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July 5th, 2002

Beat the Dog Day Slowdown...

The water is heating up and that's made for a distinct change in the fishing action throughout Eastern Massachusetts.  In that regard, I thought it might be worthwhile to pass on a few bits of advice that may help you find the fish in the warmer weather.

First off, let's understand one thing: very few fish are able to regulate their own internal temperatures.  They generally rely on the water temperature around them to accomplish this.  This is one of the major factors in the "Dog Days Slowdowns" we hear so much about in this area.  As the water gets warm in the bays and estuaries, the stripers will either move out or spend more time in deeper water.  Whereas they had sought out the warmer waters just a month ago, now it becomes uncomforatable for them to remain in them, especially during the day.

So where do they go?  Primarily, stripers will move to other prominent feeding locations.  Deeper water rockpiles and rips will draw them, they will be found working on Stellwagen over much deeper water, and they will be found along the ocean facing beaches.  This is the time of year where you can fish the whitewater on the face of the rocky shorelines with great success.

Additionally, it becomes even more important to fish the low light hours.  While the heat of the day may be productive once in a while, the sunrise is simply your best percentage shot for finding fish.

This is a good time to start working sinking lines and weighted flies (save me the "a Clouser is not a fly arguments - if you want to play purist, trout fishing should probably be your game...). I like to work boulder fields like the Glades off Scituate, Hardings Ledge or the Graves off Boston and any of the rockpiles too numerous to name off Cape Ann.  I find it best when there's a good tidal flow over the rocks.  Probably the hardest thing to learn about this type of fishing is the patience required to give your fly the time to sink deep enough to be effective.

At this time of year, I also start looking for bluefish over deeper waters.  Places like the H Buoy, the triangle from Thieves Ledge to Harding to the south harbor entrance, and the B Buoy will all play host to roving schools of blues (as well as just about anywhere along the coast).  Often you will mark these fish on the finder before you see them and it's not uncommon to find  aggressively feeding in the middle of the day, the problem being that they will do this at a 40-50' depth which makes it problematic to present a fly to them.

I hope you all have a great weekend and enjoyed a wonderful 4th - God Bless America!

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

Tight Lines!

Mark Cahill

Boston Harbor

Peter Tojano emailed this report in this afternoon (Friday):

moved some large stripers off of boston ledge and the shag rocks on 4 inch white and chartruse half&halfs, but no takers. then ran into schools of VERY spooky fish rolling around the surface, showing backs and fins like bonefish, both at the shag and inside spectacle island- what gives with these fish? tried gurglers too and couldn't get a hit to save me, although it was a blast watching them roll and trying to get a cast on top of them. any advice?

I've seen that type of lazy, finning the surface, behavior a couple of times. I've seen it a whole lot more in bluefish, but generally I've had a hard time enticing them (if they won't take a popper right away, your chances of success are low). In those cases, I've used a big gaudy fly to turn them on. I suspect I was more irritating them into striking, as one might do when salmon fishing. Anyone else seen this behavior?

Capt. Wayne Frieden of Reel Dream Charters checks in with this report - note his technique for getting the action going in the warmer weather!

Saturday, June 29, 2002: Enjoyed taking Rick and Liz Newman out for a day of light tackle fishing. Again, we found small blues and bass in Quincy Bay. Later in the morning, Liz caught and released a 32" 12 lb. beauty at a different location near the airport. The day was gorgeous both Rick and Liz caught a handful of fish and had the opportunity tosee a number of bass in relatively skinny water. What a relaxing way tospend the day

Sunday, June 29, 2002: Another great day on the water for Grant Brown and girlfriend Carrie Lascell. Just shortly after first light, a couple large schools of small stripers were chasing herring near Governor's I. flats and in Dorchester Bay. For a while, it was "fish on" every cast for Grant, a first timer to saltwater fly fishing. Around 9:00 am, the action came to an abrupt end. We then netted some live bait (smallherring) which we later used to "chum up" some stripers I marked in Quincy Bay. When live bait chumming, there are at least two rules to follow:

1. You can never have enough live bait.

2. Only chum when you mark fish.

Monday, July 1, 2002: Mike Vanherff of Ottowa, Canada, took advantage of a family visit in Quincy to fly rod up his first striped bass. The weather was great and the fish were numerous and user friendly, albeit small in size. The action lasted from first light until 8:30 or so. We then netted some live herring to use as live bait chum. It was a bit difficult to net a sufficient amount of bait as the schools were movingquite fast.

Tuesday, July 2, 2002: I very much enjoyed taking Ted Purcell and 5 year old son Tanner out for Tanner's very first striped bass trip. Ted used the fly rod and Tanner caught his first striper on a 1/2 jig tipped with an alewive color fin s fish. The bass were again feeding on young herring in the Dorchester Bay area. The fish were plentiful but again relatively small in size. We later found a school of somewhat finicky but very large bass mixed in with smaller bluefish. Although Ted managed to hook a few small fish on a small popper and half & half, none of the big boys would take his offering. Lots of follows...Tanner hooked into a small blue that made a couple of leaps before brought tnear boatside for a long line release. I was throwing a 5" Bass Assassin to see if I could hook up with a nice bass for Tanner. The fish I did catch and release was much too large for a 5 year old to handle!

