*Please login or start a membership to access the full version of this podcast.

(07:29):
Well, up next on today's edition of the My Fishing Cape Cod podcast is our great friend Evan Eastman from down at Eastman's Tackle in Falmouth. Evan, how are you today?

(07:40):
I'm doing great, thanks Kevin. How are you doing out there?

(07:43):
Doing well. Wishing I was home. A little bit jealous of you back on Cape and beautiful Falmouth. First of all, how did the storm affect you guys down there?

(07:54):
It really didn't affect us much at all. My boat stayed in the water as well as my dad's. Pretty much everybody in our marina kept their boats in the water and I'm super glad that we did that. There was really, other than Buzzards Bay, I heard Buzzards Bay that there was peak waves between five and seven feet, but the way the direction of the wind was, the south side of Falmouth really was not affected at all.

(08:23):
Well good to hear that not only you and your dad and your boats, but that Eastman sport and tackle escaped Hurricane Lee unscathed. And what has it done to the fishing, if anything at all, Evan, I know it was way out in the ocean spinning around, but I'm hoping it didn't kill the Albee fishing for you.

(08:41):
It really did not. And surprisingly it has improved the fishing, if anything, really the first day after that people could actually fish. The south side of Falmouth was loaded with Albee's. I mean I talked to guys who were saying there were schools of, I don't know, a hundred all foaming on the surface all day from Wao to Tar Poin, particularly early in the week was really, really good at, I talked to guys who were fishing right off a surf drive right in front of Falmouth Harbor right in front of Manon Beach. And then later that day it seemed like they had pushed down along the Elizabeth A. Little bit. But the fishing has been really, really good. And the couple days before the storm showed up, it seemed like all the fish were in Buzzards Bay, kind of just south of Cleveland's ledge and then looked like Buzzards Bay got the brunt of the wind and those fish had pushed down to the south side.

(09:48):
But there are still fish in Buzzards Bay. I was hearing that today in front of Old Silver Beach there was some really good fishing going on. And so it seems at least as far as Albee goes, ever since the storm, it's been really good. But I'm not totally surprised. This stretch of their Albee season is arguably the best. So maybe more Alves arrived from all those fish that were around the Tuna Ridge area, they could have got pushed up closer up to the Cape. And so it seems like the last week, week and a half, it's been very, very good.

(10:26):
Now, from your experience, Evan, as we sit here in the third week of September taping this podcast, how late can you expect these fish to stay consistently around and consistently biting now with the caveat that we don't get another big blow?

(10:41):
Yeah, last year my last L V I caught was on November 7th and I'm sure they were around another week and a half after that. So potentially they could stick around till the middle to the end of November. And like you said, there's a lot of variables involved, but the one thing that's in we have going for us is the amount of bait that's around. It's just still a tremendous amount of bait. And like you said, I think it was 2018, there was a hurricane we got at the beginning of October and after that it seemed like the Alves had disappeared. But last year, I remember that day it was like high sixties degree air temperature and we were fishing off tmu and no one else was fishing. I could have caught 30 or 40 if I really wanted to. There were so many around still in November. So I think we can expect them to be here probably through at least until the end of October I hope.

(11:43):
Awesome. Evan, and you mentioned all the bait in the water. That's been a consistent theme that I've been hearing about from folks back home. Are there a lot of peanuts? Is it rain bait? What's swimming around?

(11:53):
Yeah, it seemed like when I was catching fish last Tuesday, I was fishing Buzzards Bay and they're eating those small bay anchovies I've heard of on the south side of Falmouth. Occasionally it's been that rain bait, but I've been talking to guys who've been fishing inside of born's pond and grape pond and they've seen some bigger peanut bunker and I'm hoping at some point the Alves start feeding on those bigger baits because when they do that they definitely become a little bit easier to catch. We could see some bigger silver sides arrive too, but it seems like it's an either small bay anchovies or the rain bait.

(12:33):
Well that's good to hear. And how about Benito? It's been a neglected funny fish. Everyone's focused on the Abe's, but are there still some bones mixed in?

(12:41):
There are. I actually talked to one of my good customers this morning. He was off of Lackey's and he got a bonito and a few other. And yeah, I'm seeing and talking to guys, it's hard to specifically target 'em, but they are mixed in with the ALBs. I've seen it over the last week, a bunch of guys saying they've got 'em seen it on Instagram and the internet. And so there definitely is some bonito around, which is this time last year there was none around. So that's definitely a good thing. And I'm also seeing some guys getting some Spanish mackerel too, so they're mixed in.

(13:19):
Very cool, very cool to hear about the different species being taken and along those kind of fall species. Let's talk about to tog. I know that's something that some of your customers like to try their hand at in the fall. What are you hearing about tog?

(13:33):
Yeah, for sure. I mean more guys are starting to buy tog jigs and crabs and getting them along. The Elizabeth Ska, which are two of the most popular place is to fish and guys are getting them. And usually we'll see once guys have got their kind of fill of albe, they'll start targeting tog more and more and they always will bring, my customers always will bring an albu rod and chances are when if they're anchored up along the Elizabeth, the S are going to pop up next to 'em. But got green crabs, just got an order of Joe bags lay perfect tog jigs, so fully stocked with the jigs and rigs. And so yeah, every day that passes and the water cools down a little bit more. Seems like more and more show up. So yeah, that's definitely starting to kick off for sure.

(14:23):
Well that's awesome to hear. It's a great fishery underrated if you ask me. They're a great fighting fish and they're excellent table fair even though I know a lot of the folks really are focused on the alves this time of year

(14:36):
For sure. But this is when I usually start to see more guys anchored up. Well, I'm chasing Alves. I can see usually the last five or six years is where you really see a dozen or so who are all anchored up from lackey's down to Robinson's or more. And I like to tog fish myself, but Aldi's is probably my favorite thing to do, so I tend to fish for them a little bit more. But yeah, it's a lot of fun and yeah, they make tremendous table fare.

(15:11):
The last thing I wanted to touch on Evan fishing wise was the tuna bite. I know there's been some yellowfin around south.

(15:17):
Yeah, yeah, it didn't really seem like the storm did much to them. I've talked to a few guys who've gone down to the Tuna Ridge area and they said it was red hot guys jigging them up, trolling them up a few surface feeds as well. But yeah, I mean in addition to Tuna Ridge, I know guys were going to southeast of there to the dump from middle of the dump all the way, pretty much the whole dump depending on the day has had quite a bit of elephant. So that by itself, I know the winds are going to be kicking up here over the next few days into the weekend, so it might be tough to get down there. But up to this point since the storm, the fishing's been really good so I expect that to carry into October as well as the bluefin bite too.

(16:13):
And last but not least, let's talk about the shop. I know you survived Lee, but anything good going on in the store you want to tell the people about?

(16:22):
Well this weekend, like I said, it might be a little tough to get out there and fish. It's supposed to rain on Saturday, so if you're looking to gear up, like I said, I just got some togs in from Joe bags. I know those are super popular, so fully geared up for Togs Aldi's, same thing with anything Twitter related. So if you're not able to go out fishing, come down the shop and say hi.

(16:51):
Awesome Evan, thanks so much for making some time to check in with us on this week's podcast and we'll talk to you in a couple of weeks when we turn the calendar into October.

(16:59):
Alright, great, thanks Kev.