There are no smelts in Maine. It’s all a big fat lie.
Ok, Ok, that’s not true. Reports indicate that there has been some action this year with the best seemingly on the larger Kennebec River. However the overwhelming response this year, so far as I’ve seen from those fishing the smaller tributaries where the bulk of the smelt camp operations are, is that… this year is bad. In fact, over the course of the last 7 or 8 years we’ve been doing Smeltapolooza, it seems the catch rate has steadily dwindled.
..."not a creature was stirring, not even a smelt"...
Some claim that, at least this year, the warmer winter and late ice is the cause, while others say that the tides have been running too big or that freezing then thawing ice is creating weird currents that are clouding up the water. None of this though would explain why some I talk to say that the smelt fishing just isn’t what it was a few years ago. Perhaps it some cyclical thing that happens every number of years and coincides with the New England Patriots draft picks or something. Or, maybe it’s best to leave it to the biologists to figure it out and we’ll scour the internets for any news from them.
In the mean time, we carried on the tradition again this year and tackled the Abagadasset River in Bowdoinham, Maine. 
MOF members equaled four, smelt caught equaled zero. And the dozen or so camps along the river bank with us were coming up empty handed as well on the five hour, night time, outgoing tide. We did eat well, except that the lack of a menu coordinator meant that somehow each of us brought sausages….lots of sausage,…sausage 6 ways sausage. We will review menu planning procedures for future trips. 
Dean brought his bear repellant pink flamingo (see First Big Spring Trip Roundup) to guard the shack and, although black bears are hibernating in Maine in the winter, Dean’s from down south originally and probably thinks where there is frozen water there has to be polar bears wandering around. 
I’m seeing and hearing of guys using Sabiki rigs that they bring themselves and jig with instead of relying on the single lines provided with the camps. Next year we’ll rig up a few of these with little glow in the dark krill-like jigs and work them with handheld jigging rods… you can see an early attempt we did with a single rig from the post in Monster Tech Tips called the Smeltslayer Model 2010 prototype..
Between now and then though, the MOF will be preparing for First Flys Out in early spring…. and anything else that comes up before then… 