Eastern Ma & New England Area Fishing Reports

[LadiMopar]

44 minutes ago, MassYak85 said:

Fished Whitehall today 6am to 4pm for my first outing in MA this year. All I can say is the pickerel must have had a good spawn a couple years ago because little 10-12 inch fingerlings were all I could catch. Slooooooooooow day. Never did try fishing the really deep part but gave the deeper weed edges on the steeper shores plenty of time with nothing to show for it. Fished everything from swimjigs, big worms to MS Slammers. Pickerel seemed to prefer a keitech on an owner flashy swimmer. You know it's a bad day when eve the pickerel are finicky. I messed up what was probably my one chance at a bass on a hookset on a 10" worm. My drag was too light so the hook didn't penetrate and it spit it immediately. Oh well though. It was also VERY hot, I thought I left this kind of heat down in Virginia lol. Hopefully the fish are in a bit better mood after a few days of this where they can get used to it. 

 

Welcome back to Bassachusetts! But you could have left this triple H weather down in VA.

I'll help pay the postage if you send it back!!!!

[Quarry Man]

I will be in MA for most of next week. Planning on doing some drop shot fishing, deep cranking, umbrellas rigging, and maybe even some offshore striper fishing off Cape Cod. Should be fun.

[MassYak85]

It's a longshot but if someone knows anyone that lost a pair of sunglasses on Quinsig today or over the weekend I saw a pair floating by and hooked them. I'd hate to throw them away as I am pretty sure they are prescription, but I have no use for them if I can't find the owner because of that. 

[DogBone_384]

Took the family to Little Pond in Plymouth yesterday.  Water temps were 82.x.  I caught two LMB, 1.5-2 lbs, working a 5.5” swim Senko slowly along the bottom around 15’ deep.  I tried a few other baits here & there but 2 was it.

[Mr. Aquarium]

d**n water temps at 82, wow!!!

[LadiMopar]

Loss of a local "legend" on Plum Island.

http://www.newburyportnews.com/news/local_news/plum-island-fishing-community-remembers-kay/article_4a463831-975f-5556-9060-dac7572a71a5.html

[DogBone_384]

Tom and I dropped into Westport today after wiring up a new fish finder for his canoe.  A broken trolling motor shear pin kept our lines dry longer than expected, but all was well in short order.

 

Despite it being late morning, in the 80’s, humid, and breezy, Tom and I caught a handful each.  None were scale breakers, especially on a Summer day.  

 

Water temps were 83.x - 84.x and wacky rigged worms proved the ticket.

[MassYak85]

Fished the lower Charles on the 4th before seeing the fireworks. Took a while to find fish but managed to put together a small pattern to get about 4 largeies in the early afternoon before heading over to the festivities. All fish came on a spinerbait after it deflected off some weed cover. They seemed to be holding inside the weeds on the inside edge, although a small group emerged from one of the rowing docks to chase down my spinnerbait. All the fish were between 1 - 2.5 lbs. I did break off a bigger one though after not having retied in a while (the bigger ones always seem to bite when you make a mistake lol). I tried going back along the areas I fished with the spinnerbait with a worm fished really slow to try and entice some less-aggressive bites but had no luck other than what I'm guessing was a pickerel that chomped about 10" off my 12" Jelly worm. It was one of those days it seemed a true "reaction bite" was the better producer. I was sad to see the fish I caught though. They were all VERY skinny. The only other time I've consistently caught skinny fish of that size was at A1 that one summer we had a bad drought and low water levels. 

["hamma"]

On 7/3/2018 at 9:17 PM, LadiMopar said:

Loss of a local "legend" on Plum Island.

http://www.newburyportnews.com/news/local_news/plum-island-fishing-community-remembers-kay/article_4a463831-975f-5556-9060-dac7572a71a5.html

A giant loss to the fishing community, Kay was not only a wealth of information. she was a strong advocate against any of the shenannagins PETA pulled, any rare or specialized gear you couldnt find? either Kay at surfland or Sandy at the already gone northern bass supply could get it for me.  

