Heard Pond - Wayland

After being convinced to fish the shore of Heard's after work tonight, it paid off. Casting a heavy Blue Fox spoon into the wind was just enough to pull up this nice pre-spawn Largemouth just 10 feet from shore near some bushes. The pond is still very high from the river overflow. I had a few more hits after that and that was it. I also tossed my #5 Mepps Buck Tail. Not sure if it was the 60+degre overcast that woke up the bite.

Lake Cochituate - Natick

We took a family ride on Sunday morning to investigate the boat ramp options. Things looked nice. There were several boats of all sizes out trolling for Landlocked Salmon. The kids and I took several casts with spinners in hopes of a Trout. -No hits. Still a nice morning to be out.

Charles River - Boston

A slow and cold morning to say the least. Andy picked me up at 5am and we headed in to Boston. We were parked and walking to the spot at around 6am. Setup, baited and fishing shortly after, I landed my first fish, a football sized Common Carp. Over the next 1hr+ I caught 2 more, the all looked identical. See clip and watch me hand land one. Andy on the other hand pulled in about 6 and had his PB, something in the neighborhood of 13+ I believe, (pictured).
I also took a slightly different approach to baiting. I used Garbanzo's Chick Peas on a hair rig and dipped the entire rig (weight included) into soft Pineapple/Pear baby food. Mix in a Little Oatmeal for consistency and the Carp seemed to love it. Garbanzo's stay on the Hair rig a little longer than corn too.

Assabet River - Mill Street - Maynard

With a few minutes to spare on my way home I pulled over and peeked over the Mill St bridge. The water was still moving very fast, and still high. I took a few casts into a couple of the pools but my spinner was swpt away over and over. The Rooseter Tail was too light for the current. I'm still at least a couple of weeks away from the Fall fish.

Norris Reservation , Norwell

Norris Reservation is a small dammed pond (mill pond) that is fed by Second Herring Brook.
It's stocked by the state with Rainbow Trout. Last year I stopped in and took a few casts with my son and ended up landed 2 nice Rainbow's. As I walked down the access path I could see ice covering nearly the entire pond with 2 small openings. At the waterfall there was a guy fishing the bottom who coinsdentally, I saw there last year. He showed me a 4lb Rainbow he caught there this past Fall. The picture was on his phone and was a bit difficult to verify. Every corner of the pond can almost be reached by a heavy lure, it's small, very small. I took 20 casts with the black/silver Rooster tail and maybe 10 with a Rainbow colored Kastmaster. According to the DFW site, it has already been stocked. No hits. Still covered in ice.

Assabet River - Ben Smith Dam - Maynard

Having a few extra minutes before the fam came home on Friday night, I decided to take a few casts at the dam. I took maybe 20 or so casts with my black/silver Rooseter Tail. The water has receeded a little bit but it's still very high. Casting up stream requires retrieving a lure from downstream. If it stays dry this week and most of next, I expect it to get better and the pre-spawn Fallfish will start holding up at the flow side of the dam.

Assabet River - Russell's Bridge - Maynard

I met Andy at Russels Bridge around 5pm for a little bridge fishing. We made an attempt at fishing the bottom with night crawlers hopeing to catch a Sucker. I was shocked that out of 4 rods we didn't even get a single hit, not even from a Sunfish.
Russell's is a great place for the camera. We lowered the Aqua-vu down and the picture below was crytal clear, sandy with very little vegistation, no fish.
The highlight of the night was seeing a couple of freinds who were launching thier Ranger Bass boat.

Charles River - Boston

Early Spring Carp fishing at it's finest.
Andy and I set out at 5:30am to fish a discharge flow on the Boston side of the Charles River. Upon arrival (nearly still dark) I mixed up a very basic starch bait of corn and oatmeal. After a sticky consistency was achieved, I began to drop a few meatball sized grenades below as well as some scattering of dry oatmeal. Not to give away too many secrets, but we also dipped out baited rigs into some sweetened baby food.
Our lines were in the water no more than one minute when I lost my first fish. I was amazed, it only took another few minutes and I landed my first fish, a Mirror Carp (pictured). This was my first Mirror, ever.
We continued to fish for about 3 hrs. I landed 12 fish, all Common Carp and one Mirror, I also lost a few others. Andy ended up catching 11 Common Carp and his PB for the day is pictured. All together we caught 23 Carp in one 3hr outing. The weather was perfect, no wind and in the mid to high 30s. We noticed several fish rising to the surface 50 to 100 yrds out.
I also have my Aqua-Vu camera back in service and the fish were swarming around the camera all morning. I'm hoping next time I'll be able to make a video of a fish being caught.
Spring is here.

