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Cape Cod &the Islands
August 18th, 2003 |
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| FishWire Coordinator: | Dave Churbuck |
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The tides are turning
Two weeks of slow reports and what is a poor FishWire correspondent to do? Make things up? No. That would be wrong. Truth and integrity are what we are all about here at Reel-Time, so I'll let the reports speak for themselves. This week I thought I'd talk about the early, early days of online fish reports. The reappearance of an old Reel-Timer in my email inbox has sparked this sentimental waxing, and has made me realize, with some nostalgia, the names that have cycled in and out of my online sphere over the past 15 years. I say "some" nostalgia as I never knew the real names of more than half of the people from the early days of online fishing. I definitely remember those who did use their real names, and the handles, or nicknames of many others. I would guess that the first organized online discussions of fishing happened inside of the technical community in the 70s and 80s via USENET -- the text-only threaded discussion system that covered everything from kayaks to kink. There was some chatter on the commercial online services such as The Source and CompuServe, but fishing discussions didn't get really rolling online until the late 80s on "alt.fishing", a USENET newsgroup that seemed to be dominated by steelhead fishermen in the Northwest such as Tom Gilg, an engineer with Hewlett Packard in Oregon. Almost all of the early posters on alt.fishing were engineers or geeks of one sort or another. There are archives of all this stuff. Go to Google Groups and check them out. The "alt" designation meant that the fishing discussions were not officially sanctioned by the powers-that-be, so in the early 1990s a petition to create an official newsgroup, "rec.outdoors.fishing" was circulated, submitted, and approved. But alt.fishing lived on, and in fact, continues to exist to this day. In the early days, it was remarkably civil. Very few, if any flame wars, and the discussions were very wide-ranging and mostly about tackle and technique. Personalities quickly emerged, along with specializations. I was, for example, the Cape Cod surfcasting guy. Tom Gilg was the steelhead guy. The newsgroups were followed by mailing lists. These were discussions that arrived in your inbox. One would subscribe by sending an email to a specific "subscription address" and then reply by sending to another address. The fly fishing list (or "listserv") out of the University of Kentucky was a very active, voluminous list, that was remarkably detailed, especially for fly tying and tackle, but which degenerated into "banter" as users argued about their college football teams or the qualities of one micro-brewery over another. Saltwater groups were slow to come along. For email, it was "salt-l", an email list set up by Ron Morgan in Texas (and which was eventually inherited by Reel-Time in 1997). Salt-L was a very good forum for a while, but it too degenerated into flames, mostly about catch-and-release ethics. The first web sites were the Virtual Fly Shop, started by two guys who were well-known on the University of Kentucky fly fishing email list, and of course, Reel-Time, which opened its doors in the spring of 1995. Next week I'll talk about the early days on the web. But if any of you veterans have any stories or reminiscences from the early, pre-web days, please send them along. Reel-Time News: Sales of the special edition Bonito t-shirt continue, but you people need to drag your butts into the store and buy stuff. Lots of stuff! Don't forget to send me your own reports, and until next week...
