Eastern Ma & New England Area Fishing Reports

[DogBone_384]

Drove to my favorite pond in Plymouth Friday morning.  Did well.  5 SMB, 4 white perch, and one pickerel.  Three smallies were over 2 pounds.  Everyone but the pickerel went for a stealth shad Stunna 112+1.  

 

I marked bait balls on the bottom in ~ 20' but caught all my fish in 8 ~ 12, except for the pick and one white perch.  Surprisingly, one perch was in 3 - 4' of water.  All the smallies fought above their weight class.  

 

Water temps were 71.x.  Winds were light when I launched and about 10 mph when I left.  Air pressure was 30.4.

 

Looks like the fall feed is on.  I'll be on Cape Cod the 27th to the 29th with my Ranger.

 

Good luck to everyone getting out there.

[MassYak85]

6 hours ago, DogBone_384 said:

Drove to my favorite pond in Plymouth Friday morning.  Did well.  5 SMB, 4 white perch, and one pickerel.  Three smallies were over 2 pounds.  Everyone but the pickerel went for a stealth shad Stunna 112+1.  

 

I marked bait balls on the bottom in ~ 20' but caught all my fish in 8 ~ 12, except for the pick and one white perch.  Surprisingly, one perch was in 3 - 4' of water.  All the smallies fought above their weight class.  

 

Water temps were 71.x.  Winds were light when I launched and about 10 mph when I left.  Air pressure was 30.4.

 

Looks like the fall feed is on.  I'll be on Cape Cod the 27th to the 29th with my Ranger.

 

Good luck to everyone getting out there.

The bass we were catching were full of energy, the largies were fighting like smallies.

[DogBone_384]

I had a mixed bag on Cape Cod the last few days.  Did well on Wednesday, fishing two ponds.  Totaled 30+ fish between the two, with a mix of SMB, LMB, yellow perch, white perch, and pickerel.  Jerkbaits were the lure of choice.  My biggest bass was a smallie just over two pounds.

 

The fish were SHUT OFF Thursday.  I fished three ponds (luckily, two of them had HP restrictions but let me run on TM only) from dawn to dusk, throwing the kitchen sink, and couldn't buy a bite - not even from a perch or pickerel.  Needless to say it was a TALL pour that night....

 

Boss lady's calling more later ...

 

It's later ... I fished one pond in Sandwich Friday morning and was rewarded with a 4-6 Larry in short order on a 5" orange/brown Senko.  Adding a 1-13 SMB, 14 oz sunny, and decent pickerel to the mix by the time I had to leave.  

 

Water temps were 66.x - 67.x.  I'm not sure what was going on Thursday, but Wednesday & Friday made up for it.

[Don51]

Don't be afraid to throw a rattle bait this time of year.  ?

[MassYak85]

I haven't been able to put down the spinnerbait. It's just so consistent for me and I can cover so much water this time of year. That and a tailspin especially on lakes with alewives.

[guidoStow]

I got up to try to find some cooler water and find some pike. First contact was a >30" jumper that spit the fly fly right at the net. It was followers I couldn't get to sign the deal the rest of the day. Landed one the next day but it was smaller 24". Caught some bass along the way including a 21" largemouth.

 

 

 

 

[Don51]

That is a strange pattern on that LM.  ?

[guidoStow]

The board dropped this one from that last post:

[Don51]

Well, this is it boys! This month offers a very good chance of hooking into a new pb. The bass know what's coming and will be feeding hard. Right place, right time, right bait. Get out as often as you can and hope you hit it just right. I always had my best days fishing shallow, bog type ponds as opposed to the deep sand bowls.  ?

[DogBone_384]

I got @Fishing Rhino on his home pond again.  We didn’t kill it like the last trip, but Tom’s pond never disappoints.  It was pretty busy for the first hour and trailed off quickly.  I got a mix of everything and Tom got a couple good bass and picks.

 

There’s a pickerel with my favorite Rapala jerkbait stuck in its face … good thing I keep spares of my top lures in the garage.

 

Gonna try for stripers tomorrow afternoon.

[MassYak85]

16 hours ago, Don51 said:

Well, this is it boys! This month offers a very good chance of hooking into a new pb. The bass know what's coming and will be feeding hard. Right place, right time, right bait. Get out as often as you can and hope you hit it just right. I always had my best days fishing shallow, bog type ponds as opposed to the deep sand bowls.  ?

I'll be getting out Friday. Hoping the leading edge of the front yields some good ones.

[guidoStow]

Has anyone been out to western/central MA recently and gotten a water temperature reading? TIA

[guidoStow]

I was out at dawn to catch the major period and the front's approach at a mid state pond containing bass and pike. Got neither, just a yellow perch and a black crappie swinging above their weight by taking a fly over half their length. Drizzle and finally steady rain chased me off.

[MassYak85]

4 hours ago, guidoStow said:

I was out at dawn to catch the major period and the front's approach at a mid state pond containing bass and pike. Got neither, just a yellow perch and a black crappie swinging above their weight by taking a fly over half their length. Drizzle and finally steady rain chased me off.

