomes more difficult and less fun. Targeting stripers that deep requires heavy gear and heavy lures, which can be very effective, but it takes a lot of the fun out of it in my eyes. I have, however, caught stripers on vertical jigs meant for tuna in 100 feet of water or more. (expect a blog on vertical jigging for stripers at a later date!)

Finding deep stripers is not an easy task, but if you have even a bottom line fish finder, and knowledge of structure and channels in the area, you will be able to find them. Focus your efforts around humps, rock piles, and soft structure (sand) that creates an ambush point for stripers. Find these areas and simply drop your soft plastic shads down to the bottom. It helps to use a shad that weighs around 2oz and braided line to help reduce line drag. Often times, the vibration of the paddle tail on the shad is enough to draw strikes. I've caught numerous big stripers out of the same school simply by dropping my swim shad down and letting the tail do the work. If fish are there, and your shad is in front of them, it is a good chance that they'll grab it.

Tsunami also makes 'Deep Shads" which are heavier and will hold bottom in water 50ft or more, assuming the current speed is moderate.

Next time you're out on the water try finding some deep structure and dropping down a soft plastic shad.

-S.B.