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Cape Cod Regions
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This is the transition week from the summer doldrums to the hot and heavy fall action. You can feel it in the air. Someone get the guy who phoned the Barnstable police about the dead baby "great white shark" an ID card so he can tell the difference between brown and white. Things are pretty quiet all over but bonito continue to tease with sporadic reports of their existence. |
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Capt. Bob Paccia at Shoreline Guide Service filed this report on Friday: "Didn’t know whether I should start out this week’s report with the good news or the bad news first. Hell, let’s be positive and go with the good news: ü The oppressive tropical fronts with their dangerous poor visibility, downpours, winds and lightning that have often kept us off the water, has been replaced with some welcomed dry stable weather for a change. It’s a wonderful change. ü Masses of baby bunker, juvenile alewives and blueback herring are leaving the protection of their nursery waters in the estuaries surrounding Buzzards Bay and are testing the warm waters along the edges of the Cape Cod Canal and the Bay itself. At this time of the year the glass-calm waters of early morning and dusk often reveal acres of these baby baitfish as they feed heavily on plankton near the surface. This gives the appearance of thousands of raindrops hitting on the calm surface. Often too, you’ll see these “raindrops” explode into the air as hungry bluefish and schoolie bass attack the baitfish from below. ü All of this new fresh bait being introduced into our waters will not go un-noticed and will certainly ring the dinner bell for hungry predatory fish that will start to prepare themselves for the upcoming fall migration. ü Good weather, plenty of bait in the bay and even the Red Sox have managed to come back from behind to win a few very important games…Life is good again! So, what’s the bad news? ü We’ve been getting calls confirming bonito sightings anywhere from Bird Island to Wings Neck to the Cape Cod Canal Railroad Bridge. Mate Diane and I have spent a good deal of time during the past several days trying to confirm these reports. We didn’t see any bonito. My guess is that what they saw and thought were bonito were, in fact, small one to five pound bluefish working the bait on the surface. To this date, we still have no sightings that we feel are credible. However, with all the bait currently in the Bay, it’s only a matter of time until they’ll show up. My only concern is that if the bonito get here too late, they will have to compete with the false albacore, which are more aggressive and often drive the bonito out of the area. It seems that each year our bonito season gets shorter and the false albacore season gets longer. Don’t get me wrong; these are both great game fish. It would just be great to have both species here for an extended period of time. Although the fishing was difficult during the past week because of the weather, we did have some good trips. One very rewarding trip was with charter, Dave Wheatley from Detroit, MI who was spending a few days playing his luck at the Foxwood Casino. He called to see if he could get a half-day trip fly-fishing for a striper. He told me that not only didn’t he know how to fly cast, but he had never done any fishing in his life, never been on a boat and never been in saltwater. He said that if I could fit him in he would drive the three hours from Foxwood and take his chances on the weather. We met the next morning at 5 am and by noontime he was comfortably casting over 60-feet and had caught more than thirty schoolies, five bluefish and one fat 30-inch keeper that he was going to proudly bring to his dad who now lived in Rhode Island. Not a bad trip for someone who had never held a fishing rod. Next year, I get the three day trip and Foxwood may get a half day !!!" Bret Bokelkamp out of Marion reports Spanish Mackerel have arrived: "Watching the water temps, the water in Buzzards Bay has continued to warm. It's 79-75 in the harbors with temps in the Bay proper in the upper 60's to 70. Water temps off shore, South of the Vineyard and Nantucket, have remained cool. Still in the 60's, while warmer water's @ 70 appear to be West of me, from Narragansett on west. This is possibly a reason we haven't had many more reports of Bonito in the South Cape and Vineyard Sound area. In past years I've caught my first Bonito in Mid to late July, with Albies in maybe 2 weeks later. Not this year. The waters in Buzzards Bay are warm enough, but not at the Islands or south. |
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Reel-Time Managing Editor Mark Cahill got out on the waters around the Elizabeths with our esteemed New Egnald forum moderator, Bob Parsons: Bob Parsons and I did the big tour of the sound yesterday, starting at Waquoit, where we quickly connected with some blues and a pair of bass. Spent a little time taking turns catching blues on a popper at Hedge Fence while power drifting. Then we headed off to the Vineyard in search of bonito which we've been expecting to show up for some time. Arrived over by one of the likely spots in Oak Bluffs to find a good bunch of boats huddled around. They'd been seeing fish, but apparently no one was able to connect. Did the tour down state beach, spotted several pods of bones, couldn't connect. Moved on to Tashmoo, where the bones were breaking, and I missed one almost at boatside. Headed to Lackeys were the blues were busting bait, but on the move. Before heading in we ran into a nice blitz of blues outside of Richardson's which made for great fun on my now mangled popper. A great day, and we can only expect the bonito action to improve over the next couple days as more fish move in. |
