Cape Cod and Buzzards Bay Fishing Report 2-2-2012

Writing these reports each week, I’m starting to feel like Bill Murray in the movie Groundhog Day, which, coincidentally, is today. If you haven’t seen the movie, Bill Murray relives the same exact day over and over again, which is exactly what Cape Cod fishermen have been doing for the past few weeks. It’s been too warm for ice, but too cold for most anglers to bother fishing. Not that the fishing is bad – in fact, it’s pretty good, at least for largemouth bass.

Christian at Falmouth Bait and Tackle said that one customer this week has been finding luck fishing deep and slow for largemouth bass. Blue-backed C7 Rapala Countdowns have been the hot ticket. The biggest thing, Christian said, is to remember that the fish have been holding deep.

I’ve been sneaking out to do some largemouth bass fishing of my own, and have had some limited success. My success has come on Senko worms and suspending jerkbaits. Bass have also been responding well to live shiners, with the bite turning on just before sunset.

Along with the bass, pickerel have been active and can be caught using many of the same methods. However, pickerel are a little more active in the cold temperatures and may respond better to some more aggressive retrieves.

According to both Eric at the Hook Up in Orleans and Christian at Falmouth, trout fishing is spotty. Mid-winter trout can be finicky, and slow presentations are often the key to success.

Successful mid-winter trout fishing is often a matter of choosing the right days. Some days, all the right conditions come together, and the trout, especially the rainbows, strap on the feedbag. Other days, most often ones with bright sun, the trout lock up and simply do not eat.

A couple nice fish have been duped on live bait lately. On The Water’s Anthony Deicicchi fooled a big salmon on a live killifish last Saturday, and I also heard a fish story of a big trout that was lost on a live shiner in an Upper Cape Pond last Sunday.

Even the saltwater fish have been affected by this mild winter, as the first returning herring was documented in a Cape Cod herring run.

Best Bets for the Weekend

Who cares if Punxsutawney Phil predicted 6 more weeks of winter – we haven’t even had 6 weeks of winter weather on the Cape yet. The small ponds are fishing very well right now. Fish near the bottom and fish slow — the water is still quite cold. To improve your odds of success, bring along some live shiners and fish them under a bobber.

For trout, bring some of the smallest live baits you can find, like killifish, and fish them in your local trout swim. The killies (locally called “chubs”) are available at some bait shops and can be trapped or netted in estuaries. With the mild weather, these small baitfish are still very visible in the shallows. At the very least, escape the pre-Super-Bowl talk for a little bit and get out and wet a line this weekend.