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Home › Waters › New Jersey › East Thorofare
Estuary · New Jersey shore behind Long Beach Island, the back-bay thorofare at Ship Bottom between the island and the Manahawkin Bay marshes · New Jersey

East Thorofare Fishing Guides

Back-bay tidal water behind Long Beach Island, where stripers and flounder work the channel edges on a moving tide.

A tidal creek meandering in tight bends through green salt marsh
Gauge location. Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Guides on the East Thorofare

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About the East Thorofare

East Thorofare is one of the tidal channels that thread the back bay behind Long Beach Island, running between the island itself at Ship Bottom and the salt marsh and sedge islands of Manahawkin Bay to the west. Thorofare is the local word for exactly this – a natural through-channel connecting one part of the back bay to another – and the New Jersey shore has dozens of them. They are the arteries of the estuary. Water moving in and out on the tide has to pass through the thorofares, and everything that eats in the back bay knows it.

That is the whole logic of fishing here. This is not a place you fish by casting at random water; it is a place you fish by finding an edge and letting the tide work. Striped bass hold along the channel drop-offs and behind the sod banks, ambushing bait swept past on a moving tide. Summer flounder lie on the sand and mud at the channel edges through the warm months and are the mainstay of the local summer fishery. Bluefish come through in fast marauding schools, weakfish show in the spring and fall, and blue crabs are abundant enough in the shallows and around the marsh grass that crabbing is a genuine part of the season here.

The gauge at Ship Bottom publishes discharge and tidal elevation but no water temperature, and it is worth understanding what that means. Water in a thorofare reverses direction twice a day, so the discharge trace is not a river flow figure – it is a tide clock, and reading it tells you when the water will move. Fish the moving water on either side of the slack and stay off the dead tide. Access is from the island’s bay side, the Route 72 causeway, and by small boat or kayak.

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Read the full license

Version 1.0, dated 6 September 2026. Applies to every photograph submitted to GuidedFloats through the contact form, a species page, or the community board.

1. What you give us

By ticking the box on the form you grant Guided Floats, LLC (“GuidedFloats”, “we”) a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to store, copy, resize, crop and display your photograph on guidedfloats.com, in GuidedFloats’ own social media accounts and mobile apps, and in material that promotes the site itself, in connection with the fish, water or community feature you sent it in for. The license lasts until you withdraw it (section 4).

You keep the copyright. The license is not exclusive, so you can use the photo anywhere else and license it to anyone else. We will not sell your photo, license it on to anyone else on its own, or use it in paid advertising for a third party.

2. What you confirm

You confirm that you took the photograph yourself (or otherwise own the rights to it), that you have the right to grant this license, and that publishing the photo does not infringe anyone else’s copyright, privacy or other rights.

If any person is recognisable in the photo, you confirm that they have agreed to its being published here, and that a parent or guardian has agreed on behalf of anyone under 18. Please do not send photographs of other people’s catches, screenshots, or pictures copied from other websites or social media.

3. Credit

We print the credit name you give us beside the photo wherever it appears on the site, and record it as the photo’s creator in the page’s structured data. If you leave the credit blank we use the name you gave us on the form. Write “Anonymous” if you prefer no name at all. Your email address, phone number and the exact spot the photo was taken are never published.

4. Withdrawing the license

You can withdraw the license at any time by emailing hello@guidedfloats.com, or by using the contact form, and telling us which photo you mean. We will remove the photo from guidedfloats.com within 7 days of receiving your message and stop using it in anything new. Copies that are already outside our control — search-engine caches, social posts that have already gone out, printed material already produced — may take longer to disappear or may not be recallable, and we are not responsible for those.

5. What we may do

We choose which photos to publish and may decline any submission without giving a reason. We may crop, resize, sharpen or colour-correct a photo for display, and we may remove a photo at any time. We will not alter a photo in a way that misrepresents the fish, the water or you.

6. Your details

We keep your name, email address, the credit name, the water and date you gave us, and the network address the submission came from, with the submission record, as our evidence of this license. We hold that record for as long as the photo is published and for the retention period described in our privacy policy. Location data that your camera or phone embedded in the file is removed before the photo is published.

7. Versions

The version of this license you accepted is stored with your submission and printed with the photo. A later version does not apply to a photo you have already sent unless you agree to it.

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Posting to East Thorofare.

JPG, PNG or WebP, up to 12 MB. We resize it and strip the location data out of the file.

The name shown under the photo. Leave blank to stay anonymous.