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Bill Downing says the Canal may be stirring: "Had a decent couple of hours on the last of the west in the wee hours this AM. 13 or 14 bass caught, mostly 20-26 inch cookie cutters, but a couple of low keepers as well. Nothing huge, but a welcome change from the recent abysmal reports. After sunup and the tide change, I saw some guys continuing to catch 'em (mostly schoolies) both down deep and on top. Some bass surfacing here and there at first light. All my night action was on jigs of various types and the fish didn't seem too picky. Would have done better had I not smoked my reel's anti-reverse . One other thing: saw lots of fish breaking at night, which I haven't seen in a number of weeks. Usually this signals the arrival of hordes of small bait (peanut bunker and such) that we and the bass all know and love. I couldn't tell what the bait was exactly though." |
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I've been fishing the triangle from Waquoit to Hyannisport and out as far as the Horseshoe this past week looking for bonito. Quick report: bluefish pretty much whenever and whereever you want them. I'm fishing epoxy Surf Candies on a 350 grain sinking line with a six-inch bite guard (the Orvis one's that can be quickly switched) and keeping the Bunnies in the box until I get a confirmed bonito sighting. None of which I can report this week, but the encouraging news below from Bob Parsons is an indication that they are on their way. Inside Cotuit Bay -- bait showers as the snapper blues rip through the shallows. Same in Osterville's West Bay, East Bay, and inside Popponesset. |
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Reel-Time's management -- administrator Mark Cahill and New England moderator Bob Parsons -- hit the Sound on Thursday: "Our illustrious webmaster Mark Cahill joined me for a little exploring on the vineyard sound. Coming out of Waquoit we encounter breaking fish to the left. A few quick casts and we each had a bluefish. Then on the other side of the channel more breaking fish so we putted over, fish were down but blind casting gave us each a schoolie striper. Time to head across the sound. The tide was such that the rips we crossed were just about slack so we continued over to Oak Bluff. About 20 boats circled up spook loudly of bonito in the area. We joined a line of boats that were drifting in front of the ferry dock. This gave us a shot or two at breaking fish but no hook ups. Apparently we were at that tail end of the action since the breaking fish were fewer and fewer and boats were going off. A trip over to state beach and after a short search we found more breaking bonito and had a few more shots at them. Back to OB, dead so we headed out to hedge to find rat bluefish that put up quite the fight in the strong current. Neat to see air borne bluefish attaching Mark's popper. From there we worked our way over to Tasmoo to find some more breaking bonito. Mark had one break on his fly but again no hook ups. Also had a school of blues show up which could have been mistaken for bonito but a few cleared to the water making it an easy id. Over to Lackeys and more bluefish,,,through Robinson's Hole and more...........yup you guessed it...bluefish. Through Wood's hole and plenty of birds working the strong rips but we were homeward bound. Bet the areas around Martha's Vineyard will be seeing some serious run and gunning this weekend." |
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Capt. Lynne Heyer at Cross Rip Outfitters reports bonito: "Thought I would give a quick report today.The Bones are back. Got a call from Jeff and he and The Moys are catching a couple on the bar. Good weather, Good Fishing. Capt.Shawn, mate Corey and client Carlos Ferrer had an awesome day offshore yesterday. They headed out at 3:30 am. Their catch consisted of small Bluefin Tuna , Skipjack Tuna and Mahi Mahi. I wish I was there. At least I can enjoy some nice fresh fish. Congrats on a great trip and Congrats to Carlos. " Friday Evening Update: "The Bonito Bar was going off this morning. Just got some great reports from Jared Tausig and Capt. Shawn. Multiple hookups and lots of fun." Bill Pew at Fisher's Tackle reports: "It has been okay fishing for the boats and for the beach fishermen at the Great Point. Larger boats going east are getting some small tuna, yellowfin and little bluefin and getting lots mahi-mahi. Pal of mine runs one of the boats and caught eight or so under a high flyer 15 miles out. The Billfish tourney was slow. Ten or 11 white marlin and one blue marlin were released. Also caught were tuna, mahi-mahi and a couple makos. "That’s about it. Hot and steamy." |
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Paul Cheever had some encouraging words from the creeks of East Sandwich: MNICC passed on this report of a trophy taken at Sandy Neck on bait: "Well the canal is as dead as it gets, 4+hours and not a touch. Live eels at the east end, the church, powerplant and nothing. I fished til the tide turned east and a good hour after that. NADA. HOWEVER, a 50lb Bass was weighted in at THE POWDWEHORN. The fish was caught somewhere on Sandy Neck EARLY Sat morning. the guy was driving a jeep and had a sticker so that narrows it down to about a mile stretch of beach.He caught it on chunk bait, I didn"t see the fish but it was about 48inches long. Water temps in the bay are very funny right now. I have marked places as high as 78inside the harbor and as cool as 60 on the flats early in the morning in the fog in 5 ft of water. Sandy Neck has pockets that stay cool especially at night.The water offshore is deep and holding some very nice fish. they like to run the beach from time to time. Guess this was the right time....." Keep those reports coming, |