This last week has shown a vast improvement in the fishing. Although the water temperatures east of Chatham in the ocean are still cold, around 53-54 degrees there is increasing numbers of bird life and bait on every new day. The date I have always used for the fish to show up in the rips and eventually out on the east side of Monomoy Island is Father's Day.On Wednsday I was at Point Rip on the west side of Monomoy's tip and on one of the tides I caught some nice fish. The other tide was devoid of fish entirely. It seems the water temperature is important. On Mike Dwyer's charter, Cindy hooked and landed a 42 inch 30 pound bass on her first drift through the rip ! Her two sons were quite impressed with their very cool mom but I think her husband was a little jealous !! We then caught a half a dozen more legal fish in the 5-10 pound range to finish the trip. The next day I went right back there for the same tide and caught only 3 small bass. So, it still is hot and cold in the rips. There are schools of small bluefish popping up regularly on the west northwest corner of the point about a mile or two off. They do move around a lot, but they are there quite regularly.
On the Monomoy flats however, there are tons of fish ! They are quite finicky and skittish though. One one occasion, I cast a single fresh sand eel into a school of them only to see them scatter from it as if it was a 2 pound rock I had thrown into the water. They will take a small sand eel pattern on occasion if the drift is right. These fish are scattered throughout the area all the way from south Monomoy up to Morris Island. We had some nice fish yesterday up at Morris Island, blind casting through the pea soup fog to them.
The blues are reportedly showing south of Nantucket. Hopefully that should push the bass further north into the cooler (but rapidly warming) water. Nantucket is still a little farther than I would like to travel to catch fish. There are still lots of small fish in Pleasant Bay with an occasional keeper. Try to keep away from the high traffic areas and fish early and late or on overcast or foggy day ( low light conditions) and you should do all right.
Good luck and good fishing, Bruce
