[Eroach]

Hey everyone, I'm new to the Forum but glad to be a part. Met Juro last year on Plum Island, showed me the "Juro Sand Eel" (my coining), caught some surprising fish on a Teeny 350 with his technique.

I live in Seabrook, NH -- one mile from the Hampton Estuary. I flyfish MA (Cape Ann-north), all the whopping 18 miles of costal NH, and (mostly) the tidal rivers of southern ME hard throughout the summer.

I am trying to find out if there are any NH or ME Forum members out there to share information with. It seems many of you are Boston and south.

 

[doogue]

Eroach,

Mike Doogue here. I live in Concord, NH (pretty seriously landlocked) but I am always game for a trip to the North Shore, to the Portsmouth area or to Southern Maine. I often use my brother's house as a crash pad (he lives South of Boston) on my way to the Cape for weekend fishing excursions. However, this year I plan to explore more northerly waters when the stripers make the turn at Chatham and head for Maine. No sense driving to the Cape all the time when the stripers are closer to home.

E-mail me at [email protected]mouth.org and we can chat about our preferred striper haunts. I am also looking to make a plethora of post or pre-work Plum Island/Joppa runs this May and June. It takes me about 1.25 hours to get to Joppa so the trip isn't too bad. It is also a plus that on weekends I can lure my fiancee to Newburyport and then convince her to head out and take a few casts with me.

It would be great to meet up with you some time and cast a few. Let me know if you have any interest.

Take care,

Mike

 

[juro]

Although it's no secret that I love the Cape, the North shore is an hour closer to drive for me and I know it pretty well. Count me in on the N/S sorties.

I worked at BIW for several months and hit Popham Beach, Reid State Park, etc. Had great luck at Popham and saw some hellacious blitz activity at Reid that I could not reach from shore. Some of the inlets around Bailey's and Orr's had good surges of fish.

I am a big fan of the spring smallmouth fishery in NH and Maine and will not let that get past me again this year. I fished Winni many years before moving to the northwest and know some hotspots off the beaten path.

I also fished a bunch of streams in NH northwest of Conway - packed with trout and not hard to find naturally spawning brookies in the unstocked streams.

I also typically buy brood stock tags and Spey cast on the Upper Merrimac at it's headwaters with Jay and Diane Clancy each year. I like to stop by and say hello to John Greenwood who runs the NH anadromous program. They hold a salmon FF open house event every spring.

Last but not least I like to fish Hampton for a change of pace from PI because the water is so much crisper and I like the excuse to put a couple of hefferweissen ales on ice and have steamers at Brown's or Markeys (forget the name across the street) and feed french fries to the tame cow stripers off the deck.

Biologists tell me that the huge bass are up in the Piscataqua. Any truth to that rumor?

 

[fliboy]

Eroach,

Name is Dave Pritchard and I live in southern NH. Moved to NH four years ago from Central NY where I was 15 minutes from West Canada Creek - a beautiful, productive trout stream. I fished some streams in southern NH but wasn't happy with what fish I did hook up with (Juro we gotta talk - naturally spawning brookies in NH - I may have not switched to Striper fishing if I ran into some of them). Turned to flyfishing Stripers due to my bad experiences attempting to fish for trout.

I fish mostly Plum Island area, but have poked around the Hampton Beach area some. Did some fishing around Portsmouth also. If your up for exploring, I'm up for that. I try to fish at least one to two mornings, hitting it before work, having a nice breakfast at Annie's Bakery in Newburyport (you gotta try their French Toast on Thick Cinnamon Raisin bread - what seems like almost a whole loaf), and then driving up to Nashua after the traffic dies down.

I have not ventured to Maine, but again am open to exploring up that way.

E-mail is: [email protected]

TL,

Dave

 

[Mattb]

Eroach,

I live in Concord NH right up the road from Mike Doogue. Last summer was my first down this way, so I'm still learning my way around the NH & North Shore waters, but I grew up in Southern Maine and went to college on the Kennebec, so i know my way around Maine's waters pretty well.

I have a very flexible work schedule, so I'd also be interested in any mid-week trips, as well as weekend excursions.

-Matt

 

[DFix]

Dave Fix - North Shore roamer, and there are many others near you, in Salisbury, Plaistow and Salem NH, all over the map. I'm sure Tewksbury and Westford weigh in along with Newburyport, Rye - gee, now I'm bouncing all over the map. I'm certainly game for the Seabrook/Hampton area - Dougie, JimC, Grego, Ssully, PaulH - let's let this guy know we're here

 

[Norm M]

Names Norm Mega I live in Newburyport and have a cottage up on Suncook lake in Barnstead, NH. My SWFF is mostly Plum Island and the NH coast and estuaries but I occasionally stray down to Cape Ann or up to southern Maine. I'm out about 75 times a season usually before sunrise mid week. As most of you guys witnessed, last years fall run in NH was fantastic. There were some huge fish blitzing baby bunker the whole month of September, even picked up a 35lber on a juvie fly off North Beach. Hope NH & MA dropping to 28" doesn't drastically reduce the number of large fish available. I try to get a PI or NH report out at least a couple times a week on the various boards and never mind giving specifics by e-mail. I'm the nut who's always in shorts(long story) no matter what season, usually drive a white durango. Stop and swap info if you see me.

