Tips for fishing during marine worm swarms
Worms Gone Wild!



Believe it or not you can drop a fly in such a melee and not get a hit.



By Jim White In time, anglers discover that a worm swarm is a doubled-edged sword. You either love ’em, or you hate ’em, with very little latitude at either end of the spectrum. The fact is, the cinder worm hatch, as it is sometimes called, is a spawning ritual, and not a true hatch at all. Just millions of tiny worms twisting and gyrating on the water’s surface.



Well-intentioned crossover freshwater fly anglers mistakenly coined it a hatch years ago, perhaps because of the sheer volume of biomass, much like when mayflies fill the air on trout streams. Worm swarms usually take place at dusk, sometimes as early as late April but more consistently in May and June as the weather settles. The new and full moon periods see lower tidal ranges which expose mud flats where the worms live. There’s debate over whether the full or dark moon is best; however, the proper water temperature, occurring with a late-afternoon low tide appears to be the best combination of conditions for them to appear. Their appearance is usually prompted by warm, clear days that allow the sun to heat shallow salt ponds or tidal flats.

Swarms like this one form in the spring around the full or new moon.



When a swarm occurs, there are literally millions of worms twisting and darting in the water. Sometimes there are so many worms, the water looks like it’s full of red weed, and the water will actually turn reddish-pink.




In New England the swarming worms are called clam worms. No one has actually identified precisely what types of worms we actually have, since there are well over 300 different species of worms along the Atlantic Coast. The common clam worm, Nereis succinea, is a wandering benthic predator, and one of the most widespread bristle worm species. Though it reaches a length of five or six inches, it’s more common to find smaller specimens. Its anterior portion is usually brown and the “head” has four eyes, feelers at the mouth and tentacles.



Normally, these swarms take place at the same time and in the same place, year after year. Once you’ve observed this natural wonder, you won’t soon forget the spectacle. When the worms begin to swarm, you will find them along the shorelines in upper estuaries, in shallow rivers, shallow coves, in creeks, and on tidal flats where soft mud bottoms exist. Over the grassier bottoms, swarms tend to be less intense, or simply don’t happen at all. A spring low tide typically exposes the bottom, which in turn is then heated by the sun. Mixed sand and mud bottom seem to produce the best swarms.



Weather is also an important factor in worm-swarm intensity. It should be relatively warm with stable conditions for a few days; temperatures of 60 to 65 degrees are best and the ideal tide phase is an early falling tide in late afternoon. Once a swarm begins, it can continue all night long and into the early morning hours.



It isn’t too often that these worms get much bigger than an inch or an inch-and-a-half in length while the swarm is going on. Because there are so many different species of worms, coloration runs the gamut. Light green, blue-green, cream, pink, reddish-green or brown are common. Most knowledgeable fly anglers that fish the swarms carry impressionistic worm patterns in at least two or three different colors or color combinations with them when fishing a swarm.



The Worm Man


One of Rhode Island’s premier worm-swarm specialists is 73-year-old Gene Matteson, of Cranston, Rhode Island. He has had more success fishing the worm swarm than anyone I know. He has also taught many other anglers how to be successful as well—a virtue he is not often credited for.



I asked Matteson about fishing this phenomenon. “It’s not only the most exciting fishing but it can also be the most frustrating fishing you will ever encounter,” he claims.



“I’ve heard that quite a few fishermen, once the hatch is in full swing, will simply go the other way and leave it. They become that frustrated with it,” says Matteson.



“I fly fish exclusively during the swarms, and prefer a 9-foot rod rated for a 9-weight line. However, I like to overload a 9-weight with a 10-weight floating line. Just like any other type of fishing, you are going to make an awful lot of casts between strikes. I like the ease in which this outfit casts. It doesn’t tire me out, and at my age, that’s a good thing,” he remarked.



Matteson fishes an 8- to 10-foot leader with a dropper tied in about 30 inches up from the trailing fly. His leaders are made from 20-pound fluorocarbon leader material and the dropper fly is attached with a non-slip loop knot, as well as the main fly. This works well—at no time will the fly come in sideways. The fly should be cast into feeding stripers and retrieved immediately with 6-inch strips.



