It All Went Down in Buzzards Bay

 I could still hear the frantic calls of gulls and terns ringing in my ears as we hit the road home. It had been one of those events. Bait, predator fish, and birds all collided under the right conditions, and massive blitzes were scattered all over. We paddled till our bodies wouldn't let us, bent rods on bass and blues, a few of them large, and almost died in raging and turbulent currents. This was the stuff I live for. This was the goods. Everything broke and we lost our minds over the course of two days in Buzzards Bay.

 Until next time,

Fish for the love of fish.
Fish for the love of places fish live.
Fish for you.
And stay safe and healthy.

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Leo, and Franky for supporting this blog on Patreon.

Cape Cod Brook Trout

 Historically, coastal streams in the Northeast were rich with brook trout. These lower gradient, mud and gravel bottomed, vegetation filled spring fed streams provided a nutrient rich habitat that grew char faster than high gradient mountain streams ever could. Add to that access to saltwater, and anadromy can happen. When a salmonid has access to the ocean and the plethora of calorically dense bait fish it holds, they grow to exceptional proportions. The anadromous life style also makes brook trout take on a chrome coloration not often seen in their solely freshwater fluvial brethren.

Connecticut doesn't have any healthy sea run, or "salter" brook trout populations anymore. Neither does Rhode Island. Massachusetts though still has a few. On and early fall trip, Noah and I decided to pay a visit to one we'd never seen before. The wind was honkin' and we felt we had very little we could accomplish on the salt in kayaks, despite crazy daily bass and bluefish blitzes and the first little tunny of the year being around, but Cape Cod has some surprising freshwater gems and this was one of them. 

I got taken almost immediately by a sizable brook trout, on my third cast, but it ended up being Noah who struck first, with a tiny silvery brook trout that flopped back into the water before it was brought to hand. But he redeamed himself not long later with an absolute gem of a long, lean female wild brook trout. 

We Continued down stream toward the estuary, getting a few takes as we went, but never got to brackish water because the stream was just too difficult to navigate. On our way back up I made a cast into the pool where I'd had the first takes and my streamer got pounded. A studly brook trout began leaping as though it were a small salmon. Some, I was holding my favorite fish of the many I've ever caught out on Cape Cod. 

Has this particular brook trout spent time outside the sweet water stream we were standing in? Maybe, but we'll never know. I was chuffed though, as either way this was an extraordinary fish. 

We decided to hop on a trail that paralleled the river and meet it again upstream to work our way back down to the parking area. On the way, we met a fantastically colored eastern garter snakes, one with no defined strip down its back and an extremely pronounced checkering pattern. I spent a bit of time shooting photos of her, then we moved along. 

When we got back in the river, someone fishing upstream almost immediately intercepted us. Unfortunately this meant we'd be fishing back down through water that had already been fish, and though this doesn't always mean you can't catch anything, we sure didn't this time. 

Nonetheless I think we were both very pleased. Noah had caught his first two Cape Cod brook trout, and I'd caught my best Cape Cod fish of any species. 

 New England's coastal brook trout populations live on the brink. Restoration efforts by groups like Sea Run Brook Trout Coalition have successfully brought populations back to health, including in the stream Noah and I were fishing, but in  changing world these are a fish that could all too easily be lost. Water quality, warming ocean waters, climate change, dams, and development all put these historically, socially, and ecologically important fish at risk. There's a lot that can be done to preserve and protect them. But at bare minimum, please keep these fish, as well as the numerous other at-risk species, in mind when you vote in local, state and national elections. Any politician, regardless of party affiliation, that seeks to dismantle clean air and water regulations, or even simply refuses to push forward towards definite goals in conservation, is a festering sore that needs to be removed. 

 Until next time,

Fish for the love of fish.
Fish for the love of places fish live.
Fish for you.
And stay safe and healthy.

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Leo, and Franky for supporting this blog on Patreon.

Scomber Colias From the Rocks

 Atlantic chub mackerel have been in Long Island and Block Island Sound each summer for a few years, but I'd yet to target them from shore until this August. Really I wasn't looking for them when I first ended up on the bite, I was looking for bonito. They had and still have yet to show in any notable amount in Connecticut waters. But on that first rainy morning I was looking for bonito, I ended up catching a huge chub mackerel, bigger than any I'd ever seen in photos. Though it gave me pause, it wasn't enough to make me pull my camera out in the rain... which I now regret. It was a seriously large chub mackerel and I may never see one like that again. 

The next evening though I wondered if I might find some feeding at the same spot, on a similar tide, but with the sun setting. It turned out I could. This time I was using my 5wt rod with the specific intent of catching Scomber colias. I'd tied some very small, simple flies on fine wire hooks to try to avoid issues with missing or hooking and loosing chub mackerel that had become obvious over the last three years of fishing for them from boats. One was a simple small version of a Gartside Soft Hackle Streamer, and the fish both showed a strong preference for this fly and stayed pinned without fail. (I thought this would be solution, but subsequent tests proved less successful.)

