Fall Striper Fishing

[live4striper]

Can anyone tell how to fish for striper in the fall say middle of Sept. thru October. I've only fished for them during May night bite.

[lilmule]

Think a lot of that would be due to your locale and where you fished,on the ohio river below dams a flat hopkins spoon fished with rod tip high and reeling fast will keep it in sight all the way back in and yes they hit them.
In lakes look for jumps,just out of the channel,any bait youve used prior topwater , rattletrap,spoons all work,bonus or handicap is white bass are generally mixed,and sometimes below them largemouth,waiting to pick up injured minnows with no effort.
A jump is where they are chasing bait so much the water turns frothy as near or on the surface.They may do this for ten seconds or several min at a time,if one misses another will take its place so dont reel it back in,just to recast.
And if they jump a few times in any area will do it again until they finish off the bait or spread them out they are chasing a ball,literally taking them to the last few dozen minnows out of thousands.Keep several rods rigged dont waste time picking out a professional over spin,or if one breaks it off you are still good to go.

[HURRICANEBOB]

At Cumberland in Late Sep and Early Oct, as the other guy said, look for surface feeding fish. Usually happens early in morning right at sunrise, and sometimes as late as up to 10 in the morning depending on light, fog, clouds, etc. Same thin as the sun goes down. My favorite spots include out in front of James town, first 2-3 turns in Lilly and Wolfe Creeks, and at the mouth of Beaver, behind the island on your right.

Live bait works good this time of year, shad or shiner, 40 to 25 foot down, 1 oz to 1/2 oz, under palner boards or downpoles.

Here's the dilemna. If you put live bait out, you wpn't be as mobile if the Stripe hit the surface in the jumps out of casting range. If you don't put live bait out, you might never get close to the jumps and miss out on fish.

If I'm in a spot where they just blew up close, and went back down, I immediately get 4 or 5 rods with live bait out on down poles at 25-40 foot. Sometimes the rods will get hit as they start to push bait up again. If they then blow up a short distance away, downpoles are fast to get up out of the water to run to the fish, and with shiners, if you balst the trolling motor the bait is not likely to drown.

Usually I crusie around looking for bait clouds near the surface, or till I see surface feeding. I kill the big motor, sit quiet, wait to see where they come up, then decide if I'm going to go with bait rods out or just throw lures.