Maine Fishing Reports

Striped Bass fishing on the Kennebec River continues to be great. With water temps in the mid 70s most of the mid day action is on Bucktail jigs and live bait. Fly fishing and light tack lure fishing is productive early before the sun gets bright. We have some open dates in August, call or email today to book your charter!

Kennebec River and Casco Bay Fishing Conditions: Very Good - The river flow is returning to normal levels. Water temps range from the mid-70s up river to 60* on the beaches. Striped bass are staged throughout the River in structure.

Best Striped Bass Fly Fishing Technics: Surface activity is becoming less common with the rise in water temp. Blind cast near structure and rips. Cover lots of water and you'll find them. Go early, by mid morning the stripers have full bellies and are hard to entice.

Best Striper Light Tackle / Spin Fishing Technics: Bucktail jigs and shad bodies are working great along rips and banks.

My Fly Fishing Tip of the Week: Watch for birds diving on bait then use your sounder to locate schools of striped bass. Fish slow and deep especially after sunrise.

7 Day Outlook: Fishing will improve with reduced flow now that the noon is waning.

I get asked from time to time if rainy weather affects the fishing... My smart-alecky answer usually is " Nope, the fish are already wet". I had a great week meeting folks from all over the country who braved the rain and fog with good results I might add...
I'll let you decide if fish care if its raining.

Kennebec River and Casco Bay Fishing Conditions: Stripers are spread throughout the River right now. No big schools or sustained top water feeds now that the water temps have reached the high 60s and low 70s. The river is full of river herring, alewives, sea herring and sand eels. The stripers are all fat and happy. Mid day fishing is tuff so go early and late.

Best Striped Bass Fly Fishing Technics: Surface activity is becoming less common with the rise in water temp. Use your best small mouth bass technics; blind cast structure and rips. Cover lots of water and you'll find them. Go early, by mid morning the stripers have full bellies and are hard to entice.

Best Striper Light Tackle / Spin Fishing Technics: Stripers are settling in on their summer ledges hangouts. Heavy bucktails and shad bodies are working great. Carolina rigged bait is beginning to produce and will be the hot set up over the next several weeks.

My Fly Fishing Tip of the Week: Water surface temps are now in the mid 70s. The stripers will be holding in deeper water. Use Depthcharge lines and weighted flies.

7 Day Outlook: Big tides are causing strong currents throughout the river, Water clarity is improving. There are lots of stripers in the River but the bite is early and late in the day due to warm water and full bellies.

More photos of the fun Fly fishing and light tackle fishing on the Kennebec river.

Here are some of the pictures from last week's fly fishing and light tackle spin fishing Charters. We continue to have some of the best striper action in years. email or gve us a call to book you trip.

Fishing Conditions: Water levels and flow are returning to normal. The River is clearing up from all the run off last week. Water temp is in the mid-60s. There is an abundance of bait throughout the lower river.

Bait the fish are eating: Sand eels, Juvenile herring, river herring, mackerel

Best Technics:Look for surface action early then fish the rips and banks when the sun gets bright. 

Tip of the Week: Rig up with both floating and sinking lines. Late June fly fishing provides a variety of situations from surface feeds to fish staged on structure 15-20 feet below the surface.

 7 Day Outlook: In a word – Great! We are seeing some of the best striped bass fly fishing in years here on the Kennebec. There are fish arriving in the River daily and the bait is plentiful.

Fly fishing on a windy and overcast June morning on the Kennebec River.  We had these fish all to ourselves for almost an hour. Fred boated over twenty fish before the tide changed and the school settled out. We were using an 8wt Orvis H2 with a floating line and 16# tippet.

Tom and Naomi Nicholl from Plattsburg, NY enjoyed a morning of fly fishing for striped bass on the Kennebec River this week. Here’s some of the action caught on video. We had a good blend of surface feeding fish and blind casting throughout the morning despite very high water levels, turbidity and strong current. There are more stripers showing up in the River daily thanks to the huge amount of bait available for them to munch on! 2014 is going to be a very good year!

Fishing Conditions: Mid June fishing is here! Schools of Striped Bass are arriving in the Kennebec River daily. Water levels will be high this week. Run off from heavy rains over the past weekend will lower the water clarity through mid-week.

Bait the striped bass  are eating: Sand eels, Juvenile herring, river herring, mackerel

Best Fly fishing and Light Tackle Fishing Technics: Watch for surface feeding striped bass throughout the river and along the beaches. Use floating and intermediate lines and smaller flies at the mouth and along the beaches. Use large, brighter flies in the river until the water clarity improves mid week.

Fishng Tip of the Week: Great time of year to watch for bird activity indicating surface feeding striped bass.

7 Day Kennebec Fishng Outlook: By mid week the water clarity and flow level in the River should improve until then, the beach is the place to be.

