After the spectacular fishing of last week, when some anglers had days of 25 stripers between 20 and 38 pounds out of Boston Harbor and there was at least one 50-pounder taken out of the Merrimack River, you’d expect the following week to be a bit anticlimactic, and it definitely was. The upside is that the surge of snapper blues is making for a lot of fun and great fluke bait. River herring fry are beginning to gather at the mouths of their natal watersheds resulting in sporadic blitzes. And there’s even chatter of “keeper black sea bass” finally in the Greater Boston area.

What a difference a week makes for those that basked in the fantastic fishing in Boston Harbor. It was a simple case of find the pogies, snag up and hold-on until you lipped a 40-inch-plus fish (if you weren’t there, check out last week’s forecast photos). While anglers snagged away at the pogy schools for nearly a week and made little obvious damage, there was a dark cloud looming – purse seiners had sniffed out the pogies, too. I know of one confirmed sighting of one of the commercial entities scooping pogies just off Revere Beach on Saturday, and I’m sure this was not their first drop on their way to filling the 3.1-million-pound quota that Massachusetts is allowed. And now, those pogies are all but gone and so is the fantastic fishing. How one user group is able to monopolize a resource at the expense of another such as the recreational community is beyond my comprehension.

South Shore Massachusetts Fishing Forecast

Dave from The Fisherman’s Outfitter in Plymouth said that the striper bite in the Plymouth area improved over last week. Anglers working eels at night off Long Beach in the direction of the pilling remnants were doing quite well. Boaters casting and trolling chrome Krocodiles near the Sparkplug, which is at the bend in the Plymouth Harbor channel, are also catching. The snapper blue invasion has got to be paying off some fluke dividends even though few are talking about it. Most any wharf or pier should have the baby blues, and a Sabiki rig should catch you plenty of bait. Try using a simple egg sinker/barrel swivel and 3-foot leader and drift among the many channels, especially at confluences, that are so common throughout Kingston and Duxbury bays. High Pine Ledge off Duxbury Beach has been a good producer of fluke in the past. Anglers chunking off Duxbury Beach are hooking stripers.

Bob Pronk of Green Harbor Bait and Tackle in Marshfield said that an experienced spotter-plane pilot friend of his who spends an inordinate amount of time looking for tuna from above swears that he has spotted amberjack in with a school of tuna cruising coastward east of Stellwagen. Boy would one of them make for a heck of a bycatch! For more indigenous species try the local beaches where chunks and eels have lead to a lot of luck with linesiders. Boaters using eels, tubes and umbrella rigs are picking up stripers just outside of Beetle Rock. The cod catch has improved just east of Stellwagen and instead of keepers the talk is about 8- to 10-pound cod. An angler live-lining a snapper blue caught a 20-inch fluke and I’m sure there are more where that came from.

Pete from Belsan’s in Scituate said that anglers drifting with eels at the mouth of the South River are picking up bass over 30 pounds! Similar-sized 45-inch stripers are also falling for the venerable tube-and-worm by the Glades. Fly-fishermen are out-fishing all others at Damons Point in the North River with olive/white Clousers that closely match the juvenile river herring that are aggregating. Those practically scratching the bottom off the 21 Can and by Davis Ledge are picking up an occasional double-digit bluefish but they are working for the fish. While taking a lunch break out there, try dropping a diamond jig, Norwegian or Butterfly Jig to see if there’s a willing cod or two.

Greater Boston Fishing Report

The highlight of the past week was probably the 9th Annual Help Hook The Cure Derby held at the Elks Club last Saturday. The band, Deep Water Blues, rocked the place, the food was great and the energy electrifying, all the more considering that the proceeds were dedicated to such a worthy cause. The derby committee wanted to thank all from the participators to the volunteers and supporters, including On The Water, for making this derby into the premier one-day fishing event in Boston. If you’re wondering about next year, my friend Nick Frasso already has August 22nd circled, making next year the 10th anniversary which will make this thing really something special. And by the way, the fishing was pretty good also but many were surprised that the top three winners were all crammed into the 27- to 28-pound category and none of the cows that were so prevalent earlier in the week figured into the mix. Most feel that the loss of the pogy schools was the culprit. The good news is that two of the top three fish came from a local estuary. With the volume of snappers and spearing that frequent most marshes, estuaries and local river systems you should never discount these inshore areas for holding big bass. Of course a river system which harbors a healthy herring run should be especially hot right now as the fry begin staging near downstream structure. Many of the estuaries also have some healthy fluke this year because of all those snappers.

