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June 27th, 2002

Leaders and Knots, Continued...

(Important note: I need YOUR reports. Email me!)

After last week's bit on leaders, I thought it might be interesting to run a poll of what people are using throughout the area. Here are the results so far:

What do you use for a leader setup
Pre-manufactured fluorocarbon		6	12.24%
Straight mono - 15 lb. or less		4	8.16%
Straight mono - 16 lb. or more		1	2.04%
Hand tied mono		3	6.12%
Hand tied fluorocarbon		8	16.33%
Hand tied mono with a fluoro tippet		17	34.69%
You mean you don't tie it right to the fly line?		0	0%
Straight Fluorocarbon leader (any weight)		10	20.41%
Total:		49 votes	100%

What's it all mean? For starters, it means there is NO "right" way for leaders. You need to use what works for you; whatever the leader, you must be confident in it's ability to get the job done. A couple of points that come up:

• As Mike Greenlaw noted in a post in that thread, Clousers and sinking lines call for short leaders. He prefers 4' of 20 lb. fluoro, which gives him the ability to handle the fish at boatside.
• Alderbrookfarm makes the point that fluoro is weakened by heat. This makes lubricating the knot before puling it tight even more important.

Knot make up is again an issue that sparks discussion. Capt Charles Crue of Channel Edge Charters forwarded this on knots:

I use only a very few knots. I like the Perfection Knot for a making a leader loop for loop-to-loop connections to the fly line.

I like a simple Loop Knot to attach the fly to the leader. It gives more freedom of movement to the fly during the stripping activity.

I generally use 15# Fluorocarbon to make my leaders ( about 6 feet). Knots are described in Practical Fishing Knots II by Mark Sosin and Lefty Krey.1991

Captain Wayne Frieden of Reel Dream Charters notes:

Here are the basic knots that I feel a beginner ought to learn:

1. Albright knot to tie backing to fly line
2. Nail knot to tie an 8" piece of 40lb mono to tag end of fly line
3. Double Surgeon's knot for making a loop to attach leader to 40 lb mono, or to tie together different size leader material
4. Blood knot for making a tapered leader, tying together different size leader material, and attaching tippet
5. Non-slip Loop knot for tying on clousers, half and half's, etc...

While we're on the subject of knots, I have started working with a leader that is tied with only Surgeon's Knots. The Surgeon's Knot has several key benefits. Firstly, it is a nearly 100% knot when tied correctly (that codicile goes for all knots). It is very simple to tie, which means that in a pinch, at night, you can tie on a new section without worry. The standard Blood Knot is less than 100% and is primarily intended for similar size materials (which means you have a potential problem if you drop from 30 lb. down to 10 lb. The Surgeon's Knot handles dissimilar materials very well and I can atest to the stregth of the knot as it is the one I used for line to leader connections when I fished tuna with heavy tackle. I cannot recall having one break.

The Surgeon's Knot also ties a nice loop. You can accomplish this by doubling the line on itself, then tying the knot, as though the loop end was the tag end of the running line and the second leader section.

The only problem I see with using Surgeon's Knots in leaders is that the two sections of running line coming out of the knot don't come out exactly horizontal.

More knots you should know:

Albright Knot - for backing to fly line.

Nail Knot - for tying the butt section to the fly line.

Uni-Knot - this knot can be adapted for just about anything

Improved Clinch Knot - this is the best hook to leader connection by far and the first knot an angler should learn. Be able to tie this knot without looking at the line!

Don't forget to send me your own reports, and until next week...

Tight Lines!

Mark Cahill

Boston Harbor

It would appear that we're starting to settle into the summer pattern in Boston Harbor. I've even heard the dreaded "dog days" words a couple of times this week. The stripers are certainly out there, but it is getting a little harder to get them on the end of a line.

