Striper fishing picks up!

five stripers

After several really slow weeks, the striper fishing seems to be picking up, especially in theInner Harbor. This is what other anglers have been telling me and it seems to be so from my ownexperience today.

This evening (starting around 6 pm) I went out for a few hours to fish some of the Inner Harbor water that I hadn’t fished much recently. The wind was way down and the surface as calm as could be. Ideal for fishing a Gurglerand that is what I tied on and stayed with until it got dark.

The tide was relatively high (but soon to drop) and I fished fairly close to shore, choosing places where the wading was pleasant and where there was some structure or eel grass close in. My first stop was Donovan Beach in Winthrop, where I picked up four stripers, all between 24″ and 26″. Next stop was around the corner in Belle Isle Creek, where I picked up some more. Then, just to sample a few different places, it was on to Bayswater Road (near Strawberry Fields) in East Boston, where I picked up five more, all about the same size–24″-26″. I quit around dark, when the bugs began to “bug” me. All in all it was great fishing for a few hours. And I can’t help but think that it’s going to get better and better now that the weather seems to be settling down.

Striper fishing report 5/13-5/15

mad_hatter.jpgThe striper fishing along the shores of the inner harbor in Winthrop has slowed down a bit over the past few days, probably because of the offshore storms, which have really roiled up the water in some places and have made the outside shore relatively unfishable unless you can cast a flyrod
while riding a surfboard.

I fished a few hours each day and each day I caught fish, but they were widely spaced, one every twenty minutes or so. There was one stretch when I went almost an hour without a hit, this in an area that had been producing well on this stage of the tide only a few days before. I’ve had some surface action with a Gurgler but it’s been very spotty; the most consistent producer has been a chartreuse and white BeastMaster, which is very visible in the murky water. I think, though, that once the weather settles a bit, the fishing will certainly pick up. Looking at my records from last year, the fishing didn’t become consistently good until May 20th; maybe it’ll be the same this year. One thing’s for sure; the water temperature must rise by a few degrees before things really turn on. The temperature’s been up and down this past week but for the most part it’s averaged a chilly 50 degrees in most of the places I’ve fished. Brrrr!

Stripers and largemouths

The Stripers are here!

stripedbassgov.jpg

Stripers have been appearing in good numbers (and sizes) all up and down the northeast coast for several days now along with good numbers of baitfish: herring and silversides for the most part.

It seems like you can almost predict the date: May 8. Depending on weather of course. My logs from the past ten years show that one or two days before and after May 8 you can expect the stripers to be in the warmer parts of the harbor and in most of the estuaries. So get out your gear and head to your favorite striper spot and expect some good action, especially around the lower stages of the tide. If you have only six hours to fish and are wading, try to be on the water three hours into the drop until about three hours after the rise. You can, of course, find good fishing at other times but the fish are more concentrated when the water is lower–and of course it’s easier to access most fishable spots at this time.

I’ve only been out twice in the past few days (the weather hasn’t been all that cooperative; wind, cold, rain, etc. but the two times I’ve been out I’ve been successful. And thrilled to bits to catch the first (for me) stripers of the season.

Here’s a brief rundown of the past few days, my life in capsule form, so to speak.

Saturday, May 10

I had to cancel my first Striper Strategies class of the season because of a predicted storm (which never came, by the way; however it WAS cold and windy) and I stayed in to tie flies and catch up on orders and watch the weather forecasts, hoping that the next day would be warm enough to fish. I was impatient to get back on the water, especially since the night before I had done well fishing for stripers “under the lights”.

Sunday May 11 warmed up more than expected and turned out to be a really interesting day, actually a great day for fishing–at least until the wind picked up. I started fishing a little later than planned (couldn’t get up early enough to fish the dropping tide) and arrived at one of my favorite spots in the inner harbor about half and hour into the rise. It was my first visit of the season and for the first half hour I didn’t get a hit. It wasn’t until about an hour into the rise that the fish started showing up. The water was exceptionally clear considering how roiled up the outside water was and the fly I was fishing–a chartreuse/white BeastMaster–almost glowed beneath the surface. Most of the fish hit close to the surface, within a foot or two, and I was able to see almost every take. The fishing, to be honest, wasn’t fast, one fish about every fifteen casts, but what a thrill! The smallest was about 21″ and the largest 32,” a real beauty! I caught seven in all–this in about an hour and a half. I would have fished longer but the wind was picking up and my hands were getting cold; my shoulder was beginning to bother me as well. Not only that but I had a plan to fish for largemouth bass later in the afternoon and I wanted to get home and take a nap so that I wasn’t completely exhausted for the evening fishing.

Later in the afternoon, after my nap, my friend Dale Linder came by and we headed up to Putnamville Reservoir in Danvers/Topsfield. I hadn’t been there in fifty years and was looking forward to fishing for bass with a 5 weight rod. If you read my last blog entry you might remember that I’ve been looking over some of my log notes from fifty years ago. It was while doing this that I remembered Putnamville Reservoir and decided to revisit it, just for the fun of it–and maybe for the nostalgic element as well.

The fishing was about as good as I could have expected with the temperature in the low 50’s and the water colder than that. Wandering the shore line, I picked up bass wherever I found structure close to shore. They were all largemouth bass–though there are smallies here as well–and all eagerly hit the small Bass Gurgler I was fishing. None was large–the largest about a pound–but all were fun. Caught four bluegills and a pickerel as well. Dale was fishing a streamer and caught many more pickerel than bass. We didn’t have a lot of time to fish, a few hours, and it took a bit of hiking and wandering through the woods to discover some of the best places but in that short time I decided that it was a place I’d love to explore further, but I think I’ll wait until the water warms up a bit before heading up there again.

All in all it was a wonderful day of fishing. Stripers and largemouth bass. Who could ask for anything more? Well, maybe a trout or two thrown into the mix. But that’ll have to wait for another day.

Striper Strategies

strategiescover5.jpgIn between tying flies and filling orders this past month I’ve been busily working on revising and rewriting Striper Strategies, which has been out of print now for almost a year. It’s been over ten years since the first printing and, judging from many readers’ requests, it’s time to bring it back.

Although the first edition was a fairly amateurish effort as far as production values go–with the pages folded and stapled together and somewhat murky photographs–it received a lot of good reviews from the flyfishing press and from readers. This time around I’m working hard to make it an even better book, with the added advantage of being ten years farther along on the road to understanding stripers. I’ve been re-writing much of it, including more (and better) photos as well as an expanded section on fly design and fly choices–and other topics. And no longer will it be stapled and folded and put together with glue and paste but will be paper-bound with an attractive color cover–maybe the same one as the old but this time in color (people seem to love that photo of me on my giraffed). I’m hoping to have the book ready in time for the coming season. Stay tuned.