Reader photo license v1.0 — the short version:

  • You grant Guided Floats, LLC a non-exclusive, royalty-free license to publish, resize and crop your photo on guidedfloats.com and in GuidedFloats’ own social posts and apps. You keep the copyright and can use the photo anywhere else.
  • You confirm that you took the photo yourself, that publishing it does not infringe anyone else’s rights, and that anyone recognisable in it (or a parent or guardian, if they are under 18) is happy for it to appear here.
  • Credit is printed beside the photo wherever it appears on the site, using the credit name you give us. Leave it blank and we use your name; write “Anonymous” for no name. Your email address is never published.
  • Withdrawing is one email to hello@guidedfloats.com naming the photo. It comes off the site within 7 days.
Read the full license

Version 1.0, dated 6 September 2026. Applies to every photograph submitted to GuidedFloats through the contact form, a species page, or the community board.

1. What you give us

By ticking the box on the form you grant Guided Floats, LLC (“GuidedFloats”, “we”) a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to store, copy, resize, crop and display your photograph on guidedfloats.com, in GuidedFloats’ own social media accounts and mobile apps, and in material that promotes the site itself, in connection with the fish, water or community feature you sent it in for. The license lasts until you withdraw it (section 4).

You keep the copyright. The license is not exclusive, so you can use the photo anywhere else and license it to anyone else. We will not sell your photo, license it on to anyone else on its own, or use it in paid advertising for a third party.

2. What you confirm

You confirm that you took the photograph yourself (or otherwise own the rights to it), that you have the right to grant this license, and that publishing the photo does not infringe anyone else’s copyright, privacy or other rights.

If any person is recognisable in the photo, you confirm that they have agreed to its being published here, and that a parent or guardian has agreed on behalf of anyone under 18. Please do not send photographs of other people’s catches, screenshots, or pictures copied from other websites or social media.

3. Credit

We print the credit name you give us beside the photo wherever it appears on the site, and record it as the photo’s creator in the page’s structured data. If you leave the credit blank we use the name you gave us on the form. Write “Anonymous” if you prefer no name at all. Your email address, phone number and the exact spot the photo was taken are never published.

4. Withdrawing the license

You can withdraw the license at any time by emailing hello@guidedfloats.com, or by using the contact form, and telling us which photo you mean. We will remove the photo from guidedfloats.com within 7 days of receiving your message and stop using it in anything new. Copies that are already outside our control — search-engine caches, social posts that have already gone out, printed material already produced — may take longer to disappear or may not be recallable, and we are not responsible for those.

5. What we may do

We choose which photos to publish and may decline any submission without giving a reason. We may crop, resize, sharpen or colour-correct a photo for display, and we may remove a photo at any time. We will not alter a photo in a way that misrepresents the fish, the water or you.

6. Your details

We keep your name, email address, the credit name, the water and date you gave us, and the network address the submission came from, with the submission record, as our evidence of this license. We hold that record for as long as the photo is published and for the retention period described in our privacy policy. Location data that your camera or phone embedded in the file is removed before the photo is published.

7. Versions

The version of this license you accepted is stored with your submission and printed with the photo. A later version does not apply to a photo you have already sent unless you agree to it.

Access

Ship Bottom bayside street ends - walk-in access to the thorofare edge.
Route 72 causeway - the classic shore-based access and a productive striper spot.
Barnegat Bay boat ramps on the mainland - trailer access to the back bay.
Manahawkin Bay marsh edges - kayak access to the sedge islands.
Long Beach Island bay-side docks and bulkheads - local access, subject to posted rules.
Surf City bayfront - a nearby back-bay entry to the north.
Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge waters - paddle access to the surrounding marsh.

Seasons

Spring: weakfish and the first striped bass arrive as the back bay warms ahead of the ocean.
Summer: the flounder and crab season, with early and late tides the best of the day.
Fall: the strongest season - the striper run and hard-feeding bluefish behind the island.
Winter: mostly dormant in the back bay; the fish have moved out to the ocean and south.

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Questions

What species can you catch on the East Thorofare?

Anglers target American Eel, Atlantic Croaker, Black Drum, Black Sea Bass, Blue Crab, Bluefish, Northern Kingfish, Striped Bass, Summer Flounder, Tautog, Weakfish on the East Thorofare in New Jersey.

Where can you access the East Thorofare?

Ship Bottom bayside street ends - walk-in access to the thorofare edge. Route 72 causeway - the classic shore-based access and a productive striper spot. Barnegat Bay boat ramps on the mainland - trailer access to the back bay. Manahawkin Bay marsh edges - kayak access to the sedge islands. Long Beach Island bay-side docks and bulkheads - local access, subject to posted rules. Surf City bayfront - a nearby back-bay entry to the north. Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge waters - paddle access to the surrounding marsh.

When is the best time to fish the East Thorofare?

Spring: weakfish and the first striped bass arrive as the back bay warms ahead of the ocean. Summer: the flounder and crab season, with early and late tides the best of the day. Fall: the strongest season - the striper run and hard-feeding bluefish behind the island. Winter: mostly dormant in the back bay; the fish have moved out to the ocean and south.

Where are the fishing regulations for the East Thorofare?

Regulations change by season and section. Read the current rules on the New Jersey agency site: https://dep.nj.gov/njfw/fishing/marine/