.. if 26" at the largest if your idea of a bonanza … it isn’t to me, but was still a better few hours of fishing than recorded in a LONG time!

Well, of course I sure wish they were bigger, but fishing the out-going tide pre-dawn in the sound after the rain storm of SAT night produced 1 to 3 bass each per drift, per person. Ran out of chunk bait! The far majority were in the 26" class – like seriously, 8 to 9 out of 10 of the fish – nothing bigger – but more fish around than I’ve seen in a long, long while … !

We resorted to examining their scale patterns to ensure we weren’t catching the same few fish time after time after time. Typical patterns of purple to dark green to olive drab-backed fish were caught & released, but no sea lice observed. All fish were released boat-side, w/ only one pulled quick for a measurement (ahhhhhh, but I told my crew it was short …).

While it’s not the ‘keepahs’ of 15-years ago (personal best was more than a dozen fish > 36" (largest 48{) in an hours fishing using live pogies)… this should bear good news for the upcoming seasons … unless MD continues to slaughter them …

Even saw a HUGE school of pogies the other day. Had to be pogies, as the surface of the water about 2 football fields in size was way higher than the surrounding waters. On another note, a friend helps out at the alewife/herring runs and has seen more this year than in the past 30-years.

Here’s to hoping that maybe the fish and the bait … are making a comeback!

i gotta say…reminds me of my childhood…maybe extreme winters produce??? started fishing shortly after ’78

Definitely a lot of those mid-range fish around, as well as a few pushing into the low 30" ‘s. Mac’s are easy to find out in front of the sandbars–I start looking when I get out about 50’ deep. Also heard they were thick off Folly Cove. On Saturday saw a few little surface breaks that were probably bunker, and was able to confirm this when we found a big school of pogies just past Halibut Point. Big ones-12-14"! Was hoping to that big bait would cull out a bigger bass, but no luck, I think Saturday’s boat traffic pushed anything big enough to eat those thing well away from the usual ledges.
Also worked mackerel around the rocks just past Rockport with no action.