Striped Bass Fishing Trip, late August 2026. During my biennial visit to the Boston area to visit my siblings, we will charter a guide to take my middle brother and I fishing for striped bass. Even though he only fishes a single day every two years or so (he’s more into golf), he is game and I really appreciate that. We hired Captain Nick Kathmann of Fly Guy Fish Guides for this year’s trip, a new guide for us. Pre-dawn, we left from Winthrop (a peninsula just northeast of Boston and Logan Airport) in his 27; Conch skiff.
His twin Mercury 225hp engines and high resolution radar carried us through the dawn fog to the waters off Salem and Marblehead.
Nick was looking for any sign of a school of large stripers that were seen here over the weekend. We were hoping that we might see fish busting menhaden (aka, “bunker”) at the surface or some bird activity that would indicate stripers underneath. After searching for almost an hour, we decided to go to plan B. A guide friend of Nick’s reported on the radio that he had found a school of large stripers off Scituate, approximately 25 miles to the south. Before putting the hammer down, we jigged up 20 live mackerel to use as bait.
Cruising at 30 knots, we were off Scituate relatively quickly, albeit a bit frozen due to the wet, cold fog and high rate of travel.
Nick prepared two bait rods and for me he set up a 9wt. Scott rod with a Hardy reel, a sinking line, and a long, thin yellowish streamer fly for me.
The plan was for Nick to use his side-scan sonar to find the tight school of stripers resting just off the bottom in 10-20’ of water. I would cast my fly rod from the bow. For the bait rods, Nick inserted a circle hook behind the second dorsal of a frisky mackerel. When cast out, the live mackerel landed on the water with a loud splat, ringing the brunch bell for the stripers. A monster would emerge from the school, chase the fleeing mackerel and finally engulf the bait.
My brother was fishing one bait rod and the second for me as a “pass-through” from Nick. Phil hooked the first striper. It put up an amazing battle. Nick grabbed it with a Boga grip and brought it over the gunwale. This was a huge striper, 38 lbs and 44” (probably 20ish years old). It was easily the biggest striped bass that either of us had ever caught.
The circle hook was in the jaw and easy to unhook. After a few pictures, Nick released the fish and it swam off strongly.
We then cruised around to find the striper school again. Rinse and repeat. My brother hooked up again quite quickly and the second live bait rod when off at about the same time. I secured the fly rod / line and grabbed the second rod from Nick. My brother’s was about 38” and 25lb and mine was similar.
This one fish weighed more than all the other striped bass that I have caught in a decade of striper fishing… Back at it, I saw a disturbance at the surface just starboard of the bow and ink casting distance. I dropped a cast just in front the disturbance and the water just exploded literally as the fly hit the surface. I almost fell out of the boat trying to set the hook. This fish had struck at the fly before I had time to tight up on the slack in the leader and I never hooked up. Argghhh, but encouraging…
I kept casting blindly off the bow. It didn’t help that the fish school seem to be off the port side of the boat most often. This required a backhand cast for this lefty casting from the bow. Finally, I laid out a nice cast, let the fly sink for 10 seconds and started to strip the fly back. Something engulfed my fly. I strip-set the line to set the hook. And it was game on. It was good battle back and forth, but Nick soon had the fish’s lip in the Boga grip. This one was 34”, 18lbs. by far the biggest striper that I have caught on a fly (I had caught quite a few striped bass while fishing the Roanoke River in NC).
A few pictures and we sent it on its way. My brother hooked and landed another nice striper, in the 40”, 25lb. neighborhood.
Nick had already gone over the five hour that we had chartered and so it was time to go unfortunately. We passed our remaining live mackerel to Nick’s guide friend. At 30 knots, we were at the outer reaches of Boston Harbor quite quickly. I guesstimate that we covered close to 90 miles at least in that fiveish hour charter. The Boston skyline of the city was off in the distance as Nick slipped his boat off Logan Airport to the Winthrop ramp.
We didn’t catch a large number of fish, but the size more than made up for the lack of numbers.
Steve
His twin Mercury 225hp engines and high resolution radar carried us through the dawn fog to the waters off Salem and Marblehead.
Nick was looking for any sign of a school of large stripers that were seen here over the weekend. We were hoping that we might see fish busting menhaden (aka, “bunker”) at the surface or some bird activity that would indicate stripers underneath. After searching for almost an hour, we decided to go to plan B. A guide friend of Nick’s reported on the radio that he had found a school of large stripers off Scituate, approximately 25 miles to the south. Before putting the hammer down, we jigged up 20 live mackerel to use as bait.
Cruising at 30 knots, we were off Scituate relatively quickly, albeit a bit frozen due to the wet, cold fog and high rate of travel.
Nick prepared two bait rods and for me he set up a 9wt. Scott rod with a Hardy reel, a sinking line, and a long, thin yellowish streamer fly for me.
The plan was for Nick to use his side-scan sonar to find the tight school of stripers resting just off the bottom in 10-20’ of water. I would cast my fly rod from the bow. For the bait rods, Nick inserted a circle hook behind the second dorsal of a frisky mackerel. When cast out, the live mackerel landed on the water with a loud splat, ringing the brunch bell for the stripers. A monster would emerge from the school, chase the fleeing mackerel and finally engulf the bait.
My brother was fishing one bait rod and the second for me as a “pass-through” from Nick. Phil hooked the first striper. It put up an amazing battle. Nick grabbed it with a Boga grip and brought it over the gunwale. This was a huge striper, 38 lbs and 44” (probably 20ish years old). It was easily the biggest striped bass that either of us had ever caught.
The circle hook was in the jaw and easy to unhook. After a few pictures, Nick released the fish and it swam off strongly.
We then cruised around to find the striper school again. Rinse and repeat. My brother hooked up again quite quickly and the second live bait rod when off at about the same time. I secured the fly rod / line and grabbed the second rod from Nick. My brother’s was about 38” and 25lb and mine was similar.
This one fish weighed more than all the other striped bass that I have caught in a decade of striper fishing… Back at it, I saw a disturbance at the surface just starboard of the bow and ink casting distance. I dropped a cast just in front the disturbance and the water just exploded literally as the fly hit the surface. I almost fell out of the boat trying to set the hook. This fish had struck at the fly before I had time to tight up on the slack in the leader and I never hooked up. Argghhh, but encouraging…
I kept casting blindly off the bow. It didn’t help that the fish school seem to be off the port side of the boat most often. This required a backhand cast for this lefty casting from the bow. Finally, I laid out a nice cast, let the fly sink for 10 seconds and started to strip the fly back. Something engulfed my fly. I strip-set the line to set the hook. And it was game on. It was good battle back and forth, but Nick soon had the fish’s lip in the Boga grip. This one was 34”, 18lbs. by far the biggest striper that I have caught on a fly (I had caught quite a few striped bass while fishing the Roanoke River in NC).
A few pictures and we sent it on its way. My brother hooked and landed another nice striper, in the 40”, 25lb. neighborhood.
Nick had already gone over the five hour that we had chartered and so it was time to go unfortunately. We passed our remaining live mackerel to Nick’s guide friend. At 30 knots, we were at the outer reaches of Boston Harbor quite quickly. I guesstimate that we covered close to 90 miles at least in that fiveish hour charter. The Boston skyline of the city was off in the distance as Nick slipped his boat off Logan Airport to the Winthrop ramp.
We didn’t catch a large number of fish, but the size more than made up for the lack of numbers.
Steve
