Striperheads

Brewster Ma., Monday, 06/8/2009

Arrived on site at about 2 pm and checked into the Nickerson campground in Brewster. The forecast for the upcoming week was not the best for anything requiring warmth or sunlight. But today was good. It was sunny and in the seventies. The wind was less than 10 knots. It might be the best chance I had for sight fishing on the flats for the entire week.

So I set up camp in a minimal fashion and hurried to the Pleasant Bay town launch. Sorting out how best to manage a solo launch, I got the boat in the water and tied off. I situated the tackle and dressed the rods and then got the boat engine running. The sun was already lowering in the sky. The tide was outgoing, and would limit the risk I might take in pushing the boat too far up on the sand flats. Getting beached on an outgoing tide would mean a six hour wait for the incoming to release me. Not a pleasant thought, as it was almost five o’clock already.

There were wade fishermen at Minister’s Point, along with another piece of sandy real estate in the bay… More than I would have expected there to be on a Monday afternoon, so I was hopeful. I explored the flats from The Narrows and beyond, and eventually out to the open cut in the barrier bar. Last year’s storms had breached the bar to the open Atlantic, and one distraught resident saw his cottage swallowed up by the sea. But the extreme change in the configuration of the beach had created new, direct access point into upper Pleasant bay for ocean side, cruising Stripers to utilize. No birds were in sight, and the water was somewhat murky as it can be in Pleasant Bay on the outgoing. So much for sight fishing…

I had begun to wish that I made the trip down here a day earlier, so I could have been out here in the morning on the incoming tide, with the sun high. I did some blind casting, and came up with one schoolie striper and 2 followers. After a while, I brought the boat back to trailer, and returned to the campground, happy enough that I had motivated myself to get out on the water and get the equipment organized. The week lay ahead.

Tuesday 06/9/2009

The NOAA forecast was glum…. Cloudy, raining cold and windy…. I half expected to spend the whole day in the Yurt, journaling and sketching. But the morning was bright, and the wind not too awful. Again, thinking of the possible limited opportunities for getting the boat on the flats this week, I had a quick breakfast and headed out. Rain was supposed to be definite for the afternoon. This time I put in at Oyster Pond to access the Monomoy Islands area.

I rounded the bend at the end of the Oyster River, cruised the edge of Common Flats, as was my custom, then crossed the channel and began searching the shallow water out from Hardings Beach. Eventually, a small cluster of terns began the feed actively, signaling that baitfish were being driven to the surface. As you might expect, the sight of the bait busting the water’s surface, followed by the backs of bluefish, sent enough adrenaline through my system to make a mess of my tackle. The wrong fly, no wire leader, and that goddam Orvis Wonderline balled up in a knot. I Wondered who invented this horrid flyline.

The blues were not doing a good job of breaking the water’s surface, although the sand eels were, offering themselves to the hungry terns. Instinctively, I ditched the eight weight and the cursed Wonderline in favor of a nine weight rod and a sink tip line to get the fly down to the fish… hurry, hurry, the fish are feeding, moving, feeding, moving…

Still there was no wire leader, and the nine weight did not have a holder for my trolling motor’s remote control. Crap. More fumbling… with the loose controller. Eventually, I got a fly down enough in the water so that a bluefish saw it, struck the fly, and the game was on. A distinct sense of relieve came after hooking a fish. Now the main concern remained the lack of a leader… I hoped that he was hooked well, but not too deeply, so that the monofilament leader stayed away from the razor teeth. A long 8 minutes later, after adjusting the reel’s drag and discovering a grinding noise in my Lamson , the blue was in the net. Nice. Something for the grill… at least that was done.