 She was always willing to order me any materials or lures she didnt have hanging on the walls in the shop,(all the while teasing me that im getting lures to catch what she called "bait") lol yeah, she jokingly messed with me about that one often,....  and was instrumental in many of my homemade lures that I now fish with almost exclusively. from spinner blades to  skirt material, crimps, leader material, clevices,  I got them all from Kay. my first fly vise, my first shimano baitrunner reel, and my beloved Penn surf rod, yup  all from Kay's shop.

 From her never ending dedication to us anglers, to her personable smile. Kay overflowed with customer service, personal attention, and kindness. I for one will miss her greatly. She was one in a million

 

RIP Kay, with a tear in my eye,.....I miss u already, without your ***? I wouldnt be the angler I am now.,.. TY

8 minutes ago, "hamma" said:

A giant loss to the fishing community, Kay was not only a wealth of information. she was a strong advocate against any of the shenannagins PETA pulled, any rare or specialized gear you couldnt find? either Kay at surfland or Sandy at the already gone northern bass supply could get it for me.  

 She was always willing to order me any materials or lures she didnt have hanging on the walls in the shop,(all the while teasing me that im getting lures to catch what she called "bait") lol yeah, she jokingly messed with me about that one often,....  and was instrumental in many of my homemade lures that I now fish with almost exclusively. from spinner blades to  skirt material, crimps, leader material, clevices,  I got them all from Kay. my first fly vise, my first shimano baitrunner reel, and my beloved Penn surf rod, yup  all from Kay's shop.

 From her never ending dedication to us anglers, to her personable smile. Kay overflowed with customer service, personal attention, and kindness. I for one will miss her greatly. She was one in a million

 

RIP Kay, with a tear in my eye,.....I miss u already, without your ***? I wouldnt be the angler I am now.,.. TY

the ***  in the last sentence was typed out as "***", why it posted ***,... is beyond me

the *** is typed out as the word ***

[je1946]

3 hours ago, "hamma" said:

A giant loss to the fishing community, Kay was not only a wealth of information. she was a strong advocate against any of the shenannagins PETA pulled, any rare or specialized gear you couldnt find? either Kay at surfland or Sandy at the already gone northern bass supply could get it for me.  

 She was always willing to order me any materials or lures she didnt have hanging on the walls in the shop,(all the while teasing me that im getting lures to catch what she called "bait") lol yeah, she jokingly messed with me about that one often,....  and was instrumental in many of my homemade lures that I now fish with almost exclusively. from spinner blades to  skirt material, crimps, leader material, clevices,  I got them all from Kay. my first fly vise, my first shimano baitrunner reel, and my beloved Penn surf rod, yup  all from Kay's shop.

 From her never ending dedication to us anglers, to her personable smile. Kay overflowed with customer service, personal attention, and kindness. I for one will miss her greatly. She was one in a million

 

RIP Kay, with a tear in my eye,.....I miss u already, without your ***? I wouldnt be the angler I am now.,.. TY

the ***  in the last sentence was typed out as "***", why it posted ***,... is beyond me

the *** is typed out as the word ***

Ditto on all you posted Hamma.   They broke the mold when they made that woman, she was one in a million.  RIP Kay.

[LadiMopar]

5 hours ago, je1946 said:

Ditto on all you posted Hamma.   They broke the mold when they made that woman, she was one in a million.  RIP Kay.

 

I never had the honor of meeting Kay but she sounds like a woman after my own heart. I've had many jobs in my day, but my all time favorites were managing a couple Mom & Pop B&T. And to be truthful they never felt like "work", it was more like extended family. ? So I can relate with everything they said about Kay and the folks she took care of all those years.

 

I still think about and miss "my guys"; those relationships are truly unique, so my heart goes out to all of you who knew Kay...it's a connection that unless you've experienced it most folks could never really understand.

 

So, Miss Kay I raise my rod and tip my well worn hat to you. 

[DogBone_384]

The boss, err, wife, sneared at me when I couldn’t decide where to go fishing today.... typical from a ‘non’ fishing person.....  

 

I stayed local, launching  at Ponkapog just after dawn.  I left around 1000 with two dinks and one decent Larry.  I tossed a Yozuri pencil, green/red flake 5.5” T-rigged swim Senko, and a wacky rigged pumpkin/chartreuse 4” Yum Dinger.  The wacky rig did the trick.  A LMB no bigger than my Yozuri thought he could eat it.  It was a trip seeing that tiny little dude try to jump out of the water to shake the lure off.

