New moon springs load up the Rip as fluke abandon the baking bay for the Hook Channels

Last week the bay did what it does every July — it cooked. Flynn's Knoll and the flats off Keyport were sitting in the high 70s by midweek, and that kind of heat doesn't just make for a sweaty ride out of Belford, it moves fish. We had light, variable wind most of the week, which kept the water clean but also let it sit and bake with no mixing. The moon's waning down toward new phase on the 13th, and you could already feel the tides starting to build — bigger swings at the Rip, more push through the Chapel Hill and Sandy Hook Channels, water moving with more authority on both ends of the tide.

That matters this week because we're heading into the new moon springs, with peak alignment Friday through Monday. Bigger high stands, deeper lows, stronger current everywhere from Romer Shoal to the mouth of the Navesink. The tide charts show the evening flood lining up close to sunset for the next several days — that's the window I'm circling. When a hard flood converges with last light at a structure spot like the Rip or Romer, bait gets pinned and predators know it. It's the first real evening setup we've had since the June full moon, and it's worth building a trip around.

Here's the honest state of the fluke bite: the bay pattern has flipped. With Raritan Bay proper sitting warm and a little sluggish — some of the flats pushing near 78 degrees — the fluke have done what they always do when the shallow water gets uncomfortable. They've slid into the channels and toward the ocean side, where upwelled water in the 70-71 degree range gives them a cooler, better-oxygenated lane to sit in. Ambrose Channel and the deeper cuts off Sandy Hook have been the address. Guys working the edges of Chapel Hill Channel in 25 to 35 feet on the outgoing tide have been picking through shorts to find keepers, best action coming on the last two hours of the drop when the current really lines the bait up along the channel edge. Four-inch chartreuse and white Gulp Swimming Mullets on 3/4-ounce bucktails, dragged slow with just enough hop to keep contact with bottom, have out-produced straight bait rigs this week. There's real size mixed in, too — a 12.3-pound doormat came across the scale at a local tackle shop out of a tournament fished right in this stretch, proof the big females are using these channels as a highway between the bay and the Hook. That's not an everyday fish, but it tells you where to look.

Striper fishing has been the tougher story, and I'll say it straight — daytime action in the bay has gone quiet with this heat. Fish don't want to feed hard in warm, sunlit water when they don't have to. But the Rip at the Hook and Romer Shoal are still delivering if you fish the right two hours. Dawn has been better than dusk so far, bunker chunks fished on fish-finder rigs in 15 to 20 feet along the Rip picking up stripers in the 24 to 32 inch range, with the occasional better fish mixed in on a fresh bunker head fished tight to the bottom. With the new moon current about to build, I expect that dusk window to start producing better than it has — more water moving through means more bait getting pinned against structure, and that's when the bigger bass show themselves. If you can find a pod of bunker holding off Conover Beach or the Keyport side, working a snag hook through it and dead-sticking the bait back through the same water has been the most consistent way to connect.

Bluefish have filled in some of the gap. Cocktail blues in the 2 to 4 pound range have been busting bunker on top around Keyport Flats and off the Highlands beach in the early morning, and metal — half-ounce Kastmasters and Deadly Dicks — worked fast through the froth has been drawing plenty of strikes. Not glamorous, but it's action when the striper bite goes quiet midday.

Weakfish, I have to be honest, still haven't shown. The Navesink and Shrewsbury have held the right water temperature for weeks now, well above what the books say weakfish want, and there's simply nothing to report. Warm water alone isn't the trigger people hoped it would be — I've stopped expecting that pattern to materialize this summer, and I'd redirect that effort elsewhere.

Porgies are steady and dependable if you want a bend in the rod without overthinking it — Romer Shoal and Old Orchard Shoal in 20 to 25 feet, bloodworms or Fishbites on a high-low rig, will keep a cooler full through the summer lull. Blackfish are out of season in most of this zone right now, so that's on hold until fall.

Looking ahead, my plan for the coming days is built around that Friday-through-Monday springs peak. I want to be at the Rip or Romer Shoal for the evening flood, working bunker chunks and swimming plugs as the light fades and the current really starts to move. If that window produces the way I think it can, it'll be the best striper stretch we've had since before the full moon. Plan B, if the bass stay quiet, is sliding right back into Ambrose and Chapel Hill Channel on the fluke drift — that pattern isn't going anywhere as long as the bay stays warm and the ocean-side water stays cool. Bring both rigs rigged and let the tide tell you which program you're running that day.