Kayak Fishing for Cod - Massachusetts - October, 2014

I travelled to the Massachusetts coast on Columbus Day weekend for a short trip. Each morning, I fished for about the first three hours after dawn targeting cod, which is something that has been on my bucket list for a long time. I've never caught a cod before and to catch one from a kayak was special. I was lucky enough to have two friends in the area that were inshore cod sharpies. The first day, Eric Hromada showed me the ropes in terms of targeting cod and looking for appropriate structure to find them. In terms of structure, we were fishing sunken islands in 50' - 80' and reading our sonar for boulders and scattered rocks along the bottom where the cod were congregated. The cod were moving from area to area quickly for a bottom fish (sort of like black sea bass), so locating a few good humps with some rocks allowed us to move with the cod. It was a great morning and my largest cod was 28". The second day, Eric Harrison showed me a different area with similar results with my largest cod being about 26". We were fishing with a larger group including Mike Baker and Mike Bartgis, who travelled all the way up from Maryland, and James Fisher and everyone caught some cod. Baker, who made the trip down from Maine, caught the largest cod of the day at 31". The final morning I went solo and worked some GPS waypoints. Although it was a little slower since 1/3 hours included fishing during the slack tide, I still caught several cod with my largest being about 27". There was an onshore wind the final day and the new revo handled the choppier weather well. Over three mornings, I caught over 30 cod. I caught all my cod on non-baited jigging spoons with 2 ounce gold hammered diamond jigs and hogy sand eels producing best. Cod are definitely underrated fighters, and the toughest part was pulling them off the bottom. After hooking up, they dig into the bottom and make a strong run that doubled over my medium spinning rod to the point it looked like it would break! I was vertically jigging these cod and they almost always took the jig on the rise, which is unusual because almost every other species I target grabs it on the drop. The water temp was 55 degrees but the air temp was in the low 40s, so it was much cooler than down here on Long Island where I'm still wearing swim trunks in mid-60s water temps. Oh, and the cod hate slack water. It was great seeing everyone, as I hadn't seen a couple of those guys since the spring. Thanks again so much to Eric Hromada and Eric Harrison for taking some time out and showing me around. It was greatly appreciated. I couldn't ask for better hosts or better company. Here are some pics: