It is officially spring, right? My dashboard thermometer suggested otherwise this morning, when it read 19 degrees on my ride to the office.
Winter is definitely making us pay for those 60-degree days in February, but around the Cape, fishermen this week said, “Forget the weather, I’m going fishing.”
Trout fishing is the main event right now. Jim at Eastman’s listed a number of ponds around the Upper Cape that are producing well. Johns has been fishing well, he said, and Ashumet has been hot. Grews, however, has been on the slow side. Jim was impressed by the numbers of brookies he’s been hearing about being caught.
Jeff at Canal Bait and Tackle said there have been some nice trout being caught. Nearby Peter’s Pond has been stocked twice, and anglers fishing there are catching a mix of rainbows and brookies.
In addition to steady trout fishing, Bull at Red Top had heard of good ice-out action for bass, pickerel, and perch.
A large group from the OTW office cashed in on that ice-out action this week, catching a mix of pickerel and bass on shiners, jerkbaits, spoons, and even flies after work on Tuesday.
On Facebook, I’ve been seeing photos of 5-plus-pound largemouths being lifted up by bundled-up anglers. It seems like jerkbaits and shallow-diving crankbaits are doing the most damage on these early-spring largemouths.
Bull also mentioned that he’d seen some herring “scouts” working their way up the Agawam River in Wareham and Eel River in Plymouth. While the first migratory stripers are still weeks away, seeing the herring is a sure sign that, frigid temperatures or not, we’ll be fishing in t-shirts soon.
Fishing Forecast for Cape Cod
The fishing action will be back on track this weekend. Bring suspending jerkbaits, shallow crankbaits, and some soft-plastics, and hunt for bass over deeper weedbeds and drop-offs. For trout, break out the spoons and cover water. The fish that have been stocked this spring, will likely be schooled up, but may have ventured away from the stocking sites. Walk the shoreline, casting a spoon like the Thomas Rough Rider, and keep moving until you find the fish.
I’ve been doing well with largemouth bass since the ice has been gone on cape