Live Bait Fishing for Striped Bass in Connecticut

The Three Primary Live Baits

**Menhaden (Bunker):** Menhaden — locally called bunker — are the #1 striper bait in Connecticut and throughout Long Island Sound. Large stripers, especially fish over 30 inches, are almost always in proximity to bunker schools when they're present. Bunker are oily, high-calorie baitfish that stripers prioritize above all other food sources.

Finding bunker: Schools of adult bunker show themselves as oil slicks, dark masses in clear water, or by the birds (gannets, cormorants, terns) working over them. In spring, bunker begin entering Long Island Sound in May, concentrating near the mouths of rivers and tidal rivers. By summer, large schools are present throughout the Sound.

**American Eel:** Eels are the premier night-fishing bait for very large stripers. Trophy-class stripers (40+ lbs) are disproportionately caught on live eels fished at night near structure — rocky points, river mouths, jetty ends, bridge pilings. Eels are available at most CT bait shops throughout the season and are easily kept alive in a cooler with ice.

**Atlantic Mackerel:** Mackerel arrive in CT waters in late spring and early summer in some years. When available (not every season), they make excellent live bait for stripers, bluefish, and other predators. A live mackerel fished under a bobber or free-lined near a bunker school will be taken quickly by any large striper in the area.

Catching Your Own Bunker

Snagging your own bunker is the most economical way to get live bait and, when a school is present, you can have live bait in the water within 15 minutes of locating fish.

**Snag rig:** A weighted treble hook rig — a 3–5 oz sinker on a two-foot dropper with a 3/0–5/0 treble hook below it. Cast the rig into or just past the bunker school and retrieve with sharp upward rod sweeps. The treble snags the fish from below. This is the standard bunker-snagging technique used throughout CT.

**Snag rod:** Medium-heavy to heavy spinning or casting rod with 20–30 lb braid for sensitivity and a fast snag hookset. A faster-action rod telegraphs the snag and allows a quick hookset before the fish pulls free.

**Keeping bunker alive:** A large round livewell with an aerator pump is critical. Bunker are fragile — they require continuous oxygenated water flow, cool temperatures, and minimal handling. A 30-gallon round livewell with a through-hull pump keeps a dozen bunker alive for hours in cool weather. In summer heat, adding ice to lower livewell temperature extends bait life significantly.

**If you can't keep them alive:** Fresh-dead bunker or butterflied bunker chunk still produces strikes. Chunk bait (2-inch sections of fresh bunker) fished on circle hooks on bottom catches many CT stripers each season when live bait isn't available.

Live Lining Bunker

Live lining — drifting a live bunker with minimal weight to allow natural presentation — is the primary technique for presenting live bunker to stripers.

**Rigging:** Hook the bunker through the nose (first dorsal, ahead of the dorsal fin) or through the back just ahead of the dorsal fin. Nose-hooking allows the fish to swim more naturally but is more likely to result in the bait being swallowed before the hook is in position; back-hooking is more secure and presents the hook more favorably. A 7/0–9/0 circle hook in Owner, Gamakatsu, or Mustad is standard.

**Leader:** 50–80 lb fluorocarbon leader, 3–6 feet long, attached to 30–50 lb braided mainline with a barrel swivel.

**Presentation:** In current, let the bunker swim naturally with minimal line tension. The bunker will try to swim down-current (away from the predator threat) — this erratic swimming behavior is exactly what triggers stripers. When a fish takes the bait, resist the urge to immediately set the hook — let the striper run with it briefly (3–5 seconds), then come tight and let the circle hook set itself with steady pressure rather than a hard hookset.

**Drifting:** In a boat, kill the engine and drift over structure — underwater ledges, current rips, points, and areas where bunker have been feeding. Keep several rods out simultaneously, each with a bunker at different depths: one near surface, one at mid-depth, one near bottom.

Live Eel Fishing

Eels are the night-fishing striper bait. The technique differs significantly from bunker fishing:

**Hooking eels:** Hook through the lower jaw and out the upper jaw, or through the lip only. Avoid hooking through the body — this kills the eel faster. Keep eels in a cooler with ice (not freezing — just cold). Cold eels are slower and easier to handle. Once they warm up in the water they become extremely active, which is what you want.

**Rigging:** 6/0–8/0 wide-gap hook, 50–60 lb fluorocarbon leader, attached to 30–50 lb braid. No swivel needed — a single improved clinch knot to a swivel and another to the hook is fine.

**Presentation:** Cast to structure — jetties, rocky points, bridge pilings, rocky outcroppings — and let the eel swim naturally. Keep light tension. Eels are bottom-oriented and will naturally work toward the substrate, which puts them right in the zone where large stripers hold at night.

**Night fishing with eels:** The bite is typically best from two hours after dark through midnight. Tide position matters — the last two hours of the outgoing tide and the first two hours of the incoming tide are generally most productive at tidal structures. Move every 30–45 minutes if you're not getting bites — nocturnal stripers follow a travel route along the structure.

Locations and Timing

**Spring (May–June):** Live bunker fishing becomes viable when bunker schools enter the Sound. Early May near the mouths of the Thames, Connecticut, and Housatonic Rivers. The CT River mouth near Old Saybrook is an early-season striper congregation point — fish follow the bunker schools inland.

**Summer (July–August):** Schools scatter throughout the Sound. Focus on areas with bait — look for diving birds and surface activity. Night eel fishing from shore at Niantic Bay, Harkness Memorial State Park, and accessible jetties in Clinton, Westbrook, and Old Saybrook.

**Fall Migration (September–November):** The best live bait fishing of the year. Large schools of adult bunker push through the Sound ahead of migrating stripers. Fish of 30–50+ lbs are more accessible from shore during the fall migration than at any other time. Locate the bunker and you've located the stripers.

**Shore access for live lining:** Live lining is primarily a boat fishery, but several CT shore locations allow it when bunker are within casting distance. Griswold Point (Old Lyme) at low tide, Orient Beach area, and Avery Point in Groton provide some shore access to striper-holding structure. A kayak dramatically increases access — kayak anglers have taken trophy stripers on live bunker from locations unreachable on foot.

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