NUMENON |
PONDERING CORE ESSENCE
NUMENON |
Birds and bait were abundant, and the New Moon current was ripping. I was presented with different conditions on my two mornings, and good things could have happened. Still, false albacore action was limited and I had only a few casts over two days anywhere close to working tunoids. Another year shall likely pass without me connecting with one of Fall's funny fish. Oh well, I learned a bit and there's always 2023. Of course I knew that tangible success during this annual Albie run was something of a shot in the dark. I was dependent on fish presenting themselves to me at a given, fixed location and on my schedule. Plus, they'd have to be inclined to eat, and I'd have to execute. This just didn't pull itself entirely together, once again, for me in 2022. Still, I'll call this a good effort and I did learn a bit. I arrived, armed with three rigs in hand; the universal epoxy jig, an Albie Snax soft bait, and a Pop-and-Fly for finicky fish. This had been confirmed for me as the go-to trio by an article earlier in the week. On Saturday, all three baits swam for me quite a bit. Thick "rain" bait was obvious; snagged silversides were common, and I'd see rivers of peanut bunker later in the day. Fiona-related winds diminished over the course of the morning from well over 20 mph from the north, to a mere 15+ mph. From daylight to slack high tide, there were constant tornados of birds over bait, but always well out of reach. A single small pod of fish (7:20 AM and about half an hour before high tide) gave me hope when it chased bait on the surface within casting range for perhaps 15 seconds. I got a couple of casts in, but my smallish, natural-colored epoxy jig was ignored. I was joined on the stubby pier by a vacationer from Colorado. He reported good albie and bass action from this location before the blow. For the most part, he only would cast to visible fish, but given their prolonged absence, he made a few blind casts before searching for greener pastures on Martha's Vineyard. He also preferred the afternoon dropping tide at this location. After 300 or more minutes of casting while standing on the concrete, my body told me to pace myself. I'd not seen a shot for about four hours; I saved my luck and energy for the following day. I was a bit peeved to find a pair of anglers already in position when I returned in the dark at 5:40 the next morning. I was blocked from my preferred position at the pier's end. But conditions remained fishy (overcast and now with a more manageable westerly breeze) and there was plenty of room. Plus, the water was moving hard and there was still lot of bait around. Things got very fishy at about 6:45 AM. Bass blitzed bait trapped against the rocks and nearby seawalls for about 20 minutes. Amazingly, I never got touched. I knew these fish were on peanuts, but they were selective! They ignored my Albie Snax, Hogy Slow-tails, Crippled Herring, and even the Popper-and-Fly. I did note, however, the guy at the end scoring a few bass on a small white swim-bait retrieved at Albie Speed through the mayhem. I'd later learn that this was a 3-inch Al Gags', and he was hoping to find an Albie mixed in with the feeding bass. Lesson learned! Once these feeds thinned out, this same tactic produced three Albies for that same gentleman. I'd switched to my closest approximation, a 4-inch thin Hogy on a jig-head. This never got touched, the albacore seemed to need that thumping Al Gags tail. Another lesson learned! A few local fishing celebrities showed up, and one caught a decent bass on a float-and-fly. Another interesting rig I noticed was a large hookless epoxy jig with a RonZ sand eel trailer. Folks were getting more creative at imitating the small bait in place. I got knocked out of the action for a couple of hours with sudden onset stomach illness, but when I returned later in the morning, the crowd had thinned and the rest were giving up. The fish were still feeding, but very sporadically and usually out of reach. Only a single small bluefish had been landed by my new friend from Colorado. He'd been totally skunked on the Vineyard the previous day; it had just been a tough day for fishing. I casted for another fruitless hour before heading home. I couldn't help but feel dejected, and I was angry about not being able to make my best sustained effort. But I'm already thinking about 2023. Pondering the questions of core essence and finding meaning in unexpected ways
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I am too tired to write; I've got a lot going on! But, I do want to celebrate this fishing season. Here's a picture from each month of 2021 (so far; I may choose to update for November and December if anything noteworthy happens). It was difficult to choose a single "best" picture to represent a given month. I tried to balance the quality of the fish, picture composition and sharpness of the memory invoked. Others might have chosen differently. Oh, well. And, it's obvious to me that too many of my pictures look too similar, and that I need to get more people out there! It was a good season; while I didn't catch any truly large fish, I did catch piles of quality fish. Much of my time was spent on new-to-me water or learning new spots and techniques. I was outside a lot, and I had many encounters with wild