Greetings from Capt. Dave & BAYMEN!

The season is almost here and this mild winter has got me fired up! First fish is typically caught in our bay April 15th. In my younger years, I wanted bragging rights and always worked hard to try and catch the first striped bass of the season in our local waters. These days, I am happy to chill out a little more and let other anglers have that title. One angler that has won those bragging rights for many, many seasons is angler, Mike Dixon of Marshfield. That kid can fish! Watch and see if he does it again this year…

Now, I will go out on a limb and share with you that there are some anglers who do not want any bragging rights or recognition, that catch early fish and winter holdovers all season long. I did it just once and it was a TON of work to catch a striped bass (on the fly!) every single month of the year on the MA coast… But it was a fun goal to reach.

 That brings us up to the 2024 Striped Bass Season on our doorstep. A little early, but with all the mild weather, I am guessing we could see some early fish. Many years back, I had a client call me from California that wanted to fish for striped bass end of April. I told him not to bother because there were no fish in our bay that early. He said he did not care. He was here for a seminar and really wanted to just wet a line. The next morning, dressed in winter coats, hats and gloves, we dropped in and began our search for “early fish” inside our bay. The night before I prayed hard to God to bless the search. At first light, it looked like a ghost town… No birds, no surface activity, nothing on sonar, and water temps were in the high 40’s. But then we turned a corner to search some flats hoping the water would be warmer up there and I was STUNNED to see two acres of bass rolling on a topwater feed!!! I felt like I was in a dream. My fly angler tied on a Baymen Universal and made his first cast: WHAM! Keeper on the fly! This went on for a solid two hours and then it was over. The fish vanished and we never saw them again. But we caught a ton of fish and if memory serves me right, every single fish landed was a keeper!

2024 marks 31 years Guiding on the Bay. Over these past years BAYMEN charters has landed and released a staggering 93,000 striped bass on the fly and light tackle on the MA coast. I have a goal as a Guide to reach 100,000 striped bass caught and released over my career. I don’t know if we will ever hit that mark and it really does not matter. I have never tried to reach any number of catch and release on any given day of my life. We just search, we fish, and we catch what the bay offers on any given day. Some days it is 15 fish or more, once in a while it is ZERO and some days it is 100 fish. And if you were with Al Uhler, Ted Healey, Jeff Hardenstine and myself on September 13, 2017 it was a BAYMEN Record Morning of 402 striped bass landed and released on light tackle on BAYMEN charters!!!  That record will never be broken on my boat.

My Baymen Log reads for that day: “West wind, high tide dropping. Mother of all blitzes!!! All topwater and never stopped for five solid hours… School of bass was one mile long by one-half mile wide… Fish to 18 pounds on light tackle… Still going strong when we left…” 

Here’s to wishing everyone a great season and Tight Lines Soon…

Capt. David Bitters, BAYMEN, baymenlife.com 31 Years Guiding The Bay. Still In Love.