Bigger Bass Heading Toward Boston
Flounder Fishing Excellent
Stripers from the North Shore to Maine
The initial slug of stripers has been supplanted by a wave of fish less river-oriented – and they are bigger! With that, mackerel have replaced river herring as the preferred forage for stripers… and don’t be surprised if a few bluefish take your bait this weekend. Blackback flounder are putting on the feedbag, and there have even been a few accounts of far bigger flatfish, as the groundfish gang is beginning to talk of halibut!
Massachusetts South Shore Fishing Report
While the rivers are initially the only striper game in town, by mid-May your odds of getting a larger linesider increase if you begin targeting the oceanfront. Back in the day when we could harvest river herring, we would drop the rivers like a bad habit after the first few weeks and haul herring, baskets and all manner of gear designed to keep the herring alive over to the beaches. Like heat-sinking missiles, the fleeing herring would find those stripers, and it would never cease to amaze how much bigger the bass were beyond the rivers. While river herring is no longer the offering, the bass are still there and they are hungry! Boaters should troll the beaches with live mackerel, and surf rats should stick to the dusk-to-dawn patrol with chunk mackerel and choice artificials, such as Sebile Magic Swimmers, Daiwa SP Minnows and Shimano Waxwings.
Pete from Belsans Bait in Scituate told me that the mackerel are a little tougher to find this week but they are still the ticket to fast bass action. The North and South rivers remain productive, with Trouants Island in the latter getting the best-bet nod. The beaches have become better for live bait, as well as artificials. They are also catching bass at The Glades and Fourth Cliff. Bigger blackbacks, up to 19 inches long, and limits of fish are now the reality for the flounder faithful targeting them in Scituate Harbor. Shad fishing in the Indian Head River is some of the best in years according to Pete, with 5- and even 6-pound females taxing gear and anglers, especially in low-light conditions.
I heard from Rob Green of Elizabeth Marie Charters out of Scituate, and it looks as if the cod action has picked up. The fish are east of Stellwagen, as the Bank remains barren, but limits of fish are now almost a foregone conclusion. While the crew hasn’t found haddock yet, the doubling up of pollock has become an excellent consolation size.
Greater Boston Fishing Report
Finally winter flounder fishing in the Hub is living up to expectations! And the timing couldn’t be better as this Saturday marks the Fifth Annual Zobo Flounder Fishing Derby, headquartered at Fishing FINatics in Everett. Along with the rest of “Team Little Sister,” I’ve been anticipating this event for months! On most outings now off Deer Island Flats, Peddocks Island and Rainsford Island, Captain Jason Colby is inding “phonebooks” up to 19 inches long! Usually the bigger blackbacks will fall for clam. Russ Eastman from Monahan Marine recently saw photos from a patron of an 18-inch fluke and a 21-inch flounder caught near Rainsford Island! Knowing that fluke were out of season, the angler released the toothy flounder to fight another day.
Mackerel can be found by Boston Light, and live-lining them on sight should produce stripers in the mid-30-inch range. If you decide to target an outside ledge, such as Ultonia, Martins or Thieves be prepared to upgrade your leader to as much as 80-pound test. There has been word of the toothy work of bluefish in the Canal and even along the South Shore, so the arrival of the yellow-eyes is imminent. Also look for macks on both sides of the Long Island Bridge. One option is to take them to the river mouths and get as close to bridges and locks as you can, where you should find stripers on the hunt for herring. However, you may find bigger bass if you troll live mackerel along Nantasket Beach, Yirrell Beach, Winthrop Beach or Revere Beach. The latter is a long-time favorite of mine, and I wasn’t surprised when my buddy Dave Panorello told me of 20-pound linesiders that were recently tallied there on live mackerel. Oh…almost forgot, I can confirm that pogies are in the area! In fact I intend on sinking a snag hook in a few shortly.
Massachusetts North Shore Fishing Report
Jimmy from Fin and Feather in Essex was just looking to wet a line the other day for the first time and test out a freshly-turned Backshore Plugs pencil when he hooked into a 32-inch striper in the Saugus River. Laura of Ippi’s told me that the beaches from Nahant to Lynn have been the scene of some surface activity with bass bashing topwater plugs. Some of the fish have been mid-teen-sized bass; expect resident fish to go up a notch by this weekend. Lynn Harbor is also worthy of a look-see for busting bass, and anglers are picking off a few flounder from the shores of the harbor as well.
