As of 4:00 PM Oct. 30th, 2007… The 17 Rivers Striper Tournament officially ended. Phew! Congratulations to you all. We do hope you enjoyed the fall striper fishing and caught lots of fish.

Anglers have through Oct. 2nd to get their pictures developed and fish entries submitted. Any fish entries submitted after this date, will not qualify for prizes.

Over the next couple weeks, the Event Organizers will aggregate the fish submissions, determine standings and prepare for the tournament Awards Ceremony. We will be sending out an invitation to all anglers who registered for the tournament inviting you to attend. The event will be held at the Kennebec Tavern (Bath) on October 13th @ 3:30 PM - 5:30 PM. Please mark your calendars and plan to attend. Anglers must be in attendance to receive awards they may have won.

With respect to the tournament standings… as in the reality TV show “Survivor”, you will have to wait until the Awards Ceremony to learn who the winners are. So, if you registered a striper, you should definitely plan to attend… PS. “I don’t have a helicopter, so will be arriving by car”.

The white flag is out and their’s one lap remaining in the race. September 30th has finally arrived. At 4:00 PM today, the tournament officially ends, and from what I’ve heard, many anglers participating in the tournament are glad the months ending. Several individuals have commented on ”how tired they are of fishing”. The odd hours of the tides and the late nights take a lot out of you and require understanding and support on the home front. A month of fishing is a lot of fishing,… and those of us with supportive spouses owe big-time!

Those hardy anglers still working the waters, until the checkered flag falls, must keep in mind fish submissions need to be e-mailed, dropped off at an official registration site or post marked no later than October 2nd, 2007 to qualify for prizes.

Good luck!

This morning I was anticipating less than good conditions due to the heavy showers, but the waters seem to have cleared quickly and the stripers are right back on the bait.

The tides right now are huge flood tides and big drains. This water movement really gets things moving around. With such an abundance of bait the stripers are holding off the mouths of tidal rivers, streams and flats just waiting for the bait to get flushed to them.

This evening as the tide approached low, I watched a huge school of stripers corral a bunch of bait by taking up feeding positions off the mouth of a flat and cutting off their escape. As the tide neared low, the stripers progressively worked the bait back up into the ever shrinking drainage. The feeding frenzy that ensued was awesome! Water flying everywhere… pop, pop, splash… craziness!

With low tides at 7:00 AM & PM it’s definitely time to get out and fish either end of the day. The fish are keying in on small 2″-4″ bait fish, so fly fishermen can count on deceivers or minnow patterns working well and spin fishermen can go right to small rubber shad. That should do the trick.

Only three days of fishing left for those participating in the 17 Rivers Striper Tournament and heavy rains, a result of tropical storm “Karen”, will likely have an impact.

Fresh water from heavy rains doesn’t mix well with salt water and sits on top of the ocean until wave action can mix the concoction. Ever add water to scotch? It’s the same effect. The rain run-off also muddies the water of the tidal bays and rivers, further confounding the stripers ability to see. These factors give the cornered bait a chance to escape and result in the stripers feeding patterns changing.

Yesterday morning and last night we had two major downpours which deposited at least two inches of rain in very brief periods. These types of showers tend not to soak into the ground, but instead run off. Such run offs result in a quick rise in river and stream levels and muddied water. Often these dramatic changes put the stripers off and change their feeding patterns.

Expect action to be slow over the next 24-36 hours. The closer you can get to open ocean, the better. Fishing the slosh near deep waters might be a productive option until the waters begins to clear.

However, as the waters clear the stripers will be hungry and will feed with added intensity. They will work to round up schools of bait and the feeding frenzies will being. Chaos is on the near horizon!

Expect action to pick up Saturday and into Sunday as the weather improves. A Canadian high is expected to push into the region overnight bringing cool dry air and bright sunshine to the areas. Bright days in combination with clearing water can result in hot action during almost any point on the tide. So, don’t be discouraged, get out there and fish hard!

Over the last several days we’ve experienced some crazy fishing. Low tide has been at both ends of the day, bait’s everywhere and some really big fish are being caught.

Ed Gauvin of Bath, registered two fish yesterday at the Kennebec Angler. A 33 inch striper landed using a fly and a 36.5 inch striper using spinning tackle and a rubber shad. Very nice fish… and because of the weighting factors, prize contending entries!

Today, the kids in Phippsburg have their first “no school” day. No it’s not because of snow, but “personal development” for the teachers. As a result, I woke the kids at 5:00 AM to catch some daylight fishing action while the tide was low.

Alex Fernald caught a small striper right off, then repeated the process, but with a much nicer fish. This time, the striper peeled line off the reel and the battle lasted 10 minutes before Alex brought the fish to the bank.

This fish measured 30 inches and is the largest striper Alex has ever caught. Shortly thereafter, Alex asked to go home,… “my hands hurt from all the reeling”.

Note the glow of pride emanating from his father as Alex displays the catch for the camera.

It was a full moon last night and that typically spells trouble… and chaos.

So, I decided to go fishing at 2:30 AM which magnified the nature of the struggle, but it was well worth the effort.

At 3:45 AM I felt the tap of a striper picking up the bait. When I set the hook, a few minor head shakes led me to believe I’d hooked a schoolie. Then a blistering run.  ZZZZZZZZ… ZZZZZZ…ZZZZZZZZ. This was NO schoolie. The fish turned and headed for open ocean taking a couple hundred yards of line off the spool in a mater of seconds. Whoa!

This initial run was complicated by the fact the striper headed around the only lobster pot in the vicinity, then proceeded to chug and splash around.

We jumped into the boat and headed out to untangle the line from the lobster pot. The fish had gone completely around the pot warp, but unbelievably it was still on.

After a few minutes of friggin, we got the line untangled, the kelp off the leader and put the fish back on the spool. Our head lamps were on, and as the fish came up from the depths we got our first look at this behemoth. I started shaking immediately,… this was one huge striper!

As the bow of the boat beached on the shore, I jumped out and eased the fish into the shallows. She was tuckered out and beached easily. With out a doubt, this is one of the largest fish I’ve ever caught! Can the tournament organizer enter a fish?

She was 41 inches long and had a girth of 22 inches… and this time I’d brought the camera. Unfortunately the gilly wasn’t very adept at photography.

My new nickname - “Nearly Headless Nick”!

Charlie Gill IV boated  a nice 22″ schoolie. Congratulations Charlie… Nice fish!

Junior Division participants… We’ve got some nice prizes to give away, so you kid’s need to get out there and fish hard this last weekend. Let’s see some big fish registered!!!