I did okay but was a bit dissapointed as well. Managed 8 bass on spinnerbaits but the bite was definitely off. It was weird too cause the ones that did end up hitting were hitting like freight trains. It was very much a shallow reaction bite they didn't want to go after much else. And I only caught them in areas near startled baitfish in shallow vegetation. Didn't catch anything over 2.5lbs but man did I think I was gonna need the net on a few of those hooksets. Seems like every time I think it's definitely gonna be a good day I get thrown a curveball by nature haha. I can't complain with the 8 fish but I had visions of some heavy hitters when I launched haha. Took a few hours to get on the bite that I did. And the rain made for some unpleasant conditions.

 

This rain has done a number on my reels, two of my workhorse reels crapped out on me so I had to do some rod swapping. One the AR bearing went, and the other had gotten a little too wet recently and the handle bearing fused to the handle with rust. Gonna need a new handle smh. But the thing that really took it out was the retainer clip for the spool bearing came loose and jammed itself between the drive gear and the pinion geat and seized it up.

[ne_dan]

River levels/flow finally came back down to normal levels around here after last weekend.  Took the kayak out for 3 hours, over 20 bass.  Biggest went 3lb 9oz.  Jig and Spinnerbait all afternoon; didn’t have to change lures the whole time (except for the jig that got bit off by a pike).  Hopefully the rain next weekend isn’t too bad.

[Frezzy]

On 10/7/2023 at 7:32 PM, ne_dan said:

River levels/flow finally came back down to normal levels around here after last weekend.  Took the kayak out for 3 hours, over 20 bass.  Biggest went 3lb 9oz.  Jig and Spinnerbait all afternoon; didn’t have to change lures the whole time (except for the jig that got bit off by a pike).  Hopefully the rain next weekend isn’t too bad.

Looks like the bulk of the rain will stay south.  River levels shouldn't be impacted.  I will be out on them this weekend.  Good luck!

[DogBone_384]

I had a mixed trip on the Cape this week.  Tuesday afternoon was my best performance where I fished my favorite kettle in Plymouth, coming up with a bunch of smallies between 1.5 - 2 pounds and a couple of yellow perch that came in around a pound. A perch 3XD was the lure of choice.  From Plymouth I went to Harwich, where three yellow perch made it to the kayak and two SMB got the better of me before I could get them in.

 

Wednesday morning went well in Chadham with a baker's dozen mix of LMB and pickerel.   Thing is, most were under a pound.  I struck out at the second Chadham pond and managed a dink yellow perch and a rainbow trout on a shad 3XD in Brewster (a reportedly great SMB pond I struggle badly at 😡). 

 

I fished in Sandwich this morning and couldn't come up with more than a few half pint smallies via wacky Senko and a 3 1l2 pound pickerel on a small Spro deep running jerkbait.  I marked most targets in 20'+ but couldn't get anyone else to commit to a lipless or drop shot.

I saw a few groups of minnows at the shoreline, but not in giant numbers, at all ponds I fished. Sandwich was the only pond where there were clouds of them suspended in 20-25’.

 

The weather yesterday afternoon & this morning was very bluebird-ish.  Air pressure was steady at 29.9 and water temps were 65.x - 67.x.

[MassYak85]

Got out for a couple hours today in Central MA. Tough bite, only got one. Going to try again tomorrow.

[MassYak85]

Got a late morning start in Central MA again, water temps finally dipping into the upper 50s. I grinded it out with the big baits and it paid off. I hooked into a 6-4 off a deep point on a Monka crawler, and followed it up with a skinny 3-13. The 6-4 ties my PB from a couple years ago on the same lake. 

 

I was so stoked haha, my heart was racing trying to net it. 

 

[DogBone_384]

27 minutes ago, MassYak85 said:

I grinded it out with the big baits and it paid off. I hooked into a 6-4

Congrats on a your big Larry.

 

Your water temps & big bait success will trigger @Mr. Aquarium to get back to bass fishing ….

[guidoStow]

Got out to a river in the north east. Water temp was 57 degrees. It was definitely a grind it out sort of day. I thought I would have to settle for my PB yellow perch when I got this gal. 34"

 

[MassYak85]

Nice catch! I've still somehow never landed a pike in MA. I've had several soft swimbaits bitten off by them on Quinsig though and saw a dead one on the shore that had to be pushing 40" once.

[ne_dan]

Got out on a river today, little bit of wind, water temps mid 50’s by the late afternoon.  100% jig bite, almost all the fish came in the 8’-13’ range bouncing the bottom, average weight was between 2-3lb.  Light bite today very different from last week where they were hammering it as soon as it hit the bottom.  Did manage a few fish shallow in some wood, but everything else was deeper on the outside bends in the main flow.  

[Frezzy]

 

Nice!  I love a good jig bite.  I fish the local rivers as well.  Would you mind sharing what color, size (3/8 or 1/2oz) and most importantly what trailer are you using?

[ne_dan]

3 hours ago, Frezzy said:

 

Nice!  I love a good jig bite.  I fish the local rivers as well.  Would you mind sharing what color, size (3/8 or 1/2oz) and most importantly what trailer are you using?

1/2 oz Berkley Finesse Jig Watermelon Candy and a Berkley Maxscent creature in Goat.  1/2 oz Dobyns football head with a black and blue skirt with the same trailer.  I really like the Berkley jigs I got a bunch over the winter when they had that 50% off sale, they do surprising well in rocks.