Many anglers are all abuzz about 50” fish but the object of their attention does not necessarily have stripes! School tuna have invaded Massbay in a major way and these fish are swarming Stellwagen Bank and seem to be hitting everything. Almost lost in the hysteria is big bass fishing which is about as good as it gets thanks to the bounce back kids themselves – pogies!
Giant bluefin require specialized gear, a properly outfitted boat and a learned skill set necessary to avoid putting the unprepared angler in a world of hurt! Catching football-size Charlies however is far less complex and right now the odds are stacked more in your favor than in years!
Massachusetts South Shore/South Coast Fishing Report
Putting patrons into school tuna has been such child’s play and such a quick accomplishment for Captain Mark Rowell of Legit Fish Charters that he’s been wondering what to do with the rest of the trip! That answer usually is steaming to within a half mile from Green Harbor Beach, finding a pogy school and then bailing bass as big as 50”! Along the way, a jig dropped to the bottom in the hopes of finding a haddock invariably is thumped by a cod! Strange interlopers have been caught as well such as a 10 pound scorpion fish – watch those spines! Suffice to say, there’s a lot going on on the South Shore.
Pete Belsan of Belsan Bait and Tackle in Scituate also weighed in on football fever telling me that Middle bank on Stellwagen has been the sweet spot with the tuna gorging on sand eels. Anglers are catching them every way imaginable with live bait, casting and trolling all accounting for tuna. Pete echoed Captain Rowell regarding big bass on bunker with action taking place off Bryant Rock as well as Black Rock Beach. Lobsters are now past the shell-shedding phase and moving around inshore structure which according to Pete attracts stripers towards inshore rocks and ledge. For bluefish, the Provincetown section is the place to be.
Captain Jason Colby recently aimed his Little Sister towards the Newport area just to shake it up with the results pretty much the same as in easy limits of big black sea bass with plenty off cooperative stripers of all sizes! While most use bait for black sea bass, one of Jason’s skills is to set up a picture perfect drift and jig over black sea bass schools; black sea bass are fun no matter how you catch them but while jigging they are a hoot! On sloppy days there is no issue since the Westport River from it’s mouth to right behind the captain’s slip is loaded with striped bass!
Greater Boston Fishing Report
If the last few days are any indication, the South Shore may have a rival – Boston Harbor! According to Captain Brian Coombs of Get Tight Sportfishing, Boston is fishing like two harbors. The inside centered around the Castle Island area to the Reserve Channel has random schools of pogies and no shortage of mixed sizes of stripers. A live or dead pogy drifted in the area will not last long before it is hit! Father out things get really interesting once you clear Deer Island as acres of pogies have aggregated by the North Channel. The bait is not always besieged as the stripers move in an out to feed and then stage in deeper water. Timing is everything with the best bite appearing to be in the afternoon as opposed to the maxim that early is everything! Tuna trauma has the skipper torn as to which way to go as Brian has been finding 50-55” school bluefin among the middle bank of Stellwagen. Al Gag’s Whip-it-Eels as well as Yo-Zuri Mag Poppers have been doing the bulk of the catching.
Pete Santini of Fishing FINatics in Everett had an unexpected visitor to the shop the other day, namely one of the chief officers of the USS Constitution! Raphael was looking for a different sort of marine experience so Pete set him up with a few worms and his tubes and soon the mariner reported back to him that he was catching fish up to 35” not far from port in Charlestown! He even broke off on a much larger fish that chaffed him off in nearby pilings. The Santini tube has also been standard issue among Johnny “Plankton” Hoffman’s boat as he’s been opting out of the snag-and-sweat efforts most are employing among the pogy schools, and instead, catching quite well by trolling the tube and worm on the outskirts of the menhaden mayhem. It’s also been an exceptional year for squid in the harbor with some coming at night off the Deer Island Pier.
Lisa from Fore River Fishing Tackle in Quincy repeated what most others have been extolling – find the pogies, find the bass! Shop customers have been doing well between Boston Light and Point Allerton as well as Nantasket Roads. Her shop is moving a lot of squid jigs with Nut Island Pier producing in addition to boaters going it themselves between Quincy Bay and Hull. World’s End has been good for chunkers.
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Massachusetts North Shore Fishing Report
The talk around Tomo’s Tackle has turned to football but it has nothing to do with a pigskin! Patrons of the shop are not immune to pelagic pandemonium which is taking place on Stellwagen and somewhat on Tillies Ledge and Jeffrey’s Ledge. The shop has those hot Yo-Zuri poppers which are ideal when the fish are pushing bait towards the surface as well as the Gag’s Whip-it-Eels which are a doppelgänger for the sand eel forage base. Sam Stavis who used to assist in the shop has been doing well fishing among pogy schools between Beverly and Manchester-by-the-Sea out of his kayak. Recently however he hooked an unforeseen beast – tuna? – which spooled him. While most are keying in on the pogy schools there are some mackerel available from Nahant through Cape Ann. A mack tossed into a pogy school will most likely not last long. Squid are still numerous among lit piers at night throughout the North Shore with the Beverly Pier getting special mention.
Matt from Three Lantern Marine said that surface feeds throughout Manchester Harbor and Gloucester Harbor are not uncommon. Pogy schools invariably have bigger fish shadowing them with a few feeds happening off Halibut Point. The beaches after dark have been fishing well for those tossing darters as well as eels.
Martha from Surfland Bait and Tackle told me that in spite of the furor of the big bass bite on the South Shore through Boston, commercial anglers are sitting tight and finding big fish off Newburyport. Plum Island Sound as well as Joppa Flats are good but the bite is temperature dependent! During sun-swept, shallow water periods the temperatures there can reach 70 degrees making the fish lethargic and unwilling to hit. Frustrated kayakers are even reporting bass bumping against their hulls and still not getting a hit! The fuse gets lit and the baits bit with a cooler incoming tide! Ocean front eel pitchers are doing well with those guys choosing the biggest eels they can get along with 8/0 and 9/0 circle hooks. Mackerel have made an appearance by Breaking Rocks, Hampton Shoal Ledge and out by the Isle of Shoals.
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Massachusetts Fishing Forecast
The school tuna fishing on the Middle Bank of Stellwagen is just about as good as angling gets in these parts! Fortunately the cookie-cutter Charlies are falling for topwater plugs, soft plastic stick baits as well as bait. Heavy duty bass gear is proving up to the task at handling these 50” fish. It’s no surprise that the pogy schools are holding the biggest bass but on the South Shore as well as Boston, outer schools are more consistent cow producers. Calamari cravers are scoring squid off Nut Island Pier, the Deer Island Pier and the Beverly Pier. On the North Shore mackerel have reappeared off Beverly as well as Plum Island and are a slam dunk bait when fished among the pogy schools. Nightime is best served off the ocean front with eels working well while the flats are most effective on cooling flooding tides.
I’m always bummed these reports for Mass BARELY have anything in regards to Shore Fishing. Coming from Rhode Island where there is a lot of shore fishing abound, Mass feels very closed off and hard to fish from shore.