Capt. Wayne Frieden of Reel Dream Charters offers this up to the minute report:

Thursday, June 20, 2002: Mike Hogan and Phil Perrino both had a memorable day on the water flyrodding numerous keeper bass including Phil's 36", 20 lb. beauty that fell for a 5" chartreuse half & half. The fished showed again out front, beyond the Graves and cooperated throughout the morning. Although both Mike and Phil had many follows with  gurglers and poppers, fast sink lines were the ticket.

Friday, June 21, 2002: The bass never showed outside and the light tackle and fly fishing was consequently slow. Dr. Brian Hinnebush and his friend Michael released about 10 schoolies total for the morning. We found some fish off Long I., in the anchorage and later on structure in Quincy Bay. Although Brian worked the fly as well as anyone could have, we couldn't buy a fish off the rocks around the Outer Harbor Islands. So, it was a beautiful day weather wise, but a tough one fishing wise!

Sunday, June 23, 2002: The fishing in the Harbor slowed significantly over the past few days. The large school of bass that was feeding on herring in the North Channel disappeared on Friday. Perhaps, the bait moved offshore or the bass had their fill. Who knows?   Today,  Taylor Thompson his wife, Val and their kids Graham and Warren saw lots of fins and tails in Quincy Bay. We threw just about everything but the kitchen sink and only managed one on the fly. Earlier in the morning, 12 year old Graham landed and released a nice 8 pound schoolie on a chartreuse deceiver pattern. The bass in Quincy Bay did start feeding just before the top of the tide and an hour or so into the going tide. However, we were catching schoolies on fly and light tackle near the airport.

Tuesday, June 25, 2002: Got a late morning start and missed most of the bite in the anchorage. Saw a number of bait balls holding @ 5" young herring. Got the cast net out and netted a bunch of bait to be used later on in the morning. My sport did manage to get a handful of fish on the fly and enjoyed a truly spectacular day on the water. About 1-2 hours after the top of the tide, I marked a number of bass in 12 - 14' of water in Quincy Bay. Started live bait chumming (a technique used by many Florida guides) and Kevin was immediately hooked up on the fly. This is a great method for getting inactive fish to feed and when it happens, the action can be fast and furious. It's a visual scene with stripers  busting  live bait on the surface all around the boat. Then it's just a matter of getting your fly or lure into the melee.

Wednesday, June 26, 2002: I usually hate  afternoon trips simply because the fishing is generally not as good as in the morning. With dire predictions of severe but scattered (where?) thunderstorms, I was reluctant to take Wally Sullivan, of Pulse Trading, Inc.  and friend Mark out for a late afternoon lite tackle trip in search of striped bass. Fortunately, the weather in Boston  cooperated. And so did the bass! Within an two and one half hour time frame, both anglers caught and released a total of 25 schoolies to 26". The bass were chowing down on small silversides and young (5") herring. The bait of choice was a 3/8 oz leadhead jig tipped with a 5-6" fin s fish in alewive color pattern (what else?). Smaller soft plastic baits were not as effective. The fish were on the Deer I. flats to the long porch.

Thursday, June 27, 2002: What did I say about mornings being better than afternoons? Today,  angler Tom Hancock had a slow morning fly rodding. It was on the windy side but that didn't hamper Tom's fly casting one bit. Although I marked clouds of bait and bass in the anchorage, we only managed to fool one striper. Tom did catch and release a  few snapper blues in Quincy Bay before heading off to the office at 9:00 am.

Until next week, we'll see you out there...

Capt. Wayne Frieden

Capt. Bill Smith of Draggin' Fly Charters reports:

Draggin' Fly Too managed to get out Sunday, June 16 after forced cancellations of Friday and Saturday trips. Dave Gale of Sharon brought along Ed Shea of Mansfield. Fishing was quite difficult but these seasoned fly rodders hung tough. Dave's modified Clouser proved to be a real attention getter, outfishing all other patterns.

