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6/8 Monomoy Island, Cape Cod, Flats, Fly, Wade, Sight Fishing

3K views 0 replies 1 participant last post by  RandyJones 
#1 ·
6/8 Monomoy Island, Cape Cod, Flats, Fly, Wade, Sight Fishing


6/1
Flats loaded! -Perfect Conditions for sight fishing!

6/2
Flats loaded, 100's upon 100's if you were in the right place. All sight fishing. Monomoy Is LOADED with fresh and aggressive fish! They were coming by us in waves of 20-50-100 at a time for 2 hours! Perfect sight-fishing conditions.

6/3
High winds and dirty water made sight fishing nearly impossible. Mostly blind casting and dredging channels, rips with heavy lines. Did o.k. for such a windy day.

6/4
Saw fish all day until the high. Good #'s! Not as many as 2 days ago, but a steady flow of 3-15 per school. Ate lunch in waist deep water so we would not miss anything. Lunches were inhaled. It does not get much better!

6/6-7
Canceled due to weather. Thank god, finally a day off to do my laundry. I was getting pretty tired of turning my underwear inside out!

6/8
Walked 2 miles out and found the creeks loaded on the drop. You could pick out the fish you wanted to catch. Sight fished all day. If water was to deep, you only had to look for the flashes. They were on fire! It was too easy so I left.

Please keep in mind that some of these days were perfect flats conditions. Sun, lil wind, incoming tide, no one around. This weekend we have opposite tides. I tend to see less on these tides. Certain areas are better than others on the drop. Having an intimate knowledge of structure, currents, transitional areas, feeding areas are imperative to fishing locations while at there optimum around Monomoy successfully. (In my opinion.)


Wish you were here:
The biggest problem with fishing at this time of the year is how hard these fish are fighting. The schoolies are hitting and fighting as hard as the keepers! It is almost too much work, to call this a sport! Ha.


Increase your catch rate in deep water:
A lot of the time, bait is on the bottom near structure (Rocks, sandbars, eel grass, lobster traps) to blend in and find protection. Major portions of predator fish are also there to feed. So by getting your line down to the bottom, you'll present your fly to the majority of fish. The way to achieve this is to cast and count to 15. Cast and count to 20. Continue to count longer and longer until you pull back eelgrass or you feel your fly being pulled through the sand. Now I'll cast and count 3-5sec. LESS there by bringing my fly just above the bottom. This technique will catch you 100 more fish then simply casting into deep water and retrieving right away. Having the correct line is imperative to put you in the ball game. Over the last 10 years I have used one line 97% of the time when fishing deep or fast moving water. It handles itself well in the wind and shoots from here to England (and back) Its an Orvis 300 grain depth charge fly line.


Sight Fishing around visible structure:
Having studied and watched bass set-up around structure (eelgrass, rocks, sandbars). I've noticed they'll wait to ambush the bait as it searches for cover or is swept along in the current. The times I've been able to see this, I've cast my fly just above the fish and stripped it or swung it towards them. The bass have always taken it with pleasure! Almost as good as casting a dry to a rising trout!


Randy,
Do we take this literally? You bring a stepladder and stand on it? Is that how you're able to have such good estimates of the size and population of schools?


Yup, anytime your higher off the water, you can increase the size of your visual cone. You see stuff that would surprise you. It's like standing on the bow of a flats boat. Ill see 3 times the # of fish as the person standing next to me on the sand. I'll see them coming much sooner. Study of baitfish, best retrieval tactics, transitional fish and relationship to structure. Tidal flow, length of leaders, mono or fluorocarbon. It also allows my clients more time to present the fly. These are just a few of the advantages. Sometime this summer Ill be putting out a story on it and all its additional advantages.



We should all try to remember that we are stewards of our environment. If it were not for conservative minded people 20 years ago, we would not be enjoying the fruits of there labor today. Please remember that a fish is to valuable a resource to only be caught once (Lee Wolf).

THANKS!


Randy Jones
 
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