We were swinging around Portsmouth Harbor Lighthouse when we spotted a frenzy of activity between two clusters of rock by Great Island Common. Several dozen terns were hovering over the water and making sporadic dives, crazed by the sight of small bait fish near the surface. With birds feasting from above, it was safe to infer that striped bass would be feeding on the same prized victuals below. 

“Oh wow, they’re striking hard,” remarked Exeter native Graham Waleryszak as the boat motored shoreward.

Newmarket resident Bryant Bickford steered his 20-foot Hewes Light Tackle closer to the rocks as Graham picked up a pole and cast a large, double-hooked lure into the water. “Got one,” he said within seconds. Bryant leaned over the edge of the boat as Graham reeled in the fish, a silvery 20-inch striper.

In New Hampshire, stripers must be at least 28 inches in order to take them home. Bryant tossed the fish back in the water, declaring that it was one of the smaller stripers he’d seen so far this season. But within a few minutes, Graham had hooked another. This one measured 23 inches. Still too small.

But we weren’t necessarily looking for supper anyway. And Graham had caught both of his fish with a spinning reel, which Bryant brought along strictly as backup. This venture into Portsmouth Harbor was a saltwater fly fishing expedition, one of about 20 Bryant has made already this spring. Starting in late April or early May, stripers become plentiful off the coast of New Hampshire and Maine. “As soon as the water temperature gets around 50, the migration begins,” Bryant said.

We launched the boat from Pierce Island in Portsmouth at about 4 p.m. as the tide was beginning to creep in. The 59-degree water was choppy as we sped over the incoming tide and into the open ocean. The boat, with its 130-horse power motor, can reach speeds over 40 mph with three people onboard. It kicked up plumes of cold ocean spray that occasionally lashed our faces.

Bryant has been fly fishing since he was a kid, but took up the more adventurous vocation of saltwater fly fishing about 10 years ago. He’s become a recreational host of less experienced fly fishers, carrying a small arsenal of rods and flies for any circumstance. As we made an initial spin around the mouth of the Piscataqua River, he instructed us to keep our eyes open for disruptions on the water’s surface, or clusters of seagulls and terns that would indicate the presence of bait fish.

After the early foray that resulted in Graham’s two stripers, the birds moved off and the fish appeared to clear out. We continued chugging along the coast for a time, occasionally spotting cormorants perched stoically over the water. “They’re doing the same thing we’re doing,” Bryant said—looking for fish. Mackerel, too, are abundant this time of year, he noted.

We considered making the six-mile trek to the Isles of Shoals, where larger stripers are known to feed along the rocky shore, but the cold and choppy ocean drove us inland along the Piscataqua. As we approached the head of Oyster River, Bryant offered a crash course in the precise art of casting a fly. It’s not an easy technique for beginners, but many anglers who try fly fishing never go back to spinning. Such is the case for Bryant, who likes casting flies so much that ordinary spin reels no longer hold much appeal.

When casting with a spinning reel, the weight of the lure pulls out the line. Fly fishing, however, relies on the weight of the actual line for the cast, since the fly itself weighs almost nothing. Tying a fly to his line in a flash, Bryant demonstrated the sport’s fundamental motion. He held the rod’s handle in his right hand and cradled the line with his left, all the while whipping the tip of the rod back and forth. If you imagine the rod as the secondhand of a clock, the range of the motion should be about 10 to 2 o’clock. He brought the rod to a complete halt at each of these positions, allowing the line to stretch out completely before jerking it in the other direction. Meanwhile, he fed out more line, increasing its length with each swing.

Finally, with a slightly exaggerated throwing motion, he let the fly settle on the ocean. He then began pulling in the line with swift tugs, causing the fly to lurch through the water and, hopefully, entice some hungry fish.

It took me a few tries to get the hang of it, but eventually I learned to feel the line stretch to its full extension before whipping it in the other direction. Managing the slack line at my feet was a constant challenge, as it easily got snaked on parts of my body or the boat. I even snagged Bryant’s line with my own a couple of times, requiring some annoying untangling. 

Having nailed down the fundamental concept, we decided to search for another hotspot in the river. “Let’s find some fish,” Bryant muttered as we took off. We soon came to Little Bay Bridge and its older neighbor, the General Sullivan Bridge. A few people fished casually off the side of the bridge with bobbers. In colloquial slang, Bryant informed us, bridge fishers are derogatorily known as “googins.”

Beneath the bridge, we saw stripers breaking the surface with violent splashes. But accessing this bed of activity proved difficult. The fish were near the shore, almost directly beneath the rusted metal trusses of General Sullivan Bridge. Every time we got close enough to get a fly in the water, the rapid current quickly carried the boat away, and we’d find ourselves watching the fish thrash about from a considerable distance. We eventually gave up in frustration and took a break.

As any fisherman knows, patience is paramount to the sport. “I’ve taken people out fly fishing who get cranky after an hour if they don’t catch anything,” Bryant said. We kept our spirits high, although we didn’t bag any more fish that evening.

So, Graham caught the only two stripers of the day. By the end of the outing, he had taken to calling himself “One-Cast Waleryszak” for his uncanny ability to catch a fish on his first cast. Although he stuck to a spinning reel on this trip, he had previously tried fly fishing with Bryant and managed to pull in three fish, one off a cast and two by trolling—a method of dragging a lure through the water from a moving boat. On that night, he said, Bryant caught about 15 stripers.

And that’s how it goes with saltwater fly fishing. Sometimes the stripers bite quicker than you can cast, and other times they seem to be fasting. Bryant has also started going after tuna with a fly, although he hasn’t caught one yet, and he aspires to one day go fly fishing for blue sharks.

But even on our humble striper outing, we managed to enjoy ourselves. As the sun went down, it ignited the low-hanging clouds in spectacular shades of purple and red, and we motored home with the sunset at our backs.  

“You just gotta love being out on the water,” Bryant said.