Matteson points out one piece of wisdom that I too consider the key to hooking up during swarms, to what may be the finickiest stripers of all: fishing when there is a slight ripple on the water’s surface. This helps break up the silhouette of the fly. Also, don’t waste valuable time fishing over bass that have thousands of worms around or above them. Instead, move to the outside edges of the swarm and concentrate your efforts on the fringe areas where there are fewer worms, thus less real food.



Your chances of duping a worm-swarm striper are best when the worms are first beginning to swarm and as the swarm tapers off. Many experienced anglers actually try to time their arrival for either one or the other because the fishing is so much better with less food in the water. And, if you can force yourself to totally ignore all the feeding activity that is happening before your very eyes, which is not an easy thing to do, and concentrate on using a large fly or something else that’s six to nine inches in length, you may be surprised at how big a striper you will catch in spite of all those worms. I’ve taken a number of fish from 20 to 30 pounds fishing this way during a swarm. This “big food-big fish” tactic works because the worms are also eaten by smaller fish, eels, herring, big silversides and mantis shrimp. Big cow stripers, especially during the spring, will normally target the larger-size baits as opposed to the tiny worms.



Matteson has also developed a worm fly, Gene’s Cinder Worm, through trial and error and hundreds of hours on the water fishing for stripers. He ties it on a No. 6 salmon hook. It has a loosely wrapped body of red Glow-Bug yarn, a wing comprised of yellow and gray bucktail extending a half-inch past the bend of the hook. Finally, the head is built from four or five turns of black ostrich herl. It’s a good imitation, and is fairly foul-proof. Other notable worm patterns include Page Roger’s Velvet Worm, Dixon’s Cinder Worm, Rovinski’s Red hackle Worm and Kenny Abrame’s Worm.




Light Tackle Options


If you do not fly fish, the smaller soft plastics on the market will work on worm-drunk stripers. Without a doubt, the versatile Slug-Go, invented by Herb Reed of Lunker City Fishing Specialists, has been one of the most productive soft-plastic, light-tackle lures that there is for fishing a worm swarm. I’ve had the most success fishing a bubblegum-colored Slug-Go in a tandem rig. First, rig a 6-inch Slug-Go on a 2/0 Tex-Pose hook. By wrapping the shank of the hook with rod-winding thread before positioning it in the body of the bait, you’ll be able to glue it in place thus keeping the hook from moving and tearing the plastic after repeated casts or hits. I use PRO’s Soft-Bait Glue that is formulated for gluing soft-plastic lures. I then tie on a 24-inch leader of 20-pound fluorocarbon. Tie on the first bait using a non-slip loop knot, and then tie a dropper loop about 18 inches up the leader from the first bait. Off of this dropper loop I tie on a 3-inch Slug-Go that is rigged on a No. 1 or 2 hook, again wrapping the shank of the hook first and then gluing it in place. At the top I tie on a quality ball bearing swivel to prevent line twist. It turns out that many anglers avoid using the Slug-Go because it tends to twist your line. The ball-bearing swivel cures that. And a baitcasting reel, compared to a spinning reel, will keep line twist to a minimum as well.



The smaller sizes of the popular Fin-S Fish, in the 2- and 3-inch size, are ideal droppers ahead of a 6-inch Slug-Go. You will need to scale down the size of the hooks you use in these little guys so you don’t kill the action of the lure. Something like a No. 2 or 4 hook is ideal. Best colors for soft baits include bubblegum, black, red shad, yellow or white.



With soft-plastic lures you might opt to apply some sort of scent to mask the odor of the plastic itself, or unrelated scents. I have seen how effective this is time after time on my boat with clients. A company called Seabait (www.seabait.com) makes a product of ground-up sea worm extract that is quite powerful and also very effective, especially during the swarm. Simply place a few drops on your baits while fishing. Sometimes the worm scent can make all the difference in the world of catching fish or being skunked.



To cast such light plastics for distance, choose light to medium-light rods in the 7- to 71⁄2-foot range matched to spin reels designed for 8- to 10-pound-test line. Most swarm bass are small, with perhaps a few fish reaching the teens.




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