creatures beyond fish; seals, eagles, dolphins, coyotes, foxes and more. Thank goodness for my ability to do so; and for those who support these efforts! Pondering the questions of core essence and finding meaning in unexpected ways From my new home waters in Falmouth Foreside, Maine down to new water in Duxbury, Massachusetts, I enjoyed my four-day weekend! In addition to Labor Day, I'd long ago scheduled myself to be "off" on Tuesday, with my mind on catching some more stripers! Each day treated me well and had its highlights. I encountered good numbers of fish with a variety of techniques, and scored my biggest striper and bluefish of the season. I caught my largest ever fly-rod striper, and enjoyed beautiful scenery and affable company. What else could I ask for? Of course, the details for each day are available (or soon will be!) under the "NumenonFunFishing" tab, above. Enjoy! Pondering the questions of core essence and finding meaning in unexpected ways 2021 has been a season of recovery... from the pandemic, the associated isolation, the generally "down" nature of 2020 and more. While virtually all of my 2021 fishing has been solo, I have gotten out a fair amount, and my recent relocation to Maine has reunited me with extended family, both boats and all my gear. I can be fishing within 15 minutes from my desk or bed; and that fishing has a lot of potential for me to unlock. I couldn't ask for more. Here, I'm just taking a breather and collecting some photos. Nothing outrageous (either good or bad) has happened in my 2021 fishing season so far, but I've had a lot of pleasant success. I've enjoyed just about every moment on the water and each and every fish I've encountered. Who knows what the second half of the season will bring; bigger stripers? Blues? Thirty-inch togue? An albie? I look forward to finding out! Enjoy! Pondering the questions of core essence and finding meaning in unexpected ways As my Maritime 1480 skiff, the amybaby22, moves to Maine for the height of the season (and perhaps longer), I wanted to take just a moment to reflect on my experiences in Barnstable, Massachusetts. Over the last couple of seasons, this might have become my favorite Bay State port. I didn't visit it much (four trips in two years; not nearly enough), but it treated me well each time. Given my lack of local experience, each trip presented new challenges and experiences. The port offers a variety of accessible habitats from estuarine to open water in Cape Cod Bay. I found my own way to fish each time. I know I've only scratched the local potential, but I've still encountered some fine fish! While I never scored a truly large striper during my limited time there, my average bass encountered was certainly fat, healthy and spunky; and probably pushing 24 inches. These fish are excellent targets on light tackle, and I caught them from the surface to 30 or more feet down. Plus, the clear water offered many additional sightings and close calls, and the port threw in several bonus bluefish of nice size, too. Perhaps because I tend to gravitate to Barnstable during a period of southerly wind, each day the skies were clear and the sun was bright. And yet, I still found feeding stripers! Because each trip here poses a new set of conditions (tide, season, water temperature, etc.), I've been open to exploring new waters and trying new techniques. On a given trip, bouncing epoxy jigs along bottom with current, ripping Ben Parker Magnum Flutter Spoons, trolling deep-diving sticks, chasing birds or simply covering water with poppers and flukes could be my answer. Of course, each of these pursuits has opportunity costs and so I've barely explored live-lining Macks, open-water trolling with big baits in deep water, sight-fishing the flats, or tube-and-worming along Sandy Neck. I know that any of these techniques could be my best answer on any given day, including my next trip. I was quick to realize (actualize?) the potential for Barnstable to offer a quality experience. I simply hit the nail on the head after my first visit: "... other than the rude boating, crowds at navigation pinch points and the rather dysfunctional ramp, this was a very high-quality experience." I've learned to manage the negatives mentioned above, leaving myself open to just the positives of this port. I am not quite sure when..., but I will be back! Pondering the questions of core essence and finding meaning in unexpected ways Saturday, May 22, 2021 offered a bit of a roller coaster experience. I expected good fishing, but things got off to a surprisingly slow start. My pick of inshore fish were small, and I left these only to find vast emptiness. Despite the persistent wind, I resorted to exploring choppy Vineyard Sound to find some quality stripers. I did, too, by focusing on subtle observations and interpreting the huge amount of information available to me via the Garmin GPS/Sonar unit. The fish were on the up-current side of an incipient rip, and my first pass through the sweet spot with my Rapala deep diver connected with a solid drag-puller! It wasn't the 25-pounder I'd hoped for, but at a chunky 25 inches, this was my biggest striper of the year! On my first pass with a new-to-me-here technique! I promptly knocked the bass off the lure with the net; there would be no pictures of this one. And when I looked