The feeding frenzy continued, and after getting the fish in the livewell, I organized again, and followed the birds and their activity back across the channel to Common Flats. The fish proved to be more and more elusive, and the feeding birds were thinning. Then a small bunch of terns got active further up on the flats. I raised the outboard and urged the trolling motor and the boat toward the working birds. Soon the trolling motor was chewing sand. Thankfully I was on the incoming tide today, and did not worry much about stranding. But I couldn’t maneuver around the high spots to get close to the ruckus. Then the feeding frenzy moved toward me. Those were stripers! Beside the excitement of finding the preferred target of Striped Bass over bluefish, it was amazing to see Stripers busting on bait in the spring. But these fish were literally in 12 – 16 inches of water, and any activity at all brought them half out of the water. They were going nuts on the ample amounts of sand eels, as were the birds from above. It was exciting to watch. The fish were schoolies, with a few medium sized fish mixed in, no bruisers from the northward Atlantic migration. I picked up a couple and released them. The world was beginning to get right.

About that time, the predicted showers began; I donned a rainjacket, and eventually began to get wet anyway. It was just past noon, and given the fact that I felt I had stolen the morning from the weatherman, I decided to give it up when the wind started to crank and I heard distant thunder. I went back to the Campground cold and wet, but satisfied at the morning activity.

Wednesday 06/10/2009

The day started at 4:30 AM. Not my choice. The campers in the next yurt are a family who seem to believe that completely allowing three young girls cry and scream and stomp their feet is a normal form of communication, and beyond any reproach. The tactic must work well for the children’s needs, because they used it as a “go-to” tool at the rate of about once every couple hours. Never having children, it seemed odd that my thoughts would wander to considerations of parenting practices. I wonder what type of adults that this child rearing approach might produce, and pity the men that might wind up having to deal with these screaming female gems. A huge empty campground, and this is how I drew the lot… and the tantrum family is staying all week. The six year old, destined to be an opera singer, gave her greatest performance to date, at the wee hours of the morning. I would be sure to use my earplugs each and every night henceforth.

Still cloudy, the skies held their bounty, and I launched the boat again into Oyster Pond, and headed back to where I had seen action yesterday. Intermittent spats of unexpected sunshine allowed me to see short expanses of sand under the water ahead of the boat, but no fish were evident. After a couple hours of blind casting to rips out from Hardings Beach and along Common Flats, I had only enticed a couple followers and hooked up on two schoolie stripers. Yesterday’s bird activity was missing and so was the adrenaline rushes. They were replaced by the lull of a sneaking boredom and the issue of suspending disbelief.

Eventually, I found myself wondering if I shouldn’t head back in, and trying elsewhere. Before I did, though, I headed over toward the barrier dune below Chatham. With the aid of the trolling motor, I was able to maintain a decent line of drift, parallel to the line of South Beach. I began to see groups of four to five mid sized stripers (upper 20 inches) and a few bigger fish, following the edges of the shallow bars just offshore. Reaction time was short, because visibility was low, and the fish were spooking on the boat. They would appear off the bow, just after I had committed a blind cast amidships to the port side. Damned. After about an hour into the drift, I had the luck of having the fly and rod in hand, at the ready, at the same moment that I spied a single good size grey ghost slipping along a bar to my right. I let go a gentle cast three feet ahead of, and just to the right of, the fish’s line of sight. The fact that I was able to do this, in fact, was another bit of luck. Frankly, my casting skills suck.

I twitched the fly as the fish neared it, and began my retrieve, pulling the imitation in hasty, jerky spurts away from the Striper. Man, that fish jumped on that fly like a beagle on a pork chop!! A quick, reaffirming double tug inline on the Wonderline to set the hook and the reel began to emit noise at an increasing rate and heightening crescendo. I was into my backing in no time. As I stood balanced on the casting platform of the boat, rod butt plated in my hip, maintaining pressure on the fish in ever changing directions, the back pain, boredom, and disillusionment of the day disappeared. The daybreak tantrum of the campground brat and resultant loss of sleep suddenly seemed like a pleasant way to start the day. As the back and forth contest progressed, with the bass gaining ground in long powerful runs against the reel’s drag, and me reclaiming ground by cranking in line whenever I was able to lead him toward the boat, I began to think about the weak links. Was the fly tied on correctly? Maybe I should have changed the leader this morning. Was the fish hooked well?

