Millstone River Sunfish

Went to the Millstone River where it joins with Carnegie Lake today. My main target were some big perch, but it was not to be. First fish was a tiny green sunfish, but it flopped off. Although I landed over 20 sunnies, the fishing was slow compared to last week, with about 70 sunfish landed (I stopped counting at 50). I guess that's also the reason I didn't catch any perch, there was almost no flow today from the dam. I mostly caught a mixture of bluegills, pumpkinseeds, and hybrids.

A green sunfish x bluegill hybrid.

A tiny bluegill.

Beautiful pumpkinseed.

Then I got this gorgeous bluegill x green sunfish hybrid with amazing colors, especially on the belly. 

The pictures do no justice to the colors. It was an overcast day, but this guy still shines. Put up a heck of a fight on my micro-light rod, too. By the way, if you're in Jersey and looking for a hybrid sunfish, your odds are pretty high under the Carnegie Lake dam. A bobber and worm is really all you need, but taking them on tiny crank baits, jigs, and flies is way more fun since these scrappers are really aggressive. The best areas are submerged timber and right along the dam wall.

A nice bluegill.

I planned to fish through the evening, but it started to pour (really, really hard), and when lightning came, I decided it was best to pack up.