Click here for a quick YouTube clip of me landing a small Common Carp:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4e-ZQt1SNs

(you might need to copy and paste the url, sorry)

Assabet River - Acton

I made a quick visit to the Powder Mill gate on my way home tonight and wasn't surprised to see how high the water level was. The water was still to high and moving way to fast to even properly retrieve a lure. Of course I couldn't resist. I tied on a heavy (oz?) rainbow colored KastMaster and pulled it thru the current as slow as I could. After 10 or so casts I made a few more with the black/silver Rooster Tail.
I also took a couple of casts at Thanksgiving Pond in Maynard before I got home. No hits, no signs of life. I think I'm still at least a few weeks away.

Heards Pond - Wayland

Finally, back in familiar waters at the back side of Heards and it was worth the wait. I'm not sure if it was the water levels or the weather that made the fish so active. So active, that for the first time since last year we ran out of bait. We burned up 1 dozen mediums and 1 dozen large in about 3 hrs. There were easily 20+ flags. I ended up catching 2 Crappie, 1 Largemouth, and 1 Pickerel. Andy I believe caught the same plus an additional Bass or two including a nice double-header (pic). It was cold and clear. In the distance we could see open water at the Sudbury River's entrance. We were setup by 6:30 and I was already home by 11:30am. A great morning. With the warm rainy forecast this week, this could have been our last trip out on the ice unless we head up North. Heards still had a decent 8-9" of solid ice, about an 1" of soft ice, with about 2" of snow on top. We're looking forward to some Spring weather that will hopefully include some Carp fishing.

Bear Hill Pond - Harvard

Bear Hill was much closer to where I live than I originally thought. I've never seen this pond before yet I've heard a lot about it. My uncle told me that he once stayed in a house on an island there. The scenery was nice, and the weather was great, but the passing caravans of touring snowmobiles didn't help the fishing much. There was a lot of sitting around and it's probably my own fault for wanting to fish the afternoon rather than the morning. I was finally skunked for the first time this year. There were a couple of flags and that was about it. Andy did managed to pull up a Sunfish on a jig. I took my son along and he seemed to enjoy the day more than me. I doubt I'll be back. Beware: The access road to the pond has signs that state: "Harvard Tax Payers Only" and "$25 to launch a boat". There are some articles hinting to pollution at Bare Hill as well as excessive Phosphorus levels.

The name "Bear Hill POND" is a bit deceiving, the pond is more of a Lake, it's huge with several islands, some with homes. I always thought the difference between ponds and lakes were the sq acreage and water depth. If sunlight reaches the bottom, it's considered a pond. To me, BHP is enormous, and state maps show depths of 20'+ of water and an area of 316 acres.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pond

Lake Chauncy - Westborough

After much thought and rumors of nice Pike being pulled out of Lake Chauncy, we decided to give it a shot. After buying Medium shiners at (the in-town bait shop) and finding once we were on the ice that what we had were smalls, we drilled 2 rows of 5 along the State Hospital side of the lake. After an hour, the flags began to pop. I lost a couple of fish and Andy ended up pulling up 4 Pickerel. I pulled up this small Bullhead (my second cat thru the ice)

It was cold and windy and looked like a nice place to bring the boat. No Pike but we stopped and talked to a couple of guys on the way out and they mentioned that last weekend an 8lb Northern won a tournament.

Lake Champlain – North Hero, VT

We woke a bit later, 6am. It’s still dark almost until 6:30. We picked up 2 dozen XL shiners and set out to the shanty. We were lucky, the temperature held overnight and we only needed to chip away a thin layer of ice, no drilling needed. Today was a bit clearer but still overcast. The snow over the ice made for some slick conditions. Bruce actually made it out both days in his truck (yes, everyone drives out to the shanties) to restock our wood supply.
We ended up with more action, do in part that the shiners were so big that they continually set off flags. Some of the XL Pike shiners were the size of my open hand. Huge. By days end I picked up another 6 Northern’s. Andy also caught his limit. In all, we landed 19 Northern Pike in 2 days. I personally put 10 on the ice. I still can’t believe it. It was a long day and just before I strapped on my headlamp to head out and pull the traps, I landed my largest fish ever thru the ice, (pic of me smiling/kneeling). Our scale was frozen dead with drained batteries so we weren’t sure how heavy it was. I was guessing close to 10lbs. It was a beauty. Every fish but one had amazing colors. The water appeared crystal clear and the fish were all perfect. Some had blue and even purple coloring mixed in to the green and yellow. One fish (see video clip) had some sort of sore or blister on it’s side. Every Northern Pike that we caught was successfully released.
We checked out around 9am and headed home. Rt 2, 89, and 93 were covered with speed traps.

