Fishing the CT river?

[shipyard]

Gonna fish the river for thr first time tomorrow 

 Anyone have any good pointers about where  and what to use? Im in the north central area near enfield/agawam

[PECo]

15 hours ago, shipyard said:

Gonna fish the river for thr first time tomorrow 

 Anyone have any good pointers about where  and what to use? Im in the north central area near enfield/agawam

 

There are a lot of smallies in that stretch of the river and you could run into a striped bass at this time of year. The anadromous stripers are swimming up the rivers to spawn. Both smallies and stripers will hit a topwater walking lure, like a Strike King KVD Sexy Dawg or a Zara Spook. That's my favorite way to catch them.

[Boomstick]

I haven't fished the CT either (yet) but plan to try the Oxbow in Northampton as soon as I can get the chance.

[PECo]

Well, I fished the Connecticut River, today. Or, at least, Keeney Cove, which is a large cove off of the river in Glastonbury, Connecticut, across the river from the south end of Hartford. Here's my report:

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After waking up at 4:15 am to fish a bass boat tourney at Lake Lillinonah, yesterday, I had no plans to do anything, today, other than sleep in. But at 7:45 am, I got a message from my friend Kira in our group fishing chat asking whether anyone wanted to paddle Keeney Cove for a while. And who am I to say "No" to that?

 

I got my crap together, refueled my Jeep and got to Keeney at about 9:45 am, just in time to see Kira land a dink smallie from Point Road. The water level is high. It's only about 1-1/2 feet below the road. You can't even see the culvert under the road:

 

 

There was only a single, tiny cloud in the sky and it wasn't overhead. It wasn't long before the air began to feel hot. REALLY HOT! The water temperature was a balmy 74 degrees and the water was clear. I could see sunnies and empty fish beds all day. When the wind blew, it was just a mild breeze out of the north-northwest.

 

To make a long story short, I paddled up the east bank from Point Road, through the culvert, counter-clockwise around the entire north cove, back through the culvert, down the west bank and back to Point Road. I was fully cooked, dehydrated and off the water by 3:15 pm. But during my paddle, I managed to boat 22 largemouth bass ranging from a tiny dink to two pounds, 10 ounces, and a 23 inch chain pickerel:

 

 

 

 

Needless to say, the fish were aggressive. I threw both a wacky-rigged five-inch Senko and a Zoom Horny Toad, and they liked both. The best fish I hooked all day was a three-plus pound largemouth bass that broke me off in the north cove, probably due to a nicked fishing line. When I checked the water temperature at the north end of the north cove, it was a scorching 82 degrees!

 

While I was circumnavigating the cove, Kira stayed in the shallows on the west shore of the middle cove. She accidentally caught the same three pound, 11 ounce, largemouth bass twice while trying to get a bedding bowfin to take a lure.

 

Although the official start of summer will be on June 21, it kinda felt like summer, today. Did I mention that it was HOT? My Jeep told me exactly how hot when I left:

 

 

 

[JustinCT]

Nice report.  Hit Coventry on Friday, soooo sloowwwww but at least I got out and boat ran well.  I'll be hitting Salmon River soon and may make my way north to some of the coves I've had some luck in before.

[BurrStone]

You got pickerel to sit still long enough to be measured. You must be the pickerel whisperer.

[PECo]

46 minutes ago, BurrStone said:

You got pickerel to sit still long enough to be measured. You must be the pickerel whisperer.

 

I try to let pickerel tire themselves out before boating them. It's a lot easier that way.

 

That particular pickerel bit my first Horny Toad clean off. I went to set the hook and whiffed. My 50 pound test braid drifted back down to me in the slight breeze. At that point, I thought it must be a northern pike.

 

I tied on another Horny Toad and casted back over the same bed of lily pads. It swiped at the Horny Toad every time for five casts, before I was finally able to set the hook on it properly. I was a little bit disappointed to see that it wasn't a pike, but pike really can't handle the stress of being caught when it's really hot, and both the air and the water were REALLY HOT, so getting a pickerel, instead, was a good thing.