Eastern Ma & New England Area Fishing Reports

[Meowmicks]

Took a scouting trip down to a couple places this evening...

Little Pond in Plymouth is still completely locked up.

Great Herring Pond in Plymouth was 3/4 open on on the North side, but the boat launch on the south end is still iced up.

 

Mashpee/Wakeby is OPEN!

 

Time to get my butt in gear and get the boat finished.

[DogBone_384]

5 minutes ago, Meowmicks said:

Mashpee/Wakeby is OPEN!

Saturday’s supposed to be WINDY from the SE. I’ve never done well there. 

[MassYak85]

This weekend I think should blow open most of the lakes in your guys neck of the woods. Central MA probably still has a couple more weeks. I'm getting the itch lol. I can feeeeeel it haha.

[Meowmicks]

Spent the day on Johns pond yesterday, the weather was just too nice to pass up.

Had to bust thru 1/4" of ice with the kayak to get to the open water, the rest of the pond was all open and the remaining ice melted by 2:00pm.

The wind was keeping me from looking for offshore spots for long so I spent most of the day in around 10'-15' and throwing both toward the bank and away to try and locate the bass.

 

Fortunately the skunk has been kicked! Caught 3 decent rainbows on a ned rig then at the end of the day got a White perch on a blade bait, 1st fish on a blade bait for me! Yo-yo retrive hopping it off the bottom.

Thanks for the tips guys.

[DogBone_384]

While the weather wasn't great today, I packed the waders and a couple rods and drove to Hedges to see if the ice was gone.  Yes, it's gone.

 

I waded to the NE corner where I rarely miss.  Nothing on a couple different jerk baits, nor a Damiki blade bait.  I caught two SMB and a fat YP on a watermelon/red flake Rage Menace on a 3/16 oz. head.  All three were roughly 1 1/4 - 1 1/2 pounds.  I'll take it for New England in late February.  I also caught 5 tennis balls that were VERY shallow, against the shoreline. There must be dog fish here !

 

Wind was roughly 15 mph from the SE, with plenty of rain.  Air temp was 40 degrees.  I didn't have any electronics, but wading along the shore, I'd say the water was cold.

 

It was late in the 9th inning, but I got my February fish to stay on track to catch a fish in open water every month of the year.

 

I'm sure gonna be back there tomorrow.

 

 

On 2/26/2021 at 8:45 AM, MassYak85 said:

I'm getting the itch lol.

If you feel like a long drive, I'll be at Hedges or Snake Pond tomorrow afternoon for sure.

[BigEyedF11sh]

31 minutes ago, DogBone_384 said:

If you feel like a long drive, I'll be at Hedges or Snake Pond tomorrow afternoon for sure.

Might see you down at hedges, I’ll be in a white Jetta and blue old town!

[DogBone_384]

18 minutes ago, BigEyedF11sh said:

I’ll be in a white Jetta and blue old town!

I drive an orange Tundra and old green CR-V and pedal a tan Lure 11.5.  Both have BR decals on their rear-ends.

 

I have some family duties in the AM and plan on an early afternoon launch.

[BigEyedF11sh]

Had a good day down at Hedges today. Got to meet @DogBone_384 and thank him personally for sharing his honey hole with us. Awesome to have a smallmouth fishery you can really break down in a day from a kayak.

 

Only got into 2 smallmouth but they were both quality healthy fish on a 1/5th oz hand tied bucktail jig. My first fish on a handmade lure and can confidently say I’m hooked.

 

Found a couple stacks of em in the Northwest corner in 12-15 feet of water.  Little footage I managed to grab of my first fish:

 

NSFW language cause I was so psyched to finally get into fish again lol

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMejgbcee/

[DogBone_384]

I launched at Hedges after lunch.  @BigEyedF11sh was already there and had couple catches.  I pedaled to the northeast corner where I caught yesterday's fish and in pretty short order caught a 1.5 pound SMB on a perch Vision 110 in roughly 5' of water.  I had one hit on a Yozuri flat crankbait and that was it.

 

Water temps were 40.x and air pressure was 30.3 with little wind.  

 

A decent way to finish February.  Bring on March!

[Mr. Aquarium]

I struggled today. Got a late start cuz I helped my buddy with some sheet rock this morning.  Had plans to head to the cape to try a few new ponds.  Went with plan b. Fished Plymouth.  Couldn’t find a pattern, fished a jig, finesse jig, few different swimbaits, a lipless and a few jerkbaits. Got a chunky fish just shy of 3lbs. 

[MassYak85]

Has anyone driven by Snipatuit or the Nip recently? Wondering if that area has open water yet.

[Meowmicks]

3 minutes ago, MassYak85 said:

Has anyone driven by Snipatuit or the Nip recently? Wondering if that area has open water yet.