By Tuesday, fishing picked up quickly. Action was outside the Harbor's approachchannels, but the ride was well worth it. Most of the bass were over legal size and many approached the three foot mark. And boy, were they hungry! At times, it seemed that the bass would attack any fly or lureThursday, June 20 John Kiley of New Hampshire celebrated daughter Jenna's college graduation by initiating her into the "Hahbah Fishing Society". And what a party they had. Jenna's first salt water fish was a beauty, weighing in at over 15 pounds. The action only got better as the tide began to pull. Conservative estimates put the count at eighteen bass from 30 to 38 inches long caught and released and the number of fish from 26 to 30 inches were far greater. While Dad used the long rod, Jenna used light tackle to tameworked well for Jenna

Bruce Moyer and Dave Gale of Sharon were on board Saturday, June 22. It was another hard day where anglers had to really fight for fish. There was no surface bite and most fish came off the structure. Dave and Bruce tried several patterns, but the fish ignored most offerings.

South Shore

Capt. John Bunar of Skippy III Charters in Duxbury came through with this report of the local action:

 I am still not seeing much in the way of breaking fish each morning.   The only salvation the past few days has been the early morning low tides have made micros easy pickens on the channel edges and up in the guzzles.  Still no bluefish anywhere near the area save for a small number of rat sized fish hanging way up in the bays.  The Power Plant buoys are set up.  They are far enough out to make fishing the effluent impossible. 

 

For "alternative" fishing, I would say flounder fishing between the bug and Saquish or off of Crescent beach in 25' will be a winner.   This is a high tide fishery.   Fluking is not all that good now so it is maybe best to hold off another week there.    Hickory shad are  possible to hook off the Plymouth Breakwater, at PP Bridge, and up in Deluxbury.  Cod fishing ain't worth the bother because of the size limit increase.

 

My live bait trips were decent this week.   The boat saw 4 fish over 30lbs this week with the biggest being a 38lber caught by Steve Corsey of Pembroke Ma.  .  I would say  average size this week was in the 12lb range.  Hot areas this week were the area around Farnham Rock off Marshfield and Gurnet Pt.    Bait of choice is still pogies but it has been a tad tougher to get them because a nasty batch of Dogfish has already invaded the bay.  I hate picking dogfish out of a net.   I have heard of a few decent fish caught in the bays but nothing of noteworthy size.

 

Have a safe and happy 4th - John B

North River

Plenty of fish still in the North River. Been there a couple of mornings this past week. No big fish!! I could not buy a big fish this year. Going to hit the cape outer beaches the second half of this week maybe I can find some big ones out there. Anyone have a mung and bug report its about that time of year...

North Shore

Not a lot to report from the Cape Ann crowd.  Generally, silence from that crew has it's own, special meaning. 

What I am hearing is that the fishing in the Danvers River remains fairly strong with some bigger fish showing up.  While I haven't heard anything, I would suspect the ocean facing shoreline along Cape Ann is producing.  I'd also expect to find good action along Crane's Beach. 

Sound King reports on the RT New England forum:

North Shore 6/25 p.m.

Quenched my thirst for chumming tonight. Hit missoury island almost as a joke with my fly rod, and saw literally hundreds of fish. Sat there and chummed for four hours, and it seemed like I was constantly hooked up. One observation I made today made me an even firmer believer in flourocarbon. I chummed up a massive school of bass, and cut identical chunks for my hook baits. Same hooks, but one had 12 pound straight mono, the other I rigged w/ 20 lb flouro. I watched the baits settle into the chum, and bass swam up to the mono, but shyed away many times, but with the flouro I didnt get a single refusal. Pretty interesting stuff. Oh yeah, you prolly want to know the fish count-40 fish smallest was 23 inches, largest was 37 inches, majority of fish were 25-30 inches. I also caught a 6 pound bluefish, which took with him a small piece of J.J. finger meat prior to his brutal beating in retaliation, and by the way, blues make great chum, especially after they grab a pice of your flesh off. Moral of the story-never leave the pliers in the dock box. Thats it until tomorrow, Tight Lines, Soundking

The Merrimack River

I've had word this week that the stripers are still holding on Joppa Flats, but they are getting down right spooky at times.  Some anglers are attributing this to a shift into a summer pattern, while others question the bait the fish are feeding on.  In the past (note: I have not been there this week to confirm) the stripers have gone over to feeding on river shrimp.  The problem with river shrimp is that stripers do not target a single shrimp, they target a whole cloud of them and tend to filter feed much like a basking shark or whale.  Even worse, these clouds of shrimp will move away from your fly.  Any one have a good imitator for a cloud of shrimp?