up, a guide boat had slid into the sweet spot, and now sat there, stemming the tide. Over the next half hour or so, I saw his fly-rodding clients land a half dozen or more fish. I recognized the onset of sea sickness. Instead of fighting it, I yielded to it; got it over and done with (or so I hoped.) Mung now made trolling virtually impossible (I was lucky to have gotten that first pass in), and attempting to stem the tide while casting worsened my illness. It robbed me of my sea legs, too. I was ineffective and downright feeble; I knew I had to retreat inshore. But first, there was that business of being sick again! Returning via the main Waquoit outlet, I hit a few spots to see if any bass were home. I continued my inshore struggles. I finally returned to where I'd started at least six hours before. The tide had literally turned, and a small seam had formed with the ebb. My first cast with a small swim-bait was lightly touched. The next was confidently eaten. For the next hour or so, I entertained myself with these small (18 inches and less) bass. On what I thought would be my last drift, I switched baits to a pink fluke, if only to show any remaining bass something different and to gain some experience/confidence with this color. My first and only bite on the pink fluke was my best striper of this young season, a very respectable inshore fish of 28 inches! Against the odds on this pretty tough day, I'd caught my first "Keeper" of the season; my earliest ever (calendar-wise) and inshore, to boot. I stayed a bit longer and caught another bass or two after switching back to a white fluke. A tough bite had been countered by landing 17 stripers. Sickness made my offshore find that much sweeter. Persevering through some slow times yielded a surprisingly nice fish. Pondering the questions of core essence and finding meaning in unexpected ways Based on the day's sunny and warm forecast, I expected them to arrive in the afternoon, but some scout herring were already in Mill Brook's Cooke's Hollow run on the morning of May 9, 2021. I expected to find more later that afternoon; conditions were sunny and approaching 70 degrees. I was surprised to find just a handful, including a couple of groups of active spawners, when I returned with Ollie. After a few days of absence, about a dozen were viewed in the upper reaches of this stretch on the afternoon of May 12. The big influx I anticipated with the New Moon didn't materialize here. Regardless of what I know or don't know about River Herring, I am glad to see them and welcome them to their home waters. I'll continue to keep tabs on them, and I may even check to see if their presence has attracted any striped bass. Pondering the questions of core essence and finding meaning in unexpected ways May 7, 2021 12:30 PM Waquoit Bay, Falmouth/Mashpee Massachusetts Here's my earliest-ever saltwater striper, a 16-incher that I fooled with a small swimbait in about seven feet of water: I had to work hard for this fish. I'll maintain that size doesn't matter for the first of the season. Still, this guy and two others of similar stature were fun enough on my light tackle, and three small (No, tiny!) stripers really can make for a fine, successful day! There's plenty of season ahead in which to catch some slightly bigger ones! Pondering the questions of core essence and finding meaning in unexpected ways Queen once sang "Nothing really matters...anyone can see. Nothing really matters... to me", but maybe I can claim to be a Tiger (Trout) King. The crowning glory of a recent day on Cape Cod's Peters Pond was the nice, 21-inch trout pictured below. It could be a brown trout, but it could also be a hybridized brown-cross-brook trout, a.k.a. Tiger Trout. They're known to be present in this pond and the wormy vermiculations around the spots are indicative of a tiger. It's not clear-cut, though, and I'll never know for sure. Still, this trout capped off a nice day of fishing and completed a Cape Cod Grand or Cape Cod Super Grand Slam. I certainly checked off four goals for the day, and possibly all five!
More details are available at: www.numenonfunfishing.com/numenonfunfishing/cape-cod-trout-slam if they are of interest! Pondering the questions of core essence and finding meaning in unexpected ways Sure, I've been ice-fishing and shore-casting a few times so far in 2021, but I'm going to consider this to be the first real fishing of 2021. I was fortunate to get amybaby22 out on the water, with trout as my target. Although I missed the first strike of the session, it didn't take long to catch my first fish of the year, a 14- or 15-inch piscivorous rainbow. The details are at www.numenonfunfishing.com/numenonfunfishing/same-place-better-choice for those who might be interested, but let's just say that once I got dialed in, the bites were steady, and I decided to call it a day when the twenty-second rainbow trout of the day came aboard. While I do miss the fun, adventure and opportunities of Lake Michigan trout fishing, this is what I currently have access to. And, it sure is more relaxing! Pondering the questions of core essence and finding meaning in unexpected ways |
Steve LachanceVia Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Michigan and now, back to New England! Archives
June 2024
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