Snipatuit has a bunch of water but wasnt 100% thawed yet. The wind today may help with that.

[superkamikazee]

Jealous of you eastern folks, still fully locked up out west. Hoping for some open water in 2 weeks or so in the pioneer valley at least. 

[MassYak85]

2 hours ago, superkamikazee said:

Jealous of you eastern folks, still fully locked up out west. Hoping for some open water in 2 weeks or so in the pioneer valley at least. 

Yea I'm hoping to get out this weekend without having to cross the canal.

[Mr. Aquarium]

Things just opened up!  You don’t have to cross the bridge 

[Meowmicks]

Explored Agawam on the kayak for 6 hours today, not a single bite. Not really sure how to fish this place.

Tried a bunch of stuff but never really felt confident about getting a bite, blind casting pretty much the whole day. ?‍♂️

 

 

[MassYak85]

20 minutes ago, Meowmicks said:

Explored Agawam on the kayak for 6 hours today, not a single bite. Not really sure how to fish this place.

Tried a bunch of stuff but never really felt confident about getting a bite, blind casting pretty much the whole day. ?‍♂️

 

 

Agawam Mill Pond? I plan to fish it more this year but haven't put much time in there yet. I think it's fairly shallow so I'd guess weedlines and subtle drops (like 4/5 feet into 7/8) would be the name of the game there. I heard the locals started a program a few years back to try and control the weeds but I'm not sure what effect it has had on the lake. 

[Meowmicks]

4 minutes ago, MassYak85 said:

Agawam Mill Pond? I plan to fish it more this year but haven't put much time in there yet. I think it's fairly shallow so I'd guess weedlines and subtle drops (like 4/5 feet into 7/8) would be the name of the game there. I heard the locals started a program a few years back to try and control the weeds but I'm not sure what effect it has had on the lake. 

Yup thats the one.

[Mr. Aquarium]

Went out shore fishin after work. Tried a few swimbaits, jerkbait, lipless crank and squarebill crank, nothin. They only wanted a weedless hudd. Had a few whacks,some good hard hits. 1 bass and 1 pickerel. 

[MassYak85]

1 hour ago, Mr. Aquarium said:

Went out shore fishin after work. Tried a few swimbaits, jerkbait, lipless crank and squarebill crank, nothin. They only wanted a weedless hudd. Had a few whacks,some good hard hits. 1 bass and 1 pickerel. 

I had my first "WACK" hit on a hudd in the fall. It startled me I was just creeping a 68 on the bottom and something just freight trained it into the bottom of the lake. I missed the hook set unfortunately. I know Matt Allen usually says the small fish hit harder on those baits but it still got me pumped up for the rest of the day. 

[Mr. Aquarium]

11 hours ago, MassYak85 said:

I had my first "WACK" hit on a hudd in the fall. It startled me I was just creeping a 68 on the bottom and something just freight trained it into the bottom of the lake. I missed the hook set unfortunately. I know Matt Allen usually says the small fish hit harder on those baits but it still got me pumped up for the rest of the day. 

Yep’ often times the giants will inhale so you just fish feel the lips on the line. Easy to notice when fishing topwater.  You’ll here the slurp and not smash. You know it’s a big fish. Your bait just suddenly disappears . 

[MassYak85]

On 3/4/2021 at 8:53 AM, Mr. Aquarium said:

Yep’ often times the giants will inhale so you just fish feel the lips on the line. Easy to notice when fishing topwater.  You’ll here the slurp and not smash. You know it’s a big fish. Your bait just suddenly disappears . 

Yea all my big slammer bites have been like that. It's one of the things that surprised me when I started fishing swimbaits. You're expecting these big fish to just crush these baits but it's usually a pretty subtle bite. I've been fishing in wind before and even though I was looking at the bait only knew I got bit once the rod loaded.

[Mr. Aquarium]

6 minutes ago, MassYak85 said:

Yea all my big slammer bites have been like that. It's one of the things that surprised me when I started fishing swimbaits. You're expecting these big fish to just crush these baits but it's usually a pretty subtle bite. I've been fishing in wind before and even though I was looking at the bait only knew I got bit once the rod loaded.

Yep. Awesome to watch a fish destroy it but those subtle bites get me going cuz I know it’s a good onr

[MassYak85]

You guys think the temps the tonight and tomorrow night will skim over the lakes in SE MA or are they already too warm to reverse course at this point?

[Styguy922]

16 minutes ago, MassYak85 said:

You guys think the temps the tonight and tomorrow night will skim over the lakes in SE MA or are they already too warm to reverse course at this point?

 

I doubt it.  At most there may be a couple spots where there's a light film but I also think with the wind it will be too turbulent to ice over.  Can't wait for next week's warm spell.  After that I think we are in the clear.....