 

I went do DSG to pick up some line and OTW back decided to check out Reservoir Pond in Canton for the first time.  I found the launch and off I went around 1200.  The water looked like coffee and there wasn’t much as far as ANY weed beds.  It looked like Sunset Lake after Braintree treated it to kill off the weeds.  

 

I worked counter clockwise with a wacky Yum Dinger, T-rigged Zoom Ultravibe, and a Ned rig as a backup.  Overall I grabbed six bass, two picks, and lost the big fish of the day 10’ from the kayak.  One bass was 2-4, and three were just short of the 2-0 mark.  All the bigger fish were caught with the T-rigged Zoom along the SE  coastline from the golf course onward.  Not a bad first visit.

 

Water temps were 80.x - 82.x at Ponkie and 84.x at Reservoir Pond.

[Dunks N Dinks]

New PB Alert!

 

Just got back from Wequaquet (air 80, water ~77). Overall, the fishing wasn't great with the water hot and bluebird skies overhead...and yet it all came down to one pitch and one $%*#-show of a fight around some lilly-pads in the southern portion of the pond. My new PB goes 7.62lb (just a hair over 23.5").

[LadiMopar]

17 minutes ago, Dunks N Dinks said:

New PB Alert!

 

Just got back from Wequaquet (air 80, water ~77). Overall, the fishing wasn't great with the water hot and bluebird skies overhead...and yet it all came down to one pitch and one $%*#-show of a fight around some lilly-pads in the southern portion of the pond. My new PB goes 7.62lb (just a hair over 23.5").

 

Sweet!!!!! Congrats! 

 

[Mr. Aquarium]

congrats hell of a fish.   fishing has been so crappy for me. dont even want to go out anymore.  would be nice getting into some decent fish but when i do go out, im praying to get one dink. 

striper fishing has been crappy as well, lot of small schoolies.

[Janderson45]

thats a stud @Dunks N Dinks !!! Well deserved ?.  I haven't been out in like 3 weeks now, think I'm taking my boat home this weekend or next, will be a whole new ballgame! 

[JG233]

Nice one!

 

It's been so hot, I haven't been motivated to go out. 

[DogBone_384]

I’m heading to Canton Reservoir with a friend’s son tonight after work and down to Tom’s neighborhood tomorrow morning.....   have to get it while job #2 slow.

[MassYak85]

@Dunks N Dinks What a TOAD! Congrats! 

 

Fishing has been slow for me these past couple weeks. I've been grinding just to get a few 1-2lbers every trip in this hot weather. I'm gonna go out this afternoon and tomorrow though and see how I do. 

[MassYak85]

Went to A1 for about 6 hours today....

 

The fishing was great...apparently I just can't set the hook anymore lol. I ended up catching 2 fish. Had I actually landed all the bites I got I would have easily had about a dozen keeper fish with multiple fish nearing 4lbs. I started off with a 7" fluke in bluegill and it got hammered 4 or 5 times in some isolated groups of pads. I was using a 7/0 Owner Jungle hook with it, which pairs up nice but obviously requires a fairly strong hookset. I was using a Heavy Fast rod but being in the kayak I am mostly relying on my arms to do the hookset, where in a boat I can twist my whole body and have a much greater range of motion, I seem to have not adjusted yet. So being frustrated by going 0-X with the big fluke I tied on a smaller 4" one with a 2/0 lightwire hook on my spinning outfit and managed one dink. Lost a few more on that size before getting frustrated and just going to a basic green pumpkin stickbait. First fish on that, SOLID bite, fish gets to the side of my kayak and as I reach with the net it jumps off....of course. I continued with the worms for about an hour and lost some more fish, finally was able to land a 3lber. 

 

It was a very humbling day for sure, I guess I need to focus on my basics a bit, but it was good to see the bass active and healthy (the fish I did catch were all pretty plump, and the 3lber had a bluegill choked down it's throat). It's also a miracle I don't have a hook stuck in my face because the amount of times I set the hook and had a bait fly back straight over my head after missing a fish was far too many for my liking. 

