Oh what a joyous week it’s been. The OTW offices are alive with talk of topwater largemouth bass, good tautog fishing and migratory stripers. Things are going great.
But for me, at least, catching my first striper of the year came at a cost. I spent hours every night spot-hopping from Vineyard Sound and Buzzards Bay for the past week, with no luck at first. When I went out for the full day on Sunday in the wind and rain, with both fly and spin gear, I was certain I’d find some schoolies. Still no dice.
Then, on Monday night, I finally connected. I hit several spots, each one a different choke point in the many tidal rivers on Cape Cod’s south side. Moving water is imperative to success, and with the tide about to flip, I needed a location that would funnel the small schools of spearing I was seeing into one small bait highway. I pulled into my last spot of the night around 12:15 a.m. and noticed the incoming tide had just reached slack. I waited, making a few half-hearted casts as the ebb tide began. The steady wind had died down to a gentle 3 knots from the southwest, and those scattered groups of spearing began dimpling on the surface. In less than 2 minutes, they were fleeing from something I could only assume was stripers. It felt like this was the right place and the right time, but I wasn’t connecting. My white 4-inch ribbed paddletail—rigged on a 1/2-ounce Eye Strike Striper Eye jighead—was the exact size and profile of the spearing, and as I crept it up the sandy channel edge, I thought to myself “This whole ‘no fish’ thing is really getting old.” That’s when the unmistakable bump came. I felt the line go slack, and after some delightful headshakes and one brief run that pulled some line off the reel, I was staring down at my first striper of the year.
Overall, I spent about 4 hours on the water with one fish to show for it; but having gotten that first striper out of the way before May 1st, I decided to call it quits and get some rest.
I’ve always made it a personal goal to catch my first bass before May 1. It was a bit easier to do when I was living on Long Island, but honestly, the effort to catch this one schoolie bass before my mental May 1 buzzer made it that much more rewarding.
Since then, I’ve gone out for a couple hours each night to investigate other spots. I hit another backwater spot near home last night towards the end of the outgoing tide, and there was tons of activity. With almost no wind again, I could easily spot schools of herring and their direction based on the large V-wakes they left behind. But it wasn’t just herring the bass were after. Frequent pops echoing in the darkness around me indicated that the bass were slurping small baits off the surface. Again, I could not buy a bite. Equally frustrated and curious, I broke the cardinal rule of surfcasting and quickly shined my headlamp (on the lowest brightness setting) into the water before me. Little grass shrimp darted around under the spotlight, but then I noticed a tightly packed, small group of unfamiliar bait. They were no more than an inch or two long and the squirmed like snakes. These bass were ignoring the herring and instead were feeding on glass eels and grass shrimp.
Glass eels are newly spawned American eels that have yet to reach their juvenile stage. They are tiny and translucent, hence the nickname “glass” eels. Once I realized that the fish were on such tiny bait, I dug through my surf bag for the smallest offering I could find. Not even a 3-inch paddletail would fool these bass. I found a shad dart that I tied over the winter, and tied that directly to my leader without a TA clip. The shart looked like a cross between a small spearing and a grass shrimp and matched the profile of the bait I was seeing. I made two casts as the tide slacked out, and on the second one, my jig got whacked. The bass held on for about 5 seconds, pulled a bit of drag and popped off. After that, utter silence. My only guess as to why I lost the fish is that I didn’t bury the short-shank hook well enough.
While I failed to land that bass, OTW’s Andy Nabreski successfully capitalized on the micro-bait bite one morning this week with a healthy schoolie he caught on one of his own hand-tied shad darts.
It’s still early, but the bass are here. While the bulk of the early migratory fish seem to be congregating in Buzzards Bay, there are a fair amount bass in the rivers and even out front in Vineyard Sound if you can catch them on the right tide. Paddletail swimbaits, lightweight bucktail jigs and flies seem to be taking most of the fish on Cape Cod this week. Captain Brian Coombs of Get Tight Sportfishing had a great day fishing for stripers on Buzzards Bay this week. He reported about 2 dozen fish all measuring between 25 and 32 inches.
Early morning, dusk and late night hours are the most productive time of day to focus your efforts. And if you end up like me once or twice (skunked and frustrated), you can always settle for a consolation freshwater trip.
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While big swimbaits and wake baits have been catching quality bass in the herring run ponds, largemouth bass are also already hitting topwater baits. Hollow-bodied frogs and jitterbugs have been responsible for some of the first topwater fish of the season. The bass are particularly fired up on days with sunny blue skies. Those shallow coves and grass beds are heating up quickly, and with spawned out yellow perch on the prowl in many of the same shallows, if the bass aren’t chasing herring, they’re crushing yellow perch. My buddy Jack has continued picking away at 4+ pounders with swimbaits in search of a real giant.
The kettle ponds will be fishing well for bass in the coming weeks too. They’re giving up largemouth and smallmouth in transition areas as the bass prepare to start bedding and spawning. Targeting sunned flats that are adjacent to drop-offs or dense patches of vegetation will be the best bet at locating consistent bass fishing in the kettle ponds, but as those bass continue to fill up before the spawn, they’ll be looking for bigger baits like recently stocked trout. This is where large swimbaits will shine, so don’t hesitate to go big. It might mean a few less fish, but they will be much better quality than if you were fishing with say, a Ned rig.
