Cape Cod and the Islands
Region

September 14, 2007

Buzzards Bay

Joe LeClair of North Eastern Anglers reports:

Fly fishing here in the Cape Cod & Islands Region is absolutely nuts right now. With three very good options for fly fisherman they can now choose to go for Striped Bass up to 40 lbs. False Albacore (where we have now had several 20 albie days) and school Bluefin Tuna averaging around 80 lbs. Over the last 10 years I have been keeping my Glacier Bay Catamaran on a trailer as well as on a mooring from time to time. This has allowed me to target the different species at this time of year out of three or four different launching areas. It is this flexablility that has also helped me tremendously when the ever changing weather of
New England makes fishing in one area difficult.

After spending time in the last two weeks fishing with several different people from up and down the east coast including Virginia, Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Conneticut, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire there is one common theme in what everyone has told me. They all think the fishing here in the Cape Cod & Islands Region is by far the best saltwater fly fishing they have seen.

This week I started preparing for my return to Southwest Florida in early November. As it stands right now I will be returning to fish for Tarpon, Snook, and Redfish in the first week of November this year. I am very excited to get back to the Silver King, especially after the fishing we experienced last year in November in the Everglades. It will be a long trip down with the Action Craft 1890 and another years worth of stuff, but the time is quickly approaching.

Falmouth & the Elizabeths

The fishing through the Vineyard sound remains strong with bonito and albacore popping up here are there pretty regularly.  Try first light, and visit the pond openings on the Cape side.  There are some nice reports of bass being caught as well, and this activity will continue to pick up.  For now, low light will still produce the best results in the passes around the Elizabeths for fly rodders. 

The South Side

OK, this information may be two weeks old, but it was such a great report from Tyler Wick, with such great pictures, that I had to include it. Unbelievable! My old stomping grounds, Cotuit, where co-founder David Churbuck (he sent this in) and I met. Tyler got world class fly fishing, and FAC conditions.

Tyler reported:

...I went out with a guide in late August and we were fishing between Poppy and the C buoy, no more than 1/2 mile off Sampsons. Total tally: 13 bones on the fly, 3 on spin, 2 albies on fly and as many blues as I could stand. Probably a day that will not be repeated in my lifetime.

 

 

 

Martha's Vineyard

Captain Phil Cronin of Capawock Charters of Martha's Vineyard reports:

Martha's Vineyard Fishing Report September 5 through September 12, 2007: The Martha's Vineyard Striped Bass & Bluefish Derby is in full swing and catching that winning bass, bluefish, false albacore or Atlantic bonito is on the minds of each of the 3,000 competitors. The entire island is in fishing mode and all talk is about what, where, how, and what time can I bag the big one. Rod racks are fully loaded, boats leave the dock at sunup, kids are bringing their school books to the beach; its derby time on Martha’s Vineyard!

During the derby, lips become sealed when it comes to sharing a lot of information. This year however there are fewer secrets; fewer lulls in the conversations. This year the fish are everywhere with an over abundance of albies and late leaving bones. Bluefish are frequent visitors to the beach and easily targeted on the shoals. Weighable bass are the tricky ones with most being caught in the waters off Gay Head, Wasque shoals or the rocky coastline of the Elizabeth Islands. The boat guys are in fishing nirvana with enough schools of fish to keep each boat spread apart and out of each other’s way. The beach guys are having more trouble locating sizable fish but there are enough to keep them interested and in active pursuit. It’s a great derby so far and sings are positive that as the water begins to cool the fish are going to get even friendlier.

For me this past week has been primarily targeting albies and bones with both fly and light spinning gear. We are definitely in the hunt and scoring regularly. The albies are so thick that this is the first time I can remember that throwing a jumping minnow, popper fly, or other top water plug will get an albie hook-up. One thing I do notice is that the bonitos are getting smaller as the big ones have moved out for the time being. Weighing in any minimum size bone at this time is important if you hope to achieve the slam during the derby.