[DogBone_384]

I took a friend’s son to Canton Reservoir after work today.  Evan struck out and I landed two bass, with the biggest an ounce under two pounds.  Both were caught on a wacky Yum Dinger.  Water temps were 81.x.

 

Tonight’s highlight, by far, was when I landed my wacky rig on a wooden dock and managed to get the line through NOT ONE, BUT TWO eyelet rings on the far edge.  Houdini couldn’t do it!

 

I got called into work so I’m rescheduling my trip with Fishing Rhino.

[Janderson45]

@MassYak85 I plan to hit A1 on Saturday, glad you at least got some decent action.

 

were you fishing straight braid?  I don't fish a lot of big flukes but I do fish a lot of big paddletail swimbaits rigged with 6/0 thru 8/0 weighted swimbait hooks.  Straight 50lb braid and a 7'8 MHXF rod are essential to my success, I swing so hard and the long rod moves so much like I actually have to back my drag off to compensate.  Used to run the drag pretty much locked down as I didn't think I'd ever break 50lb braid on a hookset.. well I did.  Down in Florida this spring a 6 or 7lber chomped down hard and I broke her off on my hookset, since then I run it just a tad looser.

 

I also never use a net when kayak fishing, tried it out a few times and lost more fish doing the awkward rod/line/net dance at the side of the boat than it was worth, personally I'm confident I land more without it, but that might say more about my net skills than anything else.  

 

 

[MassYak85]

1 hour ago, Janderson45 said:

@MassYak85 I plan to hit A1 on Saturday, glad you at least got some decent action.

 

were you fishing straight braid?  I don't fish a lot of big flukes but I do fish a lot of big paddletail swimbaits rigged with 6/0 thru 8/0 weighted swimbait hooks.  Straight 50lb braid and a 7'8 MHXF rod are essential to my success, I swing so hard and the long rod moves so much like I actually have to back my drag off to compensate.  Used to run the drag pretty much locked down as I didn't think I'd ever break 50lb braid on a hookset.. well I did.  Down in Florida this spring a 6 or 7lber chomped down hard and I broke her off on my hookset, since then I run it just a tad looser.

 

I also never use a net when kayak fishing, tried it out a few times and lost more fish doing the awkward rod/line/net dance at the side of the boat than it was worth, personally I'm confident I land more without it, but that might say more about my net skills than anything else.  

 

 

I had a 20lb fluoro leader which could have played a role, and a 7'2" rod. Besides that it was 40lb braid but if I try it again i'll use my frog rod straight 65lb braid 7'7" rod. It also doesn't help when the line interweaves itself in the lilypads. It was hard to tell if the line was actually taught or not when I swung and a good amount of my hooksets felt like the first half was just getting the line actually taught before trying to bury the hook. All that kind of added up I guess. Oh well, it was a good learning experience at least. As far as the net I like to have it mainly for fishing treble hook lures with shaky fish but I usually play it by ear for each fish. The one decent fish I did land I just lipped because it was wrapped around a bunch of lily pads. It's also nice if I need to fumble with my phone or the scale I can let the fish swim around in the net off the side while I do that. Good luck on Saturday! 

[Janderson45]

9 hours ago, MassYak85 said:

. It's also nice if I need to fumble with my phone or the scale I can let the fish swim around in the net off the side while I do that. Good luck on Saturday! 

 

I hear you, I use the cal-coast fishing "donkey leash" for this purpose, works very well.  I catch the fish, lip it and remove the lure, put it on the leash and back in the water while I grab my phone, measuring tape or scale.  Haven't lost one yet! 

[LadiMopar]

1 hour ago, Janderson45 said:

 

I hear you, I use the cal-coast fishing "donkey leash" for this purpose, works very well.  I catch the fish, lip it and remove the lure, put it on the leash and back in the water while I grab my phone, measuring tape or scale.  Haven't lost one yet! 

 

Thanks for mentioning the donkey leash, I'm not big on nets so this crazy fish grip should do exactly what I (and every other tournament angler in a yak) need. Just ordered one and am hoping it's as easy as the product vid. Any quirky things I should  know about it?