Striped Bass Push Holds On Long Island Sound as Bottom Bite Carries CT

What's biting

What's next

With no fresh buoy or gauge readings this cycle, we're leaning on angler reports and lunar timing rather than a water-temperature trend line. The Last Quarter moon means tidal swings over the next few days will ease off the extremes of the full and new moon phases, generally a window when structure fishing and slow-presented live baits, like the live-lining approach featured by The Fisherman on Long Island Sound, get more consistent rather than bursty. That favors the current striped bass pattern out of Connecticut: J&B Tackle's dawn-and-dusk glide-bait approach and deeper-water eel presentations should keep producing into the weekend as moderate current keeps fish holding tighter to structure instead of scattering on a hard rip.

Bottom fishing looks like the more dependable bet through midweek. Porgy and scup action has been steady enough at Avery Point (AW Marina) and on hard bottom (Tartan II) that it should carry regardless of any short-term bass slowdown — Tartan II already noted stripers cooling off from an earlier hot stretch, which reads as a normal mid-summer lull rather than a sign the run is over. Sea bass pulled from deeper water, per Tartan II, should stay a solid fallback if surface conditions get sloppy.

One thing worth watching over the next week or two: Saltwater Edge in Rhode Island is reporting the return of green bonito to local waters, with numbers expected to build in the weeks ahead. Bonito haven't shown up in Connecticut reports in this data set yet, but as that push moves west along the Sound it's worth checking CT-side shop reports for the first sightings, especially around structure and rips where bait concentrates.

Fluke fishing sits in the grind-it-out category based on Black Hawk's mixed keeper counts this week — plan on culling through shorts rather than expecting a fast keeper bite, and expect that to hold steady rather than improve dramatically without a change in water clarity. Weather disrupted at least one CT bottom-fishing trip midweek per Black Hawk, so anglers planning weekend trips should check local marine forecasts before committing to a bottom trip versus staying closer to structure for stripers.

Context

Early August on Long Island Sound is classically a mixed-bag stretch: striped bass fishing typically gets tougher as water warms and fish either go deep, feed mostly in low light, or push toward cooler structure, while bottom species — scup, black sea bass, and fluke — carry the action through the heat of summer. This week's reports fit that pattern closely. J&B Tackle's dawn/dusk-and-deep-water approach to stripers and the shop-level enthusiasm for porgies and sea bass at AW Marina and Tartan II both track with a typical mid-summer Sound pattern rather than anything unusual for early August.

Tartan II's note that striper action has slowed from an earlier hot stretch also fits the seasonal script — Sound stripers often bunch up on structure during a spring-into-early-summer push and then thin out or go more nocturnal once surface temps climb, which reads as consistent with what's being described here rather than a red flag.

We don't have a multi-week or year-over-year comparison in this data set to say definitively whether this season is running early, late, or on pace — the angler intel here is a single-week snapshot from a handful of CT shops and boats, not a season-long trend line. What can be said honestly: nothing in this week's reports reads as an anomaly for early August in Long Island Sound. The green bonito return noted by Saltwater Edge in Rhode Island is a seasonally normal mid-to-late-summer arrival for southern New England waters, and its appearance now is roughly on schedule, though it hasn't yet been reported on the Connecticut side of the Sound in this data set.