Our 5^th season in Boca Grande / Charlotte Harbor winds down June 7^th. We’ll be closing up the house and heading north a few days later. Along the way we’ll be stopping in the Orvis Stores in Atlanta, GA and Charlotte, NC to do some networking and drop off some brochures. There are several posts, videos and pictures about the great season we had in the Florida section of the website.

We’ll be operating from the Kennebec Tavern and Marina again this year (our 23^rd year there!) A great big Thank you to Gene, Kristy and Peter for putting up with me and the steady flow of clients passing through their dockside deck every summer. Can’t wait to “Kick Back on the Kennebec” with a cold HSA and a plate Tavern Nachos with Barb. Hope to see you there!

Memorial Day weekend is the start of striped bass fishing on the Kennebec River. With a bit of work you can find the first Kennebec striped bass. They show up in the River at the same time as they do on the flats and in the marshes of southern Maine. Tip; work the edges of mud flats with light tackle jigs and fly fish for them with a sinking fly line. The sun warms the water over the dark colored mud attracting bait. The stripers will be there too. Now don't catch them all before I gat back to Maine on the 14th!

Thanks to my good friend Jerry Jamison for this selfy.

We’ve been doing weekly Kennebec Estuary fishing reports for the Orvis website for over 5 years. You’ll find; water conditions, hot flies, tactics that are working, an outlook for the coming week and tips on how to increase your catch. There are Orvis Fishing Reports from all across the country and international destinations at: www.orvis.com/fishingreports . This is a great resource for planning your next fishing trip. Past Reports can be viewed in our Maine Fishing Reports section. We also do the Orvis Fishing Report for our winter haunt: Charlotte Harbor, Pine Island Sound and Ding Darling Refuge.

I serve as the ASMFC Striped Bass Advisory Panel Vice Chair and thought it important to post this.

The ASMFC Striped Bass Management Board is drafting an addendum to address potential overfishing. The addendum will be voted on at the August meeting. If approved, public scoping meetings will take place along the entire Atlantic coast this fall. The Striped Bass Technical Committee has recommended reducing mortality to avoid reaching the overfishing threshold. Striped bass mortality has been steadily increasing and the young of the year index (spawning in Chesapeake Bay) has been below average for several years resulting in an overall reduction in striped bass abundance. It is extremely important for striped bass anglers all along the coast to urge their State fisheries agencies to put this important addendum out for public comment. The fishing public deserves the opportunity to express their views on this valuable public resource FMI> ASMFC press release: http://www.asmfc.org/uploads/file/53766f04pr15StripedBassDraftAddIVupdate.pdf

Spring is coming. I'm guiding in Charlotte Harbor currently and making plans for the upcoming Maine guiding season. I'm looking forward to seeing you all in June! Capt. Dave Pecci

Long day yesterday. Prepping the boat at 4:45am cleaned up and left the dock at 6:30pm. Both striped bass trips were fun and productive though the afternoon was a bit slower than the morning. Burton McConnell and his son-in-law from Canada got a 17 pound 37" Kennebec River striped bass on spinning fishing gear during the morning trip along with two slot fish and 4 other stripers from 28" to 33". The girls on the afternoon trip with their parents caught smaller striped bass in the lower Kennebec near Popham Beach including one for supper.

Offshore shark fishing was a bit slow but Reagan (10) his grandpa Steve and Donna all got to land A blue shark. Reagan by the way, is a bait catching machine keeping us in fresh mackerel and pollock the entire trip. Videos coming but for now check out the poses this ocean sunfish (Mola Mola) gave us on the ride out through Eastern Casco Bay! Both profile and vertical shots. At one point it was scratching its back on the bottom of the Obsession. We also saw a small pod of Porpoise but they were not as willing to be photographed as the sunfish. Nope, no great white sightings, sorry.

Another nice day inshore fishing on the Kennebec River. The strong Northerly winds made the striped bass a bit squirrely but we persisted... Had a small blitz of schoolies on the surface early eating our spin fishing gear and then we changed over to eels mid morning.

07-28-13 Kennebec River /Casco Bay Fishing Report - We’re closing in on August and the fly fishing and light tackle fishing continues as if it were early July! Tons of bait and active striped bass are throughout the lower Kennebec. We’re catching fish from 18” – 36” each charter. Fly fishing is good early. As the sun gets bright changing to fishing deep with bait on spinning rods is working great. Gulf of Maine Shark fishing trips start this coming week. Stand by for reports and picture… I have 9 open mornings in August and many afternoons as well. Let’s go fishing!

Have I mentioned I love striped bass fishing on foggy mornings? Yeh, I have... Chuck and Jocelyn O'Neill from Hawaii had a great morning on the Kennebec River spin fishing today using light light tackle.