With the skies ablaze at sunset and the tide dropping, I caught chub mackerel from "my rock" until I was content, which was conveniently about when they wandered out of range. A slow, steady double had retrieve was periodically halted by abrupt and violent takes, then jarring fights that tested the limits of my five weight rod. I'd used a five weight for these fish from the boat and my experience was that it was not much different than an 8wt. Not so from the rocks. This was exciting fishing.

 

 There was once a time when catching a similar species from the rocks and beaches of southern New England wouldn't have been unusual. Atlantic mackerel used to make showing here. They still do sometimes in Rhode Island, on Long Island, and even on occasion in New Jersey, but really if I want to catch them from the rocks I have to go to Maine. That's the place. But now that these chub mackerel have made themselves at home in Long Island Sound, there's a great opportunity to catch a beautiful small scombrid in the surf at home. Of course, chub mackerel are actually bigger than Atlantic mackerel. I'm still not quite used to them, though they've been around for more than half of my time consistently fishing these waters. They still make me giggle and smile, as just about any pretty, hard fighting little fish does. Getting my first few from the rocks made me smile all the wider.

 Until next time,

Fish for the love of fish.
Fish for the love of places fish live.
Fish for you.
And stay safe and healthy.

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Leo, and Franky for supporting this blog on Patreon.

One And Done: A Whole Season

I slid down a steep hillside feet first, on my butt, using saplings to slow my descent, 3wt in hand bouncing perilously. I'd done this and worse before countless times and never broken a rod... so whatever it takes to get to the stream is what I do. It had been a little while since I slid down this particular hill or any other hill down to a brook trout stream. Though the chaotic spring corona virus crowds had subsided and I was no longer quite so worried about small lesser known streams being over-pressured, we are in a drought here in CT. A bad one. So I again had reason to stay away. But I can't always. So, this was my first and only local summertime brookie trip. 

Some might say I've drifted away from my beloved brook trout over the last few years, and this could be true. I've fished for them much, much less than I used to. This has more to do with balancing my need to catch brook trout with their need to be left alone. I've fished most of my local waters long enough to know what they hold and how to get a few fish any time I go. I just don't feel the need to fish them as often as I once did. The fish are better off without me bothering them. That said, these fish also go unnoticed by most, and it isn't bad to have someone that cares checking up on things. After I got up and wiped the dirt and bits of leaves off my legs and shorts, I pulled out my pocket thermometer and placed in the run I stood looking over. The flow was low, but not severely. It had rained just days prior though. I contemplated how warm the water might be. I'd never documented a temperature over 65 in this stream but if it was over 62 I would not make a single cast. I picked up the thermometer. 60 degrees.

I dressed the bomber, then slowly crawled into position behind a boulder. Just upstream was an inconspicuous pocket that some might completely ignore. I knew, however, that it rarely failed to hold a fish in late spring into late summer. This day proved no exception.

One fish to hand, a typically bejeweled wild char. A Connecticut native. I put the bomber in the hook keeper and left, whistling and smiling. Beautiful fish... I hope she survives the drought. 

 Until next time,

Fish for the love of fish.
Fish for the love of places fish live.
Fish for you.
And stay safe and healthy.

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Leo, and Franky for supporting this blog on Patreon.

Cape Cod Observations (Pt. 3)

 The morning light on the dunes was spectacular going into our second day of Cape Cod exploration. It's only unfortunate that it never back-lit the dorsal fin of a white shark for us.

As the dunes erode, sand from different strata slides down the face in streams and forms delta like deposits down slope. These vary in color depending where the sand came from in the dune itself. 

A favorite viewing spot featured high dunes overlooking seal colonies that didn't have a dry outer bar to take refuge on. We though that the fact that these seals had to be in the water might make them more likely targets.

We noticed a few of these spiders and their burrows at the top of the dunes. I fed this one some of the deer flies I swatted. 

One of our most interesting observations was the massive number of cicada killer wasps around. In this photo, there's one in the top left corner. It had been resting on one of the grass tufts. I never managed to get a good shot of one. The most interesting behavior we saw these wasps engaging in was chasing after swallows and kingbirds. We don't really know what this was about.

As with the previous day, we couldn't just spend the entire time on the dunes and beach looking for sharks. There was more of the Cape to see.

The white shark angler's tackle box.

Oil tanker leaving the east end of the Cape Cod Canal.

I pulled out the fly rod for the third and final time at the Cape Cod Canal when some sort of scombrid species began blitzing for a short time. They were probably Atlantic mackerel, though they looked a bit on the large side. I didn't catch one, so who knows. Those were our last minutes on Cape Cod, at least for that trip. We will see a white shark, though it certainly will take some tie and effort to do so fro the beach.

 Until next time,

Fish for the love of fish.
Fish for the love of places fish live.
Fish for you.
And stay safe and healthy.

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Leo, and Franky for supporting this blog on Patreon.