On board today I had Col. Richard “The Machine” Comstock (Ret.) for Day 2 of fly fishing only striped bass.

At first light, we had a West wind and about a solid acre of top water bass rolling around Bug Light in a feeding frenzy. The fish were coming in on the tide. Richard fished a Clouser minnow in Chartreuse/White and also in a Chartreuse/yellow and the bass hit them both well. He also threw a top water popper in red/white on a floating line and much to our delight, the bass slammed the popper!

After the frenzy ended and the fish were no where in site (how do a couple thousand fish disappear?) We started fishing structure. Some of my spots were filled with boats, as this is Memorial Day weekend – one of the busiest boating weekends on the bay. Those places were unfishable, so we moved to some new water that I had not fished yet this year and we found fish! To my amazement, the fish were very tight to shore, coming out of the rocks to hit out fly patterns. Most of the fish were small, but an absolute blast on fly gear. We set numerous drifts and caught a bunch of fish before moving on.

We cut across the bay and tried fishing the same way in rocky structure, tight to shore, but not a fish was around. We then moved down the coast and fished some deeper waters and found fish. Some were down deep and we had to count to 12″ seconds to get the fly down. Other fish would pop up now and then and we would catch them on top water.

We cut across the bay again to our last spot of the morning and were delighted to find lots of top water striped bass busting bait at high noon under sunny skies! We fished the popper and landed several fish and then switched up to Clouser and caught a few more.

Total catch and release today was 35 striped on the fly. It was WSW, breezy, and close to 90 degrees. A lovely late spring day on the bay that felt more like August weather. Tonight the winds turn ENE and temps will drop back into the 50’s with rain. A nice break from today’s humid heat.

Back at it. Stay posted:

Capt. Dave, BAYMEN, www.baymenlife.com