The connection between backing and flyline passed through my rod guides three times, and eventually, the fish was brought to bay and netted. Nice fish! He measured 29 inches and broke the three year dry spell I have had of not catching any keepers. Minimum size is 28 inches, and I have been able to manage only 27 inchers over the past couple seasons. I made sure he was revived and released him back to the flats. This day had been justified.

Thursday 06/11/2009

The earplugs worked fine, and I managed to arise at a more reasonable hour, about 6 am. Showers and thunderstorms were the call for the morning, with some possible clearing for the afternoon. It was chilly. Low fifties. I headed out to one of the bays on the southern shoreline of Cape Cod Bay. I had had good luck there before, and really liked the choice of sand flats that were available for sight fishing.

It was showering lightly and was cold when I arrived at the launch, but met up with a fly fisherman pulling out. It was nearly low tide. He stated that it was a bit snotty out by the hook in the flats, as the outgoing tide was combining with the wind to make a nuisance of the chop. Footing would be difficult. Thunder was booming a bit in the distance, and my doubts about heading out this morning began. I waited in the parking lot a while, and then reasoned I should head out as long as the winds were low enough to allow it, and launched before the lowering tide would make it too difficult.

I was cold… it was wet… drizzle and light showers turned on and off. I headed toward the area I wished to greet the incoming tide from, and began to blind cast toward the edge of the flat. A couple followers and then I hooked up with a schoolie. I hoped that this would bode well for the rest of the day.

Unfortunately, the next couple hours turn to misery. The showers picked up. I had minimal raingear on, and got wet. Twice the rain really opened up, completely drowning me. My clothes picked up ten pounds of water weight. The booming started again, fog was creeping around the shoreline, and although I had not seen any lightning, I reasoned that nothing here was worth it. I was freezing and began to head back in. Before I made it to the harbor area, the rain slacked off. The distant sky seemed to be lightening. Blue patches appeared. I remembered the dry bag stowed under the casting platform. Rummaging around, I found a complete change of dry clothes, and in the middle of the harbor, started my day over. With warm and dry clothes, a brightening horizon and a change in tide, I headed back to the target area. Still, the bright sunshine that was needed for sight fishing eluded me, but I began to blind cast to likely spots. No birds to help spot activity.

I managed two schoolies, one in the mid twenties and a number of followers reluctant to bite. The beastmaster flies I had been casting seemed to grab their interest, despite their obvious difference from the abundant sand eels on the flats. But the few bait fishermen in the channel were having some luck with American eels, 6-8 inches in length. Reports were that several keepers and a couple 40 inch fish had been caught by them in the past couple days. Perhaps the beastmasters were triggering the eel reaction.

The deep edge of the channel that ran along side the flats seemed to be where the bigger fish were emerging from, so I began to cast from the shallow water into the trench and retrieving after letting the fly sink. Abruptly, a dark shape charged from the depths and inhaled my fly. The ensuing battle on the edge of the channel was reminiscent of yesterday ice-breaking contest, and when it was over, a 32 inch fish was landed. Once again, the mental struggle I had with perseverance was rewarded. I kept this fish, wanting some for the grill, and the goal of making some seviche with Striped Bass. When I find an internet café to post this, I will download a recipe’ (my favorite one doesn’t seem to be in my laptop’s memory) and make some up while I am still here and the fish is fresh. One o’clock, an aching back, and a Bass to filet, I heading into the harbor, trailered up and headed back to the campsite.

Friday 06/12/2009

Regrouping day... steady rain at the rate of 70%, and winds kicked up to 20 knots or better. At least it is a warm front, and the temperatures will near seventy also. Will spend the day journaling, sketching washing and drying wet clothing, and sending off reports and emails at the local free wireless spots.

Tomorrow says only a chance of rain in the am, sun in the pm, and 5-10 knot winds… should be able to get back out and fish the weekend before wrapping up and returning on Monday.