The other possibility is alluded to by Charlie Cure - crabs. He notes that he's seen a lot of tiny crab shells around and wonders if there's been a crab hatch. These can often put the stripers in an exclusive feeding mode. keep it in mind on the water.

Capt Charlie Crue of Channel Edge Charters chimed in with this report, and late breaking word of a nice catch late Wednesday

Merrimack River Report #10 June 27, 2002

Last Thursday I had two trips, one in the morning and the other in the evening. There was a big difference in fishing success. My morning clients did quite well on the morning outgoing tide. They caught dozens of schoolies from "micros" to keeper size using flies and softbaits. The stripers were feeding on 3 to 4 inch sand eels below the sand bar near Buoy #11. In the late afternoon I hosted two very good fly casters. The problem was that I couldn’t find stripers in any of the usual spots. After three hours of fishing our score was zero. Finally as darkness approached we got into schoolies near the AYC mooring area and had good action for the remainder of the trip. I guess I will just say that morning fishing is better (at least it was that day).

The next morning I hosted a repeat client and his friend from Florida. I have been pleased to host Karl Wickstrom ( Florida Sportsman Magazine) each season for the past two. He is an ardent fisherman and enjoys this beautiful area and the great fishery here. He was not disappointed. After about a half hour of fishing we boated a 34-inch striper and soon after that lost a huge bluefish that stayed on until it was at the boat, at which point the inevitable happened as he cut the leader. It was a great morning out on Joppa Flats followed with some fast action near Plum Island after the tide got running good.

The next morning I took out Todd and his girlfriend, Lorraine. Lorraine had never caught a striper on a fly and in fact had hardly caught any fish on a fly. Her life is now changed thanks to many nice Merrimack river stripers. Both anglers did well using clousers and other flies.

After the Saturday rainy weather the fishing was good agin on Sunday morning. Fog and boat traffic precluded any plans to fish the river mouth so we fished the incoming tide near Buoy #11 and did very well on schoolies up to mid-20-inch length. They hit softbaits and flies. Nicholas (about age 10) caught a nice healthy schoolie. (Photo) Later as the tide filled Joppa Flats we looked for stripers there. We found them, I mean found lots and lots of them but they were not interested in anything we offered. It seems they were feeding only on crabs. I don’t what was going on in the crab world but we saw lots of shells floating and many very small crabs. Maybe it was a crab hatch. There were dozens of boats with fishermen using every type of gear and we only saw one or two fish caught over a couple of hours around the high tide. We saw the wakes of big fish swimming in the shallow water and boils as the fish were spooked by lures or boats. Although it was frustrating it was a great scene to witness. We could only guess at the size of some of the fish but there was no doubt in our minds that they were big. Oh well, maybe next time they will be more willing to hit an artificial.

On Wednesday I had a late day charter in the afternoon. The tide was high so my clients, Ron and John, would fish the Joppa Flats area. They did but although the fish were there they couldn’t get hits on any flys.We moved to the upper end of Joppa and caught some nice schoolie size stripers, up to 25-inches. Then we moved down to the Buoy #11 area and caught and released many schoolies and a couple close to keeper size. As our agreed time to quit approached, and in response to their hope for a big striper, we moved back to the upper end of Joppa where Ron soon had a hit by a big fish that soon took his fly line out and into the backing. After several minutes of give and take the striper came to the boat (photo in lead section of FishWire). It was a great ending to another striper day on the Merrimack River!