Canal On FIRE

Wow, what I saw last night was spectacular.  I knew the Cape Cod Canal had fish because my son, Ben, has been fishing there with good success, averaging about 5 keepers an outing.  He has been fishing some days both morning and night, scoring equally at both ends of the day.
Yesterday, I decided to give it a try in the evening.  I went down with my sons, Matt and Ben, along with Matt's friend Mike. Things were slow at first with a couple of fish here and there in the daylight.  But, once dusk came and darkness arrived, the fish turned on big time.  The four of us landed over 20 keepers caught on a combination of Hogys as well as mackerel colored swimmers.  We had nothing huge with mostly fish in the 30-36 inch range.  But, I saw a good number of fish dragged out of the canal that had to reach in the 40-46 inch range, some fish that easily weighed over 40 lbs.  All the reports claim that this hot fishing has been going on for over a week now and these reports are absolutely true. This is all being fueled by an influx of bait, mainly small mackerel, butterfish and sandeels.  On any given tide, there are well over a hundred fishermen lining the canal, and at times everyone is hooking fish.  My son, Ben, reports that a couple of days ago he estimated at least 200 keepers were landed in a short stretch of a couple of hours.


I am guessing there are more keepers from shore right now in the canal than the entire state of RI has to offer from shore.  It's a good night if you can get one or two keepers from shore in RI.  On the other hand, you have fishermen who are landing 15-20 keepers in just a couple of hours when the action is hot in the Canal.  On Fire!

Foot Long Blues Invade Bay; Stripers Scarse

Foot long bluefish have invaded Narragansett.  They seem to be everywhere whether you fish from shore or fish from a boat. The odd thing is that they are not schooled up.  You see individual fish breaking here and there whenever any bait comes around.
Last night I tried a mid Bay spot.  Right away I saw a blue jump in front of me so I knew this was going to be night in which I would not use the expensive skinny plastic.  In fact, anything plastic would be chopped to shreds.  So, I snapped on my ole reliable 3/8 oz. flathead bucktail jig with a plastic curly tail.  It did wonders as I landed 7 bluefish and one lone schoolie.  And, at the end of the night, the durable bucktail jig was still intact. The blues I caught were spitting up bay anchovies once ashore.  I also noticed good numbers of sandeels in the water, so there is a variety of bait to keep the blues eating.  Meanwhile, striper numbers are way down in the Bay right now.  I suspect it is due to warm water.  Last night's water felt like bathwater to the touch....not good for stripers.

So, looks like bluefish is THE show right now in the Bay.  Get yourself a light rod, some bucktail jigs and curly tails and enjoy the action.  They will probably stick around until the fall.

Quite the Day in Buzzards Bay

I'm moving around a lot more these days looking for fish.  Yesterday, my brother Steven, my son Matt, and I went to Buzzards Bay in Steve's boat.  There we caught tons of fish and landed five different species of fish.  Boy, you certainly knew you were no longer in RI.  The afternoon started off with some rough water so we decided to take a run through the canal and try the east end near Sandwich. We got nothing there but found tons of big bass breaking in a spectacular display in the east end of the Canal where you could not fish from a boat.  So, it was back to Buzzards Bay where we started jigging bucktail jigs.  We started catching one good size black sea bass after another on just about every drift.  Some of these were HUGE, going 5-6 lbs., mayber larger!  The best bet to catch these was to use a 1/2 oz. bucktail jig with a plastic curly tail and just drift and bounce the offering off the bottom.  In all we landed at least 35 black sea bass with most of them keepers.  In the mix we also landed some scup and two fluke.  From there we headed toward the boat landing in Wareham.  On the way in we hit a massive school of stripers.  It was wild with birds diving, bait spraying and fish breaking in a large area of the bay.  Using Cocahoes on jigheads, we landed at least 40 schoolies and a lone bluefish in less than an hour.  The schoolies were all sizes from small ones to near keeper size.  So, quite the afternoon/evening with 5 different species of fish and lots of them.  Nothing in RI that I have seen in the last month could compare to the action we had today.  Buzzards Bay turned out to be quite the place!

Fishing and Baseball

Fishing and baseball.....that's been a big part of our lives in the Pickering family for the last 25 years.  All of my four sons have been quite successful at both.  However, my son, Chris, has taken it to a level few will ever experience.  Yesterday, he was selected in the Major League Baseball draft by the San Francisco Giants in the 32nd round.  He heads to Phoenix, AZ, this weekend to begin his major league career in what they call "summer short season" in the minor leagues.

You've seen Chris many times on this blog fishing.  He loves to fish, but rarely did he have time for it with all the demands of baseball.  He is a left handed pitcher who has been very successful due to a lot of hard work, time and effort, similar to the recipe for success in fishing.  In Little League, he actually pitched in World Series when he was 12 years old.  In high school, he was a two time all stater as an outfielder and a pitcher.  In college, he pitched for 4 years at URI knocking off some big wins from top 30 teams.  Last summer, he pitched in the Cape Cod League, about the top league in the country for college ball players. There,  he was very successful and was noticed by a lot of pro scouts.  So, it moves on with the dream to pitch in the pros.

I don't know where all this is going, but I do know that next fall I'll be out surf fishing with a pro ball player.  We are very proud of his accomplishments.

Some New Gadgets on the Blog

You may have noticed a few new items on the Blog.  The first is a new counter from Blogger that will better track the hits on this site.  We are quickly heading to a quarter of a million hits. Yikes!
The second new item is a search engine just for this blog located under the counter.  It is really neat.  Just type in your topic and past blog entries come up that have to do with what you are looking for.  It saves you time and energy searching through past posts.  Ah, technology!  Enjoy the new gadgets.

What Works in One Spot May Not Work in Another

Last night I fished the ocean for a change.  I had been doing well in the lower Bay on the low end of the tide, but I lost the tide in that location. So, I fished the oceanfront in one of my high tide spots.  I started off with my pink Hogy, a lure that had been working well for me in low light and poor weather conditions at the oceanfront.  One the first cast, a schoolie came up and smacked it, but didn't take it.  I had several more hits but no takers.  So, time for a switch in lures.  I snapped on a Red Gill teaser rig with a small 6 inch white Hogy, a good choice for finicky fish.  This combo had been deadly earlier in the week in the lower Bay and I was sure this would catch these fussy schoolies.  Nothing doing.  They wouldn't even whirl at it.  So, I went back to my pink Hogy and continued to get hits and eventually got one fish.  It all points out that what works in one spot does not necessarily produce in another.  That's what makes fishing so interesting and complex.  Trial and error as well as experience often will point you in the direction of what produces.

A Very Good Outing

I made the move away from the upper Bay to the cooler waters southward yesterday evening.  It paid off with the best evening of fishing I have had in weeks.  The score for the night was 13 stripers from 18-26 inches and a lone blue.

If you get The Fisherman magazine, you'll see I have an article in this week's issue ( May31) titled Imitating Sand Eels.  Those tactics outlined in that article worked like a charm on last night's fish.  There was a lot of small bait around so I went with a teaser (Red Gill, see photo on right) rigged ahead of a 6 inch white Hogy.  That rig landed 3 double headers (see photo on left).  For the night, I got about half the fish on the teaser and half on the Hogy.  A teaser rig will be one of your prime offerings in the coming weeks when there will be a combination of small sandeels around as well as other small bait.  Right now is prime time to start adding a teaser to your leader.