Tautog fishing is great right now too. Late last week, OTW’s Adam Eldridge, Jimmy Fee and Tommy Reilly went out in search of some lunch-break tog, and Tommy tied into two good ones that broke him off in the rocks. Let this be a reminder to keep that drag tight and use strong leader when fishing around jetties, rock piles and especially in the Canal. There are still tons of tog appearing on the MMA Cape Cod Canal underwater camera feed, and soon the occasional striper will pop into frame along the rocks.
Sharing his first Canal report of the year, CCC veteran East End Eddie Doherty reported:
“I caught the first breaking tide of the season in the Canal on the 20th, but there were no fish showing so the only thing breaking was the tide itself. It was nice to wet a line after a long absence even though the winter wasn’t that bad. An unconfirmed report has one of the Bell Road Boys landing a 34-inch striped bass last week, if true, that fish was way ahead of the crowd. Some schoolies were caught this morning (Wednesday) on the mainland side of the railroad bridge and there are reports of schoolies in Buzzards Bay with slots right behind.”
This weekend should see great fishing for tautog and stripers when the weather conditions cooperate. And if the weather doesn’t cooperate, consider hitting a pond or two to find some bass or trout that will.
A.J. Coots at Red Top Sporting Goods in Buzzards Bay reports:
“There are a whole lot of fish around in Buzzards Bay. A couple employees of ours weren’t catching on the usual paddletails or anything this week which was strange, so they threw on a Doc and a Redfin and immediately started hooking fish. The bass weren’t very large, around 28-inches max, but this time of year it’s so strange to see 28-inch fish annihilating a 9-inch topwater plug. The strange thing is, the fish were dialed on the surface plugs too— they didn’t want SP minnows or any other diving minnow plugs. There are bunker around numbers in the bay, and squid are all over Newport and Hyannis which is going to blow the striper fishing wide open. We’ve already got schoolies in the Canal all the way down to the East End. The tog bite in the Canal is also phenomenal if you know how to do it right, but it’s a tricky fishery. Swing by the shop before your first trip down to the Canal this season!”
Eastman’s Sport and Tackle in Falmouth reports:
“Tog fishing has been pretty steady in Buzzards Bay and I talked to some guys who have been getting them around Woods Hole. Schoolies have moved into the south side salt ponds. I talked to a guy who fished a cinder worm spawn in Falmouth earlier this week with schoolies feeding on them. It sounds like if you hit any of the ponds locally you’ll find some bass. I fished a few ponds in West Falmouth area and didn’t see much of any action, so it would appear the fish are on the south side. Additionally, there was a customer in the shop this morning who said he hooked and lost what he claims was a 40+ inch fish on a cinder worm fly in a salt pond. The worm bite is on!”
Morgan at Sports Port Bait and Tackle in Hyannis reports:
“Freshwater fishing is still strong with a lot of trout, yellow perch and largemouth bass being caught this week. Paddletail swim shads are responsible for a good chunk of the largemouth being caught, while nightcrawlers are taking perch and trout. But the big news is all the life in the saltwater this week. There is good tautog fishing all around, with the Elizabeth Islands holding some particularly good fishing. The squid are in thick now, we just got about 230 pounds of local squid delivered to the shop. There are also tons of pogies around and we’re getting spotty reports of schoolies in the rivers. There were even some bluefish catches mixed in with the schoolies. There is more than enough bait around to set the stage, we’re just waiting for a big wave of migratory stripers and maybe some more bluefish to make things interesting!”
Canal Bait and Tackle in Sagamore reports:
“Guys are catching lots of schoolie stripers in the Canal from the West End herring run almost all the way down to the East End. Most of the fish are small schoolies but there have been a few 30-inch fish caught already. The main bait is herring right now and soon enough we’ll have some squid around here judging by the amount that are in Hyannis this week. Tog fishing has been good in the Canal too, we’re selling tons of green crabs so the bite has been good locally.”
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Cape Cod Fishing Forecast
The weekend weather doesn’t look fantastic, but that’s okay. Stripers are in, and the snotty conditions may have them feeding out front in the surf. Topwater like Rebel Jumpin’ Minnows and Game On X-Walks will bring fish to the surface in slight chop, while paddletails and bucktails will pull fish from down low.
Saturday looks like poor weather for tautog fishing, so if you’re not chasing stripes, take a trip to a recently stocked pond or your largemouth bass honey hole and pick away at some sweetwater species.
By next week, the striped bass fishing around Cape Cod should be busting wide open. Squidding is better by the day, there are herring everywhere (still) which is great after a pretty crappy herring run last year, and the back bays and rivers are full of spearing, grass shrimp and glass eels… fly guys, I’m looking at you!
I don’t know about you, but I’m really looking forward to the cinder worm “hatch” this spring. Looking for my first striper on the fly, and I have a couple tricks up my sleeve for when the bass get particularly picky. Let’s see what the week ahead holds. Get out there and have some fun.
SAVE THE DATE: Family Fishing Day on Cape Cod
We want to hear from you! If you’d like to contribute to our fishing reports, reach out to me via email (mhaeffner@onthewater.com) or via Instagram (@hefftyfishing) with a sentence or two reporting your experience on the water, along with any fish photos related to your report.
are these the largemouth striped bass that you guys are catching?
they look like big ones!
A.J.Coots from Red Top nailed it! Barely slot sized stripers crushing large top water lures in the three bays also. It must be all the Bunker around triggering them. Tight Lines.
Looking for info on possibilities of this year‘s southside blue fishing. Last few years have been slim, always loved beach fishing for blues since childhood presently only. Get to spend a few weeks a year at the Cape anymore. Planning on first 10 days of June.