The biggest news of the week was the Canal fishing that fired up over the weekend and into the early week before tapering off as the strong, new moon tides lost their strength by Monday or Tuesday. There are still fish being caught in the mornings, evenings, and in the dark by fishermen using paddletail jigs and swimmers reported Bruce at Canal Bait and Tackle.

Some of those fish have moved into Cape Cod Bay where Bruce says boat fishermen have had some luck trolling tube-and-worm rigs.

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Cape Cod Bay has had lots of 25- to 30-inch fish, Captain Matt of Fishy Business Sportfishing reported. Captain Ross from Cape Cod Charter Guys supported this, saying that Cape Cod Bay has been hit or miss for larger bass, but has plenty of smaller ones.

AJ at Red Top Sporting Goods heard that that Billingsgate Shoal had gone quiet with stripers, but that boat fishermen in upper Buzzards Bay were catching some stripers.

Captain Bobby Rice of Reel Deal Fishing Charters reported awesome fishing for stripers off the Outer Cape on Wednesday, and said he’s seeing an increasing number of bluefin tuna out there.

Besides the Big Ditch, the hottest action has been on the tuna front, both in the canyons and east of Chatham. Captain Steve from Chaser Offshore Fishing said the canyons are still the place to be, with just about any of them producing tuna right now. There have even been a large number of wahoo out there, Steve said. The amount of yellowfin continues to be astounding, with the yellows even feeding on top where fishermen are catching them on topwater poppers. Some of the fish-holding water is sliding onto the shelf, and into the South of the Vineyard area, but as of this week, Steve said the fishing short of the canyons was hit or miss with the best action being for white marlin, which had moved into the water southeast of the Dump in decent numbers.

Captain Matt from Fishy Business tried his luck south of the Vineyard and had mahi, a mako, and a hammerhead, but no tuna.

Bluefin tuna fishing is excellent reported Captain John of Fish Chatham Charters. On every tuna trip except one over the past week, he returned to the dock with bluefin (up to 95 inches) on board. John said the tuna are all over east of Chatham, with fish being caught at Crab Ledge, the Regal Sword, and many places in-between.

Striper fishing at Monomoy was decent this week. John said one day, in a strong northeast blow, a number of 20-pound and larger bass had stacked up in the rips. Overall, the fish have been smaller, but fishermen can count on a few decent fish each trip. Captain Matt from Fishy Business Sportfishing has been fishing the rips and taking 3 to 4 fish between 30 and 40 inches each trip, along with plenty of smaller fish.

Ross has been doing a lot of bonito fishing this week, running past the Hooter and catching good numbers of bonito while trolling and casting. The crew at Larry’s Tackle reported that bonito fishing has been the highlight all around Martha’s Vineyard, with both boat and shore fishermen catching them around the island. Most of the bonito are small, 2- to 3-pounders, but the occasional larger fish to 7 pounds is being caught.

Off the South Side of the Cape, the crew at Sports Port says the fishing is slow on account of the hot weather.

Black sea bass fishing is good if you’re willing to run to the deeper water where they are holding. The waters around Nomans Island is one such place where fishermen are still catching sea bass as large as 22 inches. Fluke fishing in the Sound is still a game of numbers–pick through enough undersize fish and you’re bound to find a couple for the table.

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Fishing Forecast for Cape Cod

If you can get tuna fishing, go! (And you if you have space on board, call me!) It sounds like the canyons are as good as it gets with wahoo, yellowfin, swordfish, and mahi. And bluefin fishing is good and getting better as a wider range of sizes reach Cape Cod.

Monomoy is still a good bet for striper fishing, and it could be worth heading north along the beaches to look for bigger bass. Just be sure to have some tuna gear handy in case Charlie crashes the party.