July 4, 2002: The fishing has continued good with many fish on top in the early morning hours until either the boats, sun or tide puts them down. We're seeing some larger schoolies and really big fish fresh in from the ocean with sea lice chowing down on the herring which have been plentiful. Today, the fishing was as hot as the weather  on this fine Fourth of July! Van Letham and brother in law, Don, had an outstanding day of striper fishing using fly and light tackle. The gray/lavender half & half outfished the chartreuse one, but the big fish fell to a 4" pearl shad body fished on 1/2 oz jig head by Don. As long as the weather continues to be stable and the bait remains in the Harbor, the fishing for both bass and blues should remain very good.

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

Capt. Wayne Frieden

South Shore

Matt Maderos forwarded this report from last weekend:

 I'd thought I'd pass on my fishing report for Sat. June 29th. launched at Plymouth Harbor at 5am, weather looked good, slight North wind and clear skies. but once again we were all left scratching out heads as nothing worked. looked like we were not the only ones. the three of us Kim, Matt and Pete threw everything. Bait-eels, squid, etc. Plugs, and most of our Fly's in our box, I did see some schools on the finder but the wind was brutal by 9am (strong 20 Mph North Wind) we fished Saquish beach, the rip there too,the bug light, browns bank, all around Clarks, and cow yard. ) only thing we did get was some dog fish near the deep water near the bug light. Still nice to be out on the water!

North Shore

Capt. Derek Spingler of First Light Anglers in Machester-by-the-sea reports:

June 29th- Sorry for the delay in posting a report, but the reports have not been great all week. We have truly been working our bottoms off to try and get any real numbers of fish. The full moon and the lobster fry feeding bass have essentially shut the fishing down. There have been some decent mornings and evenings fishing the rocks with a handful of nice fish in the 28”-35” range still falling to the bunny deceiver, however, a week ago we may have pulled 3-5 nice fish out of a drift, this week you are happy to get one. The fish in the rocks have also been quite finicky, our best fly in the higher light has been a tarpon fly: a purple bunny zonker strip with black cross-cut up the shank to a tungsten cone and red thread. When the fish are up doing their terribly frustrating lobster fry sipping this fly has worked but only here and there. These fish are simply not eating flies readily. I will say that sometimes stripping a large fly as fast as possible will get the fish to eat. One of the more remarkable sights of the week has been the massive school of 3-5” herring up in Salem Harbor that has yet to have the bass on it. Thousands of herring bubbling the surface and no bass!! Truly unbelievable.

We have been doing well when we break down and fish the live Pollack or Mackerel. Fishing out off Baker’s Island, the Breakers, Thachers and Milk have produced spectacular fish up to 30lbs. This has been the one highlight over a very slow week of fly rodding and plugging the rocks. It feels like we need another good push of fish or bait up inside Salem Sound to really get things cranking. Where are all the silversides that usually push up into the sound?

Another bonus has been the amount of bluefish starting to show up. On calm days there have been decent schools out off Halibut and the Salvages as well as off of Newcombs and Halfway Rock, sometimes a couple of miles out. There have also been a lot of blues up in all the rivers. The Danvers, Essex, Annisquam, and Merrimack have all had great reports of blues in the 5-10lb range, not a bad distraction when the bass fishing is slow.

At least we are moving away from the full moon and the dawn and dusk tides are improving. One thing for sure is I am not ready for the summer doldrums!! Pease call the shop for further updates. Thanks, Derek (978)526-4477

Soundking reports:

North Shore 7/1 a.m.

Fished the drop this morning. Saw good signs everywhere, yet the fish were nowhere to be found. Hit Missory island first arriving at 6,the waters around it were literally covered in scales,and the cut was flattened with slicks. I suspect that I missed an epic feed by a mater of minutes. However, I failed to mark a single fish. Large of schools of really small juvinile herring, .5-1.5 inches were all over the place. I went hitless and fishless on the entire island. From there I hit lobster cove, that produced five fish all 25 inches, suprisingly they all were in the deeper rocks maybe fifteen yards off of the shore, dredged up with a 4/0 chartruce big eye baitfish. From there sight fished a bit off of signing beach, saw a few fish, and caught one on a crease fly. One depressing thing I saw as I was leaving the beach was a huge school of sippers, looks like they're settling into their summer pattern. Fished graves island, which was insanely slow, I only hooked one small fish which I lost at the boat. Egg rock was close to stellar, producing eight fish, all were small, again on the big eye baitfish. Kettle Island fished well towards the end of the day, but all in all it was pretty quiet considdering how many fish I saw, along with the excellent tide. Conclusion:bass too have realized its summer, and are adjusting, fish early and deep, thats it for now, Tight Lines, Soundking

Sherpa T reports:

 Salem Harbor 6/30

Ventured out Sunday with my wife to get out and "cool off" (just by coincidence it was around high tide.) Didn't plan on fishing, but had my 10 wt along for "safety purposes." Saw some bird activity over by Dion's Yacht Yard and went over to check it out. Fished for about 20 mins and landed 5 or 6. Most around 18-20", best around 25". These fish hit very hard and made some very strong runs, better than I've seen this year. Gave the rod to my wife, and she hooked one-- before she could get it on the reel, it burned her fingers... oops -- my bad. Fished a chartreuse sand eel pattern, but I suspect they weren't too picky. Note: Also heard from a friend that fish were up on the Marblehead side the afternoon high tide on Saturday.

The Merrimack River

Capt. Charlie Crue reports: