A Massachusetts guide offers sage advice going into his 30th year of putting clients on fish.
It was still dark and the deck was wet with dew in the early October morning, as the 31-foot Jupiter center console headed south from Gloucester Harbor toward Stellwagen Bank. A light northwest wind came off the land and was behind them as the boat rhythmically dipped and rose at 30 knots throwing phosphorescent spray to either side. Four-stroke outboards are quiet at idle, but they made themselves heard as the twin outboards churned a widening wake through the dark, 60-degree Massachusetts Bay waters.
On The Grounds
The glow of the compass light and the muted electronics cast an incomplete light on Captain Nat Moody’s face, along with his two clients, Bob and Tommy from Waterford, CT and mate, Hugo. The bottom began to rise from 269 feet two miles back and now it rose quickly, climbing to 140 then sharply up to 105 feet.
They could see the anchor lights of six boats fishing on this most northerly edge from 5 miles back and now their deck lights showed that each boat had two to three rods in swivel holders and balloons floated at the edge of the pool of light.
The northwest wind was stronger now, as Nat gave all the anchored boats a mile wide berth then kept heading south. Eight minutes later, Nat gradually came off plane and began a slow zig-zag search pattern along the edge with his eyes glued to the screens and yesterday’s mark. As they drew closer to the previous day’s fishing spot, signs of bait became more prominent. Groups of shearwaters sat in the darkness and more than a dozen storm petrels were flitting in and out of the Jupiter’s deck lights. In less than 100 yards the machine lit up with bait from the bottom right up to the surface, just as the GPS cursor crossed where they had anchored up yesterday. It is amazing how a small change in the bottom can draw such piles of bait on this edge and tide.
Nat made a few more passes across the pile of bait, then drifted for a moment to gauge how the boat would sit on anchor. As they drifted, the solid bait reading on the sounder, became distorted with a large empty space in the middle. Nat nodded to Hugo to drop the anchor.
The most important attributes of a successful fisherman are likely a keen sense of observation and a commitment to time on the water. There are many good fishermen that can only fish once or twice in a week. In comparison, consider that Captain Nat, at 52 years old, has fished roughly 180 days a year for the last 29 years as a professional guide and is a keen observer of the constantly changing marine life in the waters he fishes. Time on the water and a sharp eye has given Captain Nat a body of knowledge on bluefin tuna and striped bass behavior that can’t be duplicated without a commensurate amount of time spent fishing with that keen sense of observation.
Wide-reaching Roots
Nat grew up in Beverly, MA and was fortunate to be part of a family that made spending time on Cape Cod beaches during the bass fishing months a priority. Like Frank Daignault’s family, who lived out of a four-wheel drive camper on the Cape’s beaches, commercial bass fishing at night and sleeping during the day, Nat and his Dad fished sand eels on high/low rigs and slung plugs at night, then slept during the day, while his Mom (an artist) and his sister enjoyed the beach during daylight hours. “My Dad knew Frank [Daignault] and I was the beneficiary, not only of a Mom and sister that appreciated the Cape, but a Dad that loved fishing as much as I do,” Nat recalled.
After years fishing the Cape and the Canal from shore, Nat’s Dad purchased a Lund aluminum skiff and they gave up driving to the Cape to learn how to fish bass in the nearby Essex River and Ipswich Bay. That 16-foot skiff was just the first of many boats that Nat has used to ply his trade in the waters off Gloucester including his current 31-foot Jupiter center console, the Night Heron, with its twin 300 HP Suzuki outboards.
Trout fishing is actually one of the best ways to learn how to fish tidal waters. Trout align themselves in a river so that they don’t waste energy to maintain their feeding position, then begin feeding when the conditions for doing so are optimal. It seems that Nat is smarter than most of us, as his college years included trout fishing in Montana, some of which was for college credit. Striped bass holding at the edge of a break in the current and giant bluefin sweeping up from the deep water to feed at slack water are examples of that fish feeding behavior that Nat “studied” by fishing trout during his time out west.
On the Fly
After college, while working in a boat yard, Nat was asked to get his six-pack license to run the boatyard’s launch. A six-pack license, a love of fishing and a trusted fishing partner in Derek Spingler lead to the creation of First Light Anglers guiding and tackle business, located first in Manchester, then in Rowley, MA. For 19 years, the tackle store was the local hub for tuna and bass fishermen, particularly for those who fly-fished. Wintertime fly tying evenings at the shop, helped many get through that time between the last cast in the fall and the next cast during the following spring.
“Giant bluefin tuna are my favorite to fish for,” says Nat, “but my preferred fishing rod is actually a fly rod.” Although it is more common that Nat is using 130-class gear for bluefin, given the choice and a day off from guiding, he would rather be chasing one species or another using the long wand. That said, he and Derek could fairly be said to have pioneered fly fishing for bluefin tuna in New England during the 1990’s. While 50-pound bluefin might have been the ideal target with a fly rod, big fish often eat small baits and Nat’s largest fly rod bluefin tipped the scales at 210 pounds and measured 75 inches.