One last note for now: derby time on the Vineyard brings out the best fishermen (male and female) in the world. It is a great time to learn new techniques and skills. Watching some of the fly fishers throw their line; the surfcasters hurl their lures; and the boat guys approach a breaking school can be a wonderful opportunity to learn. I’ve had the fishing bug for pretty much my entire life and through the years I’ve picked up a lot of tips from others but the one time I really look forward to learning new things is during the derby. Learn from others because regardless what you think, you don’t know it all.

Get out there and “catch ‘em up”.

Nantucket

Captain Lynne Heyer of Cross Rip Outfitters reports:

WOW!! The fever is spreading. Just got word Capt. Hal landed 3 Albies and Capt. Jeff landed 4 Albies 2 Bonito and a bunch of Blues this morning. I am as you probably guessed standing in the store looking out at a gorgeous day wishing I was fishin'. I will be out tomorrow so I hope this weather and the fishing holds. I am also getting reports of Albies at Great Point and some still along the South Shore. Also with the cool nights the Striper bight has been getting better. My Mom landed a 36.5 incher in the Slam Tournament on Tuesday.

Speaking of the Nantucket Slam to benefit Cystic Fibrosis. In short it was great. Good fishing, Made new Friends( Jim, Jim, Danny and Rob) and the weather for the most was descent. Best thing we are helping to Catch the Cure for CF. I think everyone who entered the Slam this year caught something. There were more than 300 fish caught and released. I think it was one of the best years so far. I know I had a great time. We caught some great fish. Philly my mom caught a bunch of Albies but her crowning glory was her 36.5 inch Bass. Kara Rogers caught her first Albie ever and Steve Rogers won the High Fly Category for the Tournament. Not to Shabby for us on Flyaway, maybe I need to re-name the boat Lady Luck. It was a blast and a Special Thank You for all who participated, folks who donated their boats and time and everyone else who has become part of this great event. Let's hope next year wil! l be even better.

Cross Rip Outfitters
http://www.crossrip.com

Capt. Bill Toelstedt of Nantucket Outfitters reports:

False Albacore seem to be the hot ticket right now ...here on Nantucket. The past several days in particular have produced better numbers of albacore doing there thing off the west end of the island. Small metals can account for the best bite although this morning with the wind blowing 25+ it was near impossible to throw the smaller jigs. As if albies were not difficult enough... large amounts of weeds have invaded the area in Madaket and it looks like we may even get the typical "fall" brown water after this latest big blow! But the fish are there and showing themselves...

The bonito are getting scarce but if you put in the effort there are still a few to be caught!
As far as bass... we are seeing the bite slowly return for fall....with the bigger fish bieng caught down deep on wire line in the usual spots.

Tuna are still hot off the east end... last thursday fishing with Capt. Shawn Bristow and his crew we landed 12 fish from 45" -55". Hopefully the weather will allow us another shot in the coming days...
Capt. Bill Toelstedt
Nantucket Outfitters, LLC

Chatham, Monomoy and the Outer Beaches

Jeff Smith of Finaddiction Charters reports:

Hi Thorne...
 
Here's a report..
 
While the albie and bonito bite has been in full swing, we have been north throwing feathers at their leviathan cousins with some good success.  The peanut bunker showed up heavy the last week and the bluefin are on them hard.  We have seen some halfbeaks as well and sandeels are in the mix. 
Small olive and white and blue and white flies with some angel hair thrown in are producing.  These are bruiser fish!  Leave your 12wts at home....We blew up a 14 wt the other day and I have had two other friends blow up 15wts on these fish....Incredible catches on the flyrod in the deep water we are fishing.....
HOPE IT LASTS!!
 
Captain Jeff Smith
www.finaddiction.com
 

Last weekend marked an incredible influx of bonito and false albacore at the tip of monomoy.  The entire tide was filled with shools both east and west, feeding in the current, in the slick in the rips.  I had DOZENS of quality shots into happy fish, with spinning re-inforcement over the top and on long shots.

NADA.