Finally some serious black sea bass have livened up local waters with Hull Gut and West Gut producing a much-improved keeper to short ratio than past weeks. But, one of the derby contestants told me that he’s been finding 5-pounders off Three and One-Half Ledge off Hull! It might be worth bouncing a Spro Bucktail or Crippled Herring on the numerous ledges out there.

North Shore Massachusetts Fishing Report

Tomo from Tomo’s Tackle in Salem said that mackerel are still hanging in there near Halfway Rock and Childrens Island. Anglers three-waying them or sinking them down with an egg sinker are scoring teen-sized stripers off Saturday Night Ledge and Newcomb Ledge. Also try tolling a tube and worm off Marblehead from Tinkers Island past The Shags out to Phillips Point. Marblehead Harbor continues to deliver the calamari but because of pier closings some are resorting to boat maneuvers, anchoring wherever there is a nighttime light source and doing very well. I did hear from a source that some big blues have moved in just outside of Beverly Harbor.

Pete from Fin and Feather told me of some fantastic beach fishing that is reminiscent of the fall run. While a predicting a chosen beach is harder to pin down than an eel, a starting point would be coursing the Rte. 127A route with a pair of binoculars and an early morning start. Steve Pappows got into just such an early blitz and tallied 6 cows over 40 inches in size. Lately he’s been taken to minimalist packing, toting just an 8-foot Avid Inshore Series Rod, a blue/green Ocean Lures Swimming Baitfish and Ocean Lures Sand Eel and hardly anything else. It looks as if the catch rate isn’t suffering. Above all he recommends that you employ a loop knot to get the most action out of your plug. And don’t be surprised if something “funny” doesn’t happen to you while you’re casting; Steve recently had what appeared to be a 5- to 6-pound false albacore launch itself at one of his plugs!

Kay from Surfland told me the winning ticket in the Newburyport area continues to be a live mackerel at the mouth of the Merrimack; while there was much buzz about Bob Roy’s 54-10 caught last Friday, there have been other big fish taken by tight-lipped anglers. Recently mackerel have been found by Halfway Rock and the Speckled Apron. A shore best bet is parking lot 3 of the Parker River Wildlife Reservation for the midnight bait brigade.

New Hampshire and Southern Maine

The good news from the Granite State continues to be the squid, with local interest at such a pitch that shops such as Suds ‘N Soda are struggling to keep jigs in stock. The Coast Guard Station in New Castle remains hot as do a number of bridges and piers throughout the Piscataqua River area. Black sea bass are the runner-up story for this season with 15-inch-plus fish falling for Thingamajigs bounced over rockpiles, musselbeds and additional structure. Great Bay is best for small blues while stripers are often shadowing the squid and prowling among the ledge at New Hampshire beaches.

Chad from Dover Marine got to sample the great groundfishing at Jeffreys Ledge the other day and was most impressed with the 30-inch to 40-inch pollock they caught in 190 feet of water. Patrons of Dover are also clamoring to catch squid and black sea bass with some of the former present from the Piscataqua out to the Isle of Shoals. Mackerel have also returned between the 2KR Buy out to White Island. Striped bass remain a game of hit or miss with the odds tilted toward the angler wherever there is squid present.

Peter answered my challenge for giving up more than the weekly Camp Ellis, Pine Point palaver for this report. The Saco Bay Tackle Company skipper recommends the Spurwink River, Royal River and Kennebec River. Eels by bridges at the turn of the tide around high, is a high-percentage method as are casting plugs such as the always reliable SP Minnow and Yo-Zuri Crystal Minnow. Also high on the list is Black Point and the Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge off Wells for chunkers and clammers. Mackerel can still be trolled or chummed up off Richmond Island.

Best Bets for the Weekend

If a slightly offshore odyssey is to your liking, consider a cod junket just east of Stellwagen or Jeffreys Ledge; it looks as if there’s a slight bump in numbers and size. Plus up north you can’t knock a mid-30-inch pollock! On the South Shore, Plymouth remains productive for those working eels along the channel edges, while at the mouth of the South River the same can be said for 30-pound stripers as long as the bait is eels. Keeper black sea bass have become more common off Hull Gut and the West Gut with some real monsters slamming jigs off Three and One-Half Fathom Ledge. Snapper blues in the estuaries of Greater Boston are fun for the kids and are what’s for dinner for the fluke. Those same estuaries are often home to river herring fry and you can never discount a hot topwater bite. Most days on the North Shore feature some solid striper surface feeds off the beaches with 127A a good route to do some recon. In New Hampshire squid fishing has reached a fever pitch with black sea bass jigging in the Piscataqua River a distant second. Down Maine, in addition to a bass bite from the Saco River Jetty, look for linesider love from the Royal and Kennebec rivers.