Striper Flies for the Flats

The old axiom "Big Baits = Big Fish" is actually true in most striper fishing scenarios on Cape Cod and is a great starting point in most cir-cumstances. Big Striped Bass are hardwired to make the most of feed-ing opportunities and often show a decided preference for larger, pro-tein rich offerings in most of their preferred spots. However, big stripers that can be found on the miles of sand flats that line the Cape Cod shoreline typically are there to feed on the thousands of small sandeels, spearing and crabs that call the sand flats home. When stripers "zone in" on these smaller baits, size and profile can become critical to imitate if you hope to catch anything.

Anyone who has extensive experience fishing the flats of Cape Cod have stories of high sun, clear water days...where packs or solitary stripers "nose" up to flies, in full chase attack mode, until the fly is retrieved almost to the tip of the rod only to veer off at the last second. When this happens, it usually indicates that they are on the feed, but are frustratingly selective about what they are eating. Finicky stripers can usually be enticed to strike by selecting the small-est, thin profiled fly you have in the box. Some anglers will even strip small flies of excess material to reduce size and profile.

 

Chartreuse and white is by far the most popular fly color in most striper patterns...and 90 percent of the time, bass will respond to vir-tually anything presented in this coloration. When the water is gin clear and the sun is beating down on the flat, it is sometimes prudent to tie on something in a more muted, natural coloration.

Our fly boxes are stocked with a small selection of tan and white, olive and white and grey and white sand eel patterns when conditions warrant. If you are going to try your hand at flats fishing, the old stand by clouser minnow, in a 2/0 size, should be well represented in your fly selection, but make sure you bring at least a couple of small epoxy and gummy sandeels in olive and white and blue and white in size 1 or smaller.

 

Lines and leader selection can be just as critical as fly selection for flats stripers. We use either the Rio Striper or Airflo Clear Intermediate lines. If wind is not a factor, we prefer to us the 8 weight set ups for a more delicate presentation. 9 wt will work just fine, just be careful to feather the line at the end of the cast so that the head of the line doesn't land like a bomb in the shallow water. It won't hurt to have a couple of packs of 9-10 foot Fluorocarbon lead-ers with a 15lb tippet. Good fluorocarbon is relatively expensive in comparison to regular mono, but with the same refractive index as the water, it can save the day if the bass get really skittish. Flats fishing is part hunting and part fishing... you will need to have a really good pair of polarized sunglasses(Maui Jim or Saltlife) to see what kind of baits are in the area you are fishing as well as spot the bass at a reasonable distance to make a decent presentation. Use amber lenses for overcast days and grey for full sun. When the fishing gets challenging on the flats, go small to catch big fish..