Norm

 

[grego]

Hi, I'm GregO.

I grew up on the Cape & fish down there a lot. However, I live in Tewksbury, so I do Some N. Shore fishing. Last year, late in the season, there was a very good N. Shore Striper Run. I began to make a conserted effort to start learning the N. Shore better (mainly Shore Access for "quickie" trips). As DFix said there are several guys who fish up that way; Norm is probably the Most Committed (or should be committed). The first things that I learned is that there is A Lot of CoastLine between Boston & PI; the second thing I learned is that Shore Access Can Be A Problem, but there are spots.

One thing I would reccommend is to check the Archieves from last fall; do a search on Magnolia, Manchester, Marblehead, etc. Things won't be picking up that way for 4-5 weeks, but now is nor a bad time to do some Scouting. One problem with the N. Shore is that the arrival of the fish is close to Tourist Season, so where you may get access Now, you may get kicked out of in June. But then things ease back up in the Fall.

See you on the water.

 

[Eroach]

Juro -- No personal experience with cows in the Piscataqua watershed. Lots of current, lots of glacial structure and an increasing biomass of larger forage fish equal quality cow feeding stations. Boat traffic and current speed discourage flyrod usage however. There are acres of mud flats to explore in Great Bay however; quality fishing from a skiff.

A friend of a friend of mine is a marine biologist (we all know one, don't we?) He is the director of the American Shad "restoration" program which -- along with the majority of the Gulf of Maine -- is showing success. Herring runs have been more productive (who could deny this who fished the immature herring exodus on the NH coast surrounding the Piscataqua? Great fishing in September.)

I will keep you informed of quality fish...If I can catch any.

 

[Eroach]

Norm -- I'll be damned if I wasn't there last September when you hauled that beautiful 42"+ striper out of the North Hampton pocket. Biggest striper I ever saw taken on a fly. I was the big guy who walked over to watch you maneuver that cow away from the mooring buoys in the cove. Great fun.

I wasn't sure what was going to happen: Would you lose the fish to the buoys? Would you break your rod with the effort? Would you die of hypothermia first? It was pretty exciting.

 

[ssully]

Eroach (04-23-2001 05:08 p.m.):
Hey everyone, I'm new to the Forum but glad to be a part. Met Juro last year on Plum Island, showed me the "Juro Sand Eel" (my coining), caught some surprising fish on a Teeny 350 with his technique.

I live in Seabrook, NH -- one mile from the Hampton Estuary. I flyfish MA (Cape Ann-north), all the whopping 18 miles of costal NH, and (mostly) the tidal rivers of southern ME hard throughout the summer.

I am trying to find out if there are any NH or ME Forum members out there to share information with. It seems many of you are Boston and south.

Where is PI?

 

[doug]

eroach,
I'm the guy in Salisbury that Dfix is referring to....#[email protected]*!
Spend most of my time in the P.I., Merrimack River, Joppa area. Occassionally try the rocks in Rye.
Post the majority of my reports on another board. why? Ummmm....don't know.
By the way...a bunch of us are getting together this Sunday at 4:00 p.m. in Newburyport for a meeting of the Joppa Flats Fly Tying Club. C'mon down. Tie a few flies, swap stories, etc.
DB

 

[Norm M]

Hey Eroach,

I remember meeting up with you a couple times in the Hampton/Rye stretch. That was a great month of fishing. The same type of action continued into October a little farther south on the Cape Ann/Manchester shore front. I met up with a few other guys from this board Nick, GregO & Terry. One morning Nick and I watched Larry Baker haul in a 25-30lber on a 7 wt. Nick posted some of the pictures in Dec. I plan on hitting the Hampton/Rye rocks more often this year. Look forward to meeting up again this coming season.

Norm

 

[Eddie]

I moved from SanFrancisco to Kittery a month ago. Huge Bass! How far is the Piscatiqua from here?

 

[Chris]

I've been fishing the Kennebec for years and we do real well from around 3rd week of May though early October. Last year at Waterville/ Winslow the new 1st impoundment was outrageous. I caught in Augusta stripers, browns, Atlantic salmon, smallies, and rainbows. Also Shawmut dam in Fairfield has some great trout water. wide, wadable and fishy.
Chris Delisle

 

[Eroach]

Hey Doug, thanks for the invite. Where in Newburyport do you meet? Are there dues involved? I am your typical broke flyfisherman...my reel purrs better than my car.

I am interested in meeting local tyers to share patterns and ideas.

 

[Eroach]

Eddie -- Check that map...you're a stone's throw from one the best areas in New England: The Piscataqua River, Great Bay, and its tributaries. Kittery borders the Piscataqua. We should do some exploring this year.

 

[juro]

Eddie -

Congrats on your cross-country move! Look forward to a great season of FF this year.

Juro

 

[doug]

Eroach,
We are meeting at the Starboard Galley on Water St. in Newburyport at 4:00 p.m.
No dues...we are very informal. I'll contact you via private email.
Doug B.