It wasn’t supposed to be so nice weather-wise today in Cape Cod. But that’s New England for you. Despite the forecast for rain and wind we had neither when Bob Lewis and I headed out fishing at sunrise again.
Today we didn’t need to be in at 9 AM. Instead we had all morning. But good weather can have negative effects on fishing. First of all, there were far more boats at the false albacore waters where we succeeded yesterday. Further bad, there were very few false albies. We basically sat around with a bunch of other boats running here and running there for nothing. I got one cast into a school of albies where I expected to get a tug but didn’t.
After more than an hour without albie action Bob suggested trying some other places for oddball fish. I tied a Clouser minnow on my Intermediate sink line and we hit some random rocks, buoys and channel markers. It didn’t take long before I landed my first ever scup (Stenotomus chrysops) on the fly. Another for the species list!
We kept an eye out for breaking albies as we explored but no doubt today was slow. I managed a bluefish and this tiny yellow jack. At 10 AM Bob asked if I wanted to head into the estuary and end the day looking for striped bass. I was all over his suggestion.
Even the striper bite was slow, however, we found some randoms in a small weedy bay that more resembled a largemouth bass pond than a place for ocean fish. I tricked this little guy right off the grassy edge on a popper and followed up with another.
I had a thrill on the second striper. As I brought him to boat side a much larger striper I’ll estimate at around 3 feet appeared. It was a sight to behold and Bob kept us in the area for another hundred casts. But that was it. Big stripers, big fish in general aren’t stupid.
Its been a great few days here in Cape Cod. A special thanks to Bob Lewis for not only taking me out for my first ever false albacore on the fly but also organizing my fly fishing seminars while here. Tomorrow its north to Wolfeboro, New Hampshire for a few days of warmwater fly fishing before returning to Idaho.