| June 16, 2008 | ||
| The hot spell last weekend and into the first part of last week raised the water temps as much as 10 degrees ocean side and 15 degrees in the backwaters. This situation changed the fishing conditions significantly at Cape Ann and the Merrimack. And the super great striper fishing of 10 days ago slowly cooled down throughout most of last week. Now I’m not saying the fishing was awful, but numbers and size were down most everywhere up and down the immediate area. We are getting reports of sizable schools of baitfish; macks and pogies, offshore and in the harbor areas of Gloucester and Rockport. The Merrimack Estuary is loaded with sand eels and the river mouth is clogged with silver sides and spike macks are everywhere. So the good news is that the stripers have plenty of food to gorge on and as such, are more reluctant to gobble up a fly of other artificial bait. The anglers who made the effort to go out and catch live bait were by far the most successful getting the big stripers to eat. This was the case around Cape Ann and the Merrimack. The warmer water has brought the first bluefish in to feed as well, with catch reports at Gloucester and Plum Island. So, it appears that we entering into an early summer pattern in the rivers and ocean front so expect the fishing to be in flux while the things settle in. The presence of huge schools of baitfish in the rivers and ocean front promises healthy stripers and if the bait stays nearby, the fishing ought to remain good for weeks to come. Other reports from well down the coast, the cape and further down are all positive with solid numbers of stripers and bluefish (moving our way).
Check out the photo of Den Kelly with his 11,000th tagged striper. When he came up to fish with me, he needed 11 stripers to reach 11,000; we landed and tagged 19 stripers of 14 inches to 30 inches. Den has been tagging stripers for quite some time now and is well on his way to 12,000.(note tag near tail)
 Capt'n Al and I got to fish together one morning last week and landed a good number of stripers.. check out the video clip of
I also had the pleasure of fishing with Marcia and Greg last week, we had a great day landing a good number of quality stipers including a super 32 inch fish.
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