I can't begin to describe the elation I felt when I saw the finny fish -- RARE visitors to Chatham really -- and my frustration when I got utterly BLANKED for the day.  Unbelievable.  Plus I was taking obscene albie phone calls from Rhode Island, hearing about suicidal albies.

North Side

Terry Nugent of RipTide Charters reports:

With all the new boat stuff going on I kind of dropped the ball writing my reports. So this is the last 4 days in review. I will be back up to speed and I will get my reports out in a more timely manner from here on out.

9/8
This was going to be the first REAL charter on my new boat. I had to cancel several offshore trips due to weather. I even called one after two hours due to 20-30kt SW winds in Buzzards Bay. I was hoping this was going to be different. I had already taken the curse off the boat on my own just laying around in Buzzards Bay learning the boat and the electronics. A few albies and a few bluefish in just a couple hours of messing around was all I had landed on the new ride.

I was hoping Jacob and his Dad would take the customer curse off the boat for me today. They are regular sports and always bring the mojo with them. Unfortunalty today they brought the wind too. I was begining to think the big boat came with 20kt+ winds as an option. With the forcast just horrible we ran out into Buzzards Bay and before we even left the canal we found breaking albies in the whitecaps. Jacob was on his game as usual and in 2-3 casts he hooked and landed a nice 7-8# albie. They took some pics and released the fish to comtinue what looked to be a promising day.

We ran around the bay in 3-5's with the occasional BIG wave thrown in. They couldn't get much over 6' since the wind kept blowing the tops off them with gusts near 30kts. The big boat performed well in the slop, but you just can't be dry in these conditions in a CC.

The guys hooked several more fish, but we were unable to get them into the boat. There were lots of fish around, but just moving around from pod to pod was a chore in the surf like conditions we had.

Finally after around 7 hours we pulled the plug as the wind kept building and the seas got basicly unfishable.

Final tally one albie under attrocious conditions, but the customer curse was off the new ride. Lure of choice, Rapala X-Rap.

9/9
With the weather forcast still looking grim my sport for 9/9 opted to exersize his right to a reschedule. I decided to brave the forecast and do some tuna recon. I grabbed Chris Kirby (up from MD) and Mike C to help me look around CC Bay and beyond. WE ran out of Plymouth and found fish here and there, but after running a LONG way we found LOTS of fish. They were super picky and super spooky while smashing on dime size Pnuts. We managed a ton of casts into the fish, but one broken off fish was all we could muster. Seas were in the 2-4' range with ocean swells making things a bit larger yet. My sport made the right call bumping this date back.

Final tally ZIPPO! Curse off the boat.....Now I'm not so sure!

9/10
A day for the ages! I had Chris Kirby and Shaun Ruge on the boat for todays trip. Today would prove to be the most impressive surface display I tuna I've EVER seen. In terms of amount, aggression, durration and size of fish today had it all.

We ran out of Plymouth around 0630 and ran towards yesterdays fish. We had some new ideas and we were hoping to get a few of the fish to bite. We found fish quickly and things just built to a peak around mid day. By mid afternoon, we had dozens of acre to 2 acre schools of fish going insane in every direction. As far as you could look to the horizon you could just keep seeing fish tearing the water white. While still boat shy and selective, we managed to land 2 and a half (see video). 
We hooked several more that were either broken off or had hooks pull.

The show was so impressive Ruge filmed for nearly an hour rather than fish.
Just to have proof of what we were seeing. There were fish from 30# to 500+ crashing everywhere. Giants mixed with rats just feeding like it was their last day.

Capt. Mike Mathews of Offshore Angler Charters reports:

We have been battling High winds and lots of Top-water Tuna all week. You gotta love September when Tuna are crushing Peanut Bunker on top. The Ocean Lures Peanut Bunker Plug can't be beat.....Maybe beat up (see pic)... but not beat. I like it rigged with the a single hook option. New fish haved moved in. We have got them from mid 30"'s to 49". We have lots of great dates available....Even this Sunday!!