Striped bass of all year classes whether on the sandy shallows of Ipswich Bay or tight to the rocky island-studded coast from Gloucester Harbor south, will feed on smaller bait. Nat loves guiding fly fishing clients into the shallow, foamy water where a well-placed cast might find a 40-inch bass willing to inhale a streamer. Spin fishermen and live bait anglers, as well, benefit from Nat’s knowledge of which structure will hold feeding fish on a certain wind and stage of the tide. Some October mornings will be devoted to bass charters, but typically, Nat concentrates on bass fishing from the end of May through July, then focusses on tuna for the balance of the year.
Many anglers know of Nat by virtue of the YouTube video available online which chronicles a battle where he and his charter landed a 712-pound bluefin on a Tiagra 50 and a 90-pound test fluoro leader. “We were sort of lucky to get that fish,” says Nat. “We had some excellent rod work managing that light leader, the weather was decent and none of the normal things that can go wrong happened”. Fair enough, but it is also true there was some very skillful boat handling that helped land that fish.
No Substitute for Experience
We’d all like to believe that what we learned fishing last year will set us up for more success this year, but every year brings with it different environmental factors (wind direction, water temperature, etc.), bait location/availability, as well as changing predator/prey relationships. Guiding every day allows Nat the opportunity to dial in new patterns of feeding behavior as they develop. Part of the predator/prey landscape includes very large predators such as giant bluefin feeding in the same shallow waters that Nat guides for bass and on occasion, the presence of great white sharks hunting the bass Nat’s clients have just hooked.
“For a couple of weeks, when fishing bass in Ipswich Bay, we had a 10-foot great white that seemed dialed into the sound of my Jupiter,” laughed Nat. “We’d start trolling live mackerel, hook a bass, then there would be a large bulge in the water where the bass was moments before. This happened on multiple days and on more than one occasion we got a good look at that great white.”
Nat has studied and fished virtually every piece of bottom within 30 miles of Gloucester. Asked what advice he’d offer to any angler trying to get better at his or her craft, Nat offered, “You will likely be more successful if you focus your time learning the bottom near your home port, rather than trying to fish a wider area when reports of blitzes are in the news. Keep your fishfinder on all the time you are on the boat and make note of where the bait hangs around and where there is bottom structure that will either hold or guide fish.”
Given that the availability of bait is such a key to catching tuna and bass, I asked Nat if he could give The Fisherman’s readers some guidance to help them locate herring and mackerel on inshore bottom structure. “For mackerel,” Nat advises, “find areas where structure creates a crease or seam in the current or at a tide line,” (also known as a weed line). Current in the ocean is not a single uniform flow, but rather an ever-changing collection of converging and diverging flows due to the shape of the bottom contour, the tide direction and surface winds. Tide lines form where two converging currents come together, potentially at different speeds, the evidence of which is often a collection of floating weed on one side and clear water on the other. “Look for mackerel along this weedy edge. Also, if the tide is coming across a shallower area then into deeper water, look for the mackerel to hold in the deeper water just over the edge. Herring prefer sandy bottom.”
Nat continued, “If the tide is running up a steep edge, look for the herring to be at the top of that edge. Conversely, if the current is running from shallower depths to the deeper water just over a steep edge, look for herring to be in the deeper water.”
The Lure of Guiding
Not everyone that is a good fisherman can be a successful charter boat captain. If you are going to charter, you need to love people. Nat enjoys people. After 29 years of chartering, Nat still wakes up before his alarm goes off and gets a big kick out of solving the fish feeding equation for the new day that will put his customers on fish.
Successfully fishing for giant bluefin tuna requires Nat to consider a host of factors including where is there a concentration of bait located near a feeding pathway for the giants he is targeting? What is the tide doing and how will the bait respond to the coming changes in tide, wind and light conditions? What has the feeding pattern been during the last week and is there a preferred time/tide slot when the giants will show up? How will the boat swing on the anchor and what does he have to do to stay on top of the sweet spot throughout the day?
On that cool October morning, before the sun had even lightened the eastern sky, Nat had a plan that he was following. The presence of bait and their behavior on the sounder confirmed that his intuition was good. He carefully dropped his heavy anchor with limited scope, while accounting for how the tide and wind would set the boat. The birds in the air, along with the bait and predator activity on the sounder suggested something good could happen. Slack water didn’t come for another two hours, but 30 minutes after the tide change, the down rod with a bridled live whiting at 90 feet got bit. After the tuna made his first run up-tide, Hugo moved the rod up to the bow swivel rod holder. Bob and Tommy did a good job of keeping the rod bent as Nat danced the Night Heron to keep the best angle on the fish. Fortunately, that northwest wind never amounted to much and being away from the other boats they had the room to end the fight in just over an hour.
Whether you fish for largemouth bass or giant bluefin tuna, consistent success depends on getting “dialed in” to the current conditions that are affecting the feeding behavior of your target species. The variables that affect feeding behavior are always changing from day to day and year to year. If you get the chance to fish with someone that is fishing 180 days each year, you will benefit by their nuanced understanding of all they have observed. Fishing with a professional guide is not only for the fisherman who wants to increase his odds of a good catch, but also for any of us that are interested in sharpening our angling skills.
To learn more about chartering the Night Heron with Nat, you can contact him through his website at nightheronfishing.com or on Instagram at @nightheronfishing.
