[juro]

Monomoy area on foot...

After a smokin' Monomoy area last weekend this weekend seemed a little off. There were some fish around, I saw half a dozen in the dim early morning light and pea soup fog, but they were far from being on any kind of rampage and the fog was so thick I would strip all the way to the nail knot before realizing where my fly was. In other words, sight fishing was a pipedream. Maybe three days of pea soup fog in the area had something to do with the slowdown. Bait was very scarce as well, what we saw in the SE region would qualify as fry (larvae even), with a few exceptions when a tern would pluck a fair sized sand eel. The water was cold as far in the bowl as we went, although we didn't go way up.

On the positive side, Chuck did hook a 12 pound blue and Dave Williams kicked things off quickly with a "just-under" striper on his 5th cast; Jim Doogue had a fish from both sides of South Beach, etc - but the overall consensus was that it was pretty dead this weekend so we cut our losses and some took the shuttle back as early as 10am.

Sat PM -

After some chores back at the cottage I met up with a couple of former co-workers to sight cast on the Brewster Flats. We found them within 15 minutes and set up on a drift that went two or three miles (maybe more) and saw fish grubbing sand eels the whole time with very few moments of idle time before seeing another pod. I got two in this years legal size but all were chunky and the best fight came from a sub-legal that ran like a banshee over and over at high speed.

Hit the outside again this morning (damn I wish I hit the bayside flats Fred!) and got bit off by a large blue on the backside and landed one nice fat sub-legal in Chatham and that was it. The tide didn't move until after 11am and although it looked real fishy some left before the current picked up to attend to duties and the last stragglers left by noon.

Overall assessment (from what I could gather) -

Monomoy area slow Sat AM (may have picked up on the afternoon flood), water cold, micro bait, pea soup and no sight fishing in the am to be had

Bayside PM flood - smokin'

Sunday - Chatham slow, water cold, micro bait

(From Fred's report I wish I hit the bayside shoreline)

 

[Bob Pink]

Needed to blast the cobwebs out of D-H this Saturday so I felt my first boat exploration of Chatham would be a great excuse. Ditto on the aforementioned observations, micro-sized bait (sandeel fry?) too small for even the terns to be interested washing in vast quantities over the outer bars between S.Beach and N.Monomoy. The Common flats looked barren up to the 2' depths that D-H can manage. A large group of very picky fish along the grass flats was not adverse to showing themselves but virtually impossible to catch.
The big suprise was that with water temps on the ocean side of S.Beach hitting the magic 55*f that it was D*E*A*D! I worked out front for over two hours in depths from 6' to 20' and did not take a single fish.

 

[striblue]

Hmmmmm. Both Pete and I struck out on south beach from 5 to about 9. Tom Dunlap was with us.. I had two hook ups , did the 30 foot release and the other was good size as she turned on the serface but broke free. Fishing was so slow that the hit surprise me and I did not set he hook. Met Juro at the point and we fished till 12 noon, with Pete leaving about 11. Juro's report about sums it up. Big tides next weekend anyway. Juro don't forget the "magnet" picture.

 

[FishHawk]

The micro bait was a factor earlier in the week. However, could it be the seals? I noticed a lot of seal activity and they seemed to drive the fish offshore.
FishHawk

 

[Hawkeye]

I fished the harbor entrance on the Hardings light side from about 10pm Sat. to 4am Sun with only a couple fish to show for it. I couldn't get out any further due to pea soup fog. All night I listened to what sounded like very large bass slurping down a midnight snack. I got all my fish and hits on a snake type fly until I discovered what they were eating and it looked like a pamet river special. Of course by that time the fish had stopped their slurping style feeding and had perhaps moved off. In any case I got no hits on the pamet. When it got light enough to add visual navigation to the gps I headed to the inside of Monomoy and saw not a fish and the same goes for the surf side. A lot of hard fishing for little return on the end of the line.

 

[Lefty]

Guys the spring run is over
It was fun while it lasted. Up north at PI I was casting to breaking schoolsters on Joppa flats fri from my ol green tin boat. Only thing they would touch...Rays flies! (or something similarly sparse).

Terry

 

[Fishinimpossible]

Hopped in my buddy's flats boat early Sat. AM. That fog just refused to burn off the water! By the time we could see a school, it was pretty much spooked. The fish we did see on the SW flats were huge. We managed a few bass and a couple blues, but they were fussy. We did drop the flyrods for a while, and jigged up some large fluke. In an hour we boated about 15 of them up to 24". I thought I saw Juro wading the west side. All in all, it was a solid day.

 

[juro]

Steve - thanks for the reassurance that they were there despite the lockjaw.

Those fluke sound great... I think I will recruit the kids to catch some doormats for my father in law, who has a restricted diet and fish is his saving grace - he loves it and he can eat it. Last time I brought some fluke fillet he talked about them for quite a while so I knew he enjoyed them.

Of course they are among my favorite eating fish too, and "purism" notwithstanding I'll temporarily put down the flyrod for a few fluke without hesitation. }>

 

[Lefty]

Juro,

Ever try Pollock? I swear the last one I caught (unintentionally) at Magnolia went 3 lbs. Almost big enough. I want to maybe filet one and try it. Maybe Meuniere style with ginger sauce....Or broiled with Pimentos and garlic butter crumbs.... ooooOOO baby I'm starving!

Terry

 

[Bill]

Why ditch the flyrod when going after fluke? Last summer I took several large fluke from a jetty in Falmouth using a sinking line and clousers. They didn't exactly fight like a big striper, but I didn't have to change rods.

 

[juro]

From what I gather most of the fish we have eaten as kids (fish sticks, frozen F&C, etc) is pollock. The only time I caught it and tried it myself was after a charter trip with co-workers out of Salisbury. Unfortunately I brought home three species - cod, haddock and pollock.

I filleted them all and put them in the fridge, cooking the haddock first... unbelievable! Then the cod... nothing like that in any supermaket! Then the pollock.... hmmm wonder if there is any haddock or cod left in the fridge? ;-)

It wasn't bad but I remember given three fresh samples which were which. Maybe I should have eaten them in the reverse order!

All that being said, I like fluke better than all three. Who wants to have a shore lunch day on South Cape?

And Bill - I'd be happy to give it a go as a purists' shore lunch, fly rods only!

Chances are good that someone will get a blue big enough for the olive oil and cajun spice treatment as well! Some may remember that from boneclave...