River Squidding

It was in middle August. When I went fishing for striper in the evening, I found lots of squid chasing bait mackerel during retrieve. Although there was no action of striper, I found squid fishing there would be promising. Next day I went to the same place with squid tackles.

This spot is nothing but river. I wore a chest wader and stood in the knee level of water. To 5’ Shakespeare micro series, I set a small reel from Shakespeare LadyFish ice combo with 10 lb NanoFil. For leader, 20’’ of 12 lb Trilene fluorocarbon was used. I started with a Yamashita Naory RangeHunter BS #1.8.

When I started fishing, it was just a low tide. There was still slight outgoing current but it slacked shortly. I could see schools of squid here and there. I casted the jig under the light and retrieved with slow jigging action. In a few casts, I got a small one. I was a little nervous about the roughness of the bottom here when I planned because there were lots of mussel shells in this spot. However, the squid jig worked without problem.

I enjoyed a cast and a hit time for a while. After a while, tide begun to move. I kept using RH but had trouble tracing the bottom with it. Also I had several line troubles during the casts. Seems like this braid line needs conditioning a little. I switched jig to the Colman’s non-weighted bullet head jig custom. It worked well for keeping the bottom in the current. I caught a few larger size ones with it. Two hours after low, I wrapped up. I caught around 25.


This was one of the most impressive fishing experiences for me. Sometimes squid schooled in very shallow BEHIND me. When I dropped the jig around them, a squid chased and hit. Squid were verrrry close and I felt like I could touch them in the water. You can also see crawling crabs, swimming skate, jumping schoolie, and even a family of raccoons. Tremendous! This is what you can never experience on a pier.