Tomo Shiraishi, who you may know from Bob’s Bait in Winthrop, has opened up a unique fishing-related business with kayak fisherman Joe Higgins on 104 Wharf St. in Salem called Joe’s Fish Prints and Tomo’s Tackle. Tomo can set you up with the latest gear and even some traditional Japanese tackle, and when you haul in your catch, Joe can smear some ink on it and capture its likeness on paper for a one-of-a-kind keepsake. According to Tomo, you may just find that fish from the Kernwood Bridge in the Danvers River out beyond the Beverly Pier as bass appear hell-bent on busting baitfish. A few “squidzillas” topping 20 inches long are providing plenty of calamari and bait for those wielding squid jigs at night off the pier. For flounder, drift Beverly Harbor as well as Manchester Harbor.
After a week of terrific striper fishing at the mouth of the Merrimack River, the pace has slowed a bit according to Kay from Surfland. Stop in and hear the tale of the good-sized sturgeon that was recently caught by the sandbar in the river and caused quite the stir as the fleet-footed angler had to negotiate about 100 yards of fishing lines as he scrambled to prevent being spooled. The relic was treated with care, never taken out of the water, and quickly released after a photo. For a more conventional catch they are starting to pick up stripers by the newly-formed sandbar just east of the shop. Look for sand eels to begin burrowing out of the sandbar there and match the hatch; I recall fondly a similar scenario there a few years ago, when I could not keep the stripers off Bill Hurley Mole Tails. The Parker River is fishing well, as is Crane’s Beach. If you really want your reel to screech, seek out the shad that are still running throughout the Merrimack River.
The groundfishing aboard the Yankee Fleet has varied from a steady pick to lights-out depending on the day. There are an awful lot of sub-legal haddock out there, which bodes well for the future. The crew begins Cashes Ledge marathon trips soon, check out their website for details.
New Hampshire and Southern Maine Fishing Report
The Granite State’s groundfish guru, Jaime from Dover Marine has been indulging heavily in haddock and cod off Jeffreys Ledge and he said the catching is great! The Curl remains hot, but you have to keep on the move and look for the fish on humps and bumps in 180 to 210 feet. The place is thick with haddock, but most are just undersized. The “steaker” cod have more than made up for it. Teasers are the trigger, and bright is where the bite is. For a recent story, I talked a lot with folks in the lure-building business and the subject many are hot about is UV coloration. More and more experts in this field believe that UV-reactive hues that we cannot see (but fish can) attract more fish. This adds credibility to discussions of teaser and jig-skirt coloration in 200 feet of water. Jamie totally buys into the bright teaser mattering, and he has been experiencing far better action on pink and chartreuse attractants. Some may scoff at the prospects of differentiating color in the depths where cod and their cousins live, but it is not our world, it is theirs. Additonally, there has been an increase in halibut encounters as of late! Should you hook a mackerel, small pollock or whiting, it might behoove you to free-spool that flattie food to the bottom.
Bigger bass are blitzing bluebacks and alewives among the tributaries of Great Bay, where talk has progressed from schoolies to keepers. There’s not much to speak of in the Piscataqua River, but with mackerel out by the 2KR Buoy, bigger bass should not be far behind. For flounder, target the flats of Rye and Hampton Harbors as well as Pepperell Cove in Kittery.
Ken from Saco Bay Tackle called the groundfishing phenomenal! They are hauling haddock and busting “brown bombers” in about 250 feet, and the buzzwords have been northern Jeffreys and The Fingers. Suspending fish have been so thick that dropping jigs have been getting hammered at 100 feet! There even have been a few halibut taken! Stripers and shad are in the Saco River, with incoming tide fishing best. There have also been fish in Scarborough Marsh as well as the Spurwink River. Mackerel are out by Wood Island but there are no pursuers with them… yet.
Fishing Forecast
While there’s not much new news in the freshwater front, double-digit laker counts are common by Gate 31 in the Quabbin with smallie scuttlebutt surpassing lake trout talk in Wachusett now. River herring runs remain hot, but a live mackerel or a lure that’s a nice match may catch you a bigger bass from Long Beach, Priscilla Beach or Peggotty Beach. Flounder are stirring in Scituate Harbor as well as Hull, Quincy and Boston Harbor where the hotly contested 5th Annual Zobo Flounder Tournament will take place on Saturday! On the North Shore, you may try to jig up a squid near the Beverly Pier but the conundrum becomes: calamari or striper food! Surfland patrons are not having to travel far as they can walk to the newly formed sandbar and dupe a sand-eel-eating striper. A live river herring is the key to steady striper action among the tributaries in Great Bay, while the groundfishing remains red hot for cod, haddock, pollock and just maybe something big enough to eat all of the above. The game is on in southern Maine as stripers swarm the Saco River and Scarborough Marsh with American shad in the Saco a pretty solid runner-up.