A special thanks to Bruce Batchelder of Holiday Harbor Motel. Bruce runs a very clean motel and bait/tackle shop. Bruce is also local to the area and very knowledgeable about the northern part of Lake Champlain. He’s not one to keep tactics and locations to himself. If you’re interested in pulling up some nice Pike, check out Holiday Harbor Motel in North Hero, VT.

Info: http://www.holidayharbormotelvt.com/
Holiday Harbor Motel, North Hero, VT 1-802-372-4077

Lake Champlain - Pike Blister - VIDEO CLIP

Lake Champlain – North Hero, VT

Day 1: After a 5 hour drive Thursday night, we were in North Hero around 11pm.
North Hero is a large island in a small chain that make up the “Grand Isles” . We were roughly 7 miles from the Canadian border. For us, it was about 260 miles. The name of the motel we stayed at was the “Holiday Harbor Motel”.
We woke up at 5am, the bait shop/motel lobby opened at 6am. One hour to suit up and ready our gear was more than enough time. Walking in to the bait shop patrons are greeted with Vermont’s Northern Pike State Record. I believe it was 38lbs and change. A monster. What a great bait shop. The array of bait alone is enough to make your head spin. Available bait was as followed: Sm, Med, Lg, Xlg, XXLg, and XLPike Shiners, and Suckers. After buying a coffee, we walked out with roughly $40 in bait.
The shanty we rented was closest to the motel and was only about a 10 minute walk. Not a problem.
After punching out 20 holes (Champlain in VT &NY allows 15 tip-ups p/p) we began to setup. We ran an X type configuration with 5 traps facing outward in each direction from the shanty. One row running towards the shore, one out deep, and one to the R and one to the L. As half of the traps were set, Andy landed a nice Largemouth. After the remaining traps were set, I landed my first Northern thru the ice (pictured).
Just after 9am a front moved in and it began snowing which continued throughout the day. Around the 9am window, as soon as the pressure dropped and the front moved in across the Lake, the flags began to pop. It’s the first time I’ve ever witnessed this in real time. The immediate pressure drop and storm had a direct and immediate effect on the fishing.
We started hitting the fish pretty good. At one point we had a double header (both with Pike at once). Running steel leaders is a must. All hook sets were workable. There was one minor surgery that took place but I ended up getting the worst of it, see pic of what a Northern’s teeth can do. I should note that I was also using large needle nose pliers!
After lunch I walked back and picked up another dozen XL shiners*.
Throughout the day, I ended up catching 3 more with a total of 4 Northern’s and I managed to pull up a small Perch inside the shanty using a Swedish Pimple.
Andy also caught a few nice ones. We kept commenting in how shocking it was to continually pull up these large fish. Every fish we caught was bigger than any fish we’ve ever pulled thru the ice in the past 20 years. Within about 2 hours of fishing I broke my personal best. What a day.
* I should note, the state of Vermont now requires anyone who has purchased live bait to carry a bait permit (issued at purchase). Bait is only permitted for use for up to 48 hours. Bait was not allowed to leave the lake. We left a few shiners out on the ice and they actually made it thru the night.

Skatutakee Lake - Harrisville, NH

Andy and I met my cousin-in-law and his two sons (pictured) at Skatutakee Lake in Harrisville, NH.
Not an easy place to be at 5:45am. I think it was roughly 60 or so miles and about a 3rd of the way was a windy secondary road.
I bought bait the night before at the Natick Outdoor Store to save travel time. We were still about 30 minutes late. It was around 20 degrees at days break. Both Andy and I drilled and cleaned 20 holes. We had our 10 traps setup in about 30 minutes. It was slow going. The auger was acting up and the holes were icing right over.
Between the hours of 7am-1pm we had only 4 flags. Pictured is the only fish landed, a small malnourished looking Pickerel.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skatutakee_Lake

Assabet River, Ben Smith Dam - Maynard

After driving over the 117 bridge and looking over at the dam it looked too good to pass up. I knew it wouldn't produce much of anything but wanted to at least give it a try. I took maybe 20 casts at different locations from the falls down 100 yrds. I used the black/silver Rooseter Tail hoping a Pickerel or even a Sunfish would be awake. I'll re-vistit the dam in 3+ months.

Heards Pond - Wayland

We finally made it back to Heards after a month of bad weather, holidays, etc... We set out for a later shift of fishing. Picked out Andy at 1pm and bought '08 licenses at the Natick Outdoor Store as well as picked up some nice Shiners. We were totally setup at Heards by 2:30pm and fished until about 4:30. We had 3 flags the entire time we were there and the only fish landed was this nice bloddy Pikckerel.

The other 30 fisherman complete with snowmobiles didn't help conditions much. I think it's time to give Heard's a break.