PLUM ISLAND — Mike Hosker of Surfland Bait and Tackle on Plum Island reported yesterday that a man caught the year;s first striper near 44th Street while surf casting, signaling fishing season in the area is ready to begin.
The fish was just 16 inches — keepers must be 28 inches — but Hosker said it means the big ones can't be far behind.
"Any day we should be seeing the push (of stripers,)" said Derek Springler, owner of First Light Anglers in Rowley. "On the South Shore and Cape, they are loaded down there. So literally in the next couple of days."
At the beginning of the week, Gloucester reported its first striper of the season.
"They are coming right up the coast right now, real fast," a worker at Bridge Road Bait and Tackle in Salisbury said.
At Crossroads Bait and Tackle in Salisbury, Lance Thole said he heard reports of "schoolies," or sexually immature fish, in the Merrimack River, but no keepers yet.
He said fishermen are seeing shad and river herring in the area — another sure sign the big stripers are on their way north.
"When the shads are in, the big boys are usually right behind them," he said. "It shouldn't be too long now."
But a phenomenon happening now with herring — a desirable food for stripers, and a favorite bait used by fishermen — may have an impact on striper fishermen, and is expected to have a big impact on lobstermen.
There are lots of herring around, but they are miles from the shore. The area stretching 40 miles off the coast from the Bay of Fundy to Cape Cod is currently teeming with Atlantic herring, a species related to river herring. But it is a regulated "no-fish" zone from June 1 through Sept. 30 for the midwater trawlers that usually haul them in.
Combine that with the huge increases in diesel fuel prices that will limit searching for fish, and it promises to make fresh herring hard to find and very expensive this season.
The impact of the effort to protect the Atlantic herring is inevitable — higher prices for the bait prized by lobstermen, and maybe shortages at any price later in the summer. Fishermen in Gloucester predict there could be stretches as long as six weeks without the bait.
Springler of Rowley said even last year it was a challenge to get fresh herring, but he said the shortage isn't likely to affect too many sport fishermen. He said typically frozen herring, clams, sea worms and mackerel — all tasty delicacies to stripers — are readily available.
"It shouldn't have a huge impact," he said.
Staff reporter Richard Gaines contributed to this report.
