Artificial Lure here with your June 18, 2025 Charles River fishing report, coming at you straight from Boston’s heart. The sunrise hit at 5:06 AM and sunset won’t be until a long-lit 8:23 PM, giving you ample daylight to wet a line. Tidal action today is classic early summer—high tide just before 5 AM, low near 11:15, and another high around 5:30 this evening per Tide-Forecast.com. That means softer currents for most of your day, which will make fishing near bridges and feeder creeks a bit easier, especially if you’re working from shore.

Weather’s starting off cool in the high 50s and should climb up into the mid-70s by afternoon, with just a gentle breeze and low humidity. It’s textbook conditions for both folks tossing lures at first light and anyone looking to hit that golden hour before sunset.

The Charles is still seeing the last wave of the annual striped bass run. Schoolie stripers and an occasional slot fish are pushing upriver, right behind river herring and alewives. The lower river remains the hotspot—below the Museum of Science and especially around the Longfellow Bridge has been loaded at dawn and dusk, with multiple schoolies reported in the last week by local anglers on the “Boston Charles River Daily Fishing Report.” Hot lures are white paddletails, slender soft plastics, and anything that mimics mackerel or juvenile herring—so break out those mackerel-patterned plugs or go with a classic white shad on a jighead. Where you see diving gulls, you’ll find active bass.

If you’re looking for a mixed bag, largemouth bass and panfish are active from Magazine Beach up through Watertown, with nightcrawlers and drop-shot rigs doing real work. For bait, live mackerel, chunked bunker, and even fresh worms are finding fish. Near the MIT bridge, folks have been landing catfish and bass at dusk—right at that sweet spot when the city lights just begin to glint off the water.

According to “On The Water,” big bass are stacking up where pogies school, so scan the river mouth and inner harbor edges for blitzes. There’ve even been a few flounder reported downstream, but they’re mostly moving deeper as water warms—so target them off the main channel edges or try your luck near the mouth if you want a flatfish.

For a couple of red-hot spots: the stretch around the Longfellow Bridge is prime for stripers on a moving tide, while the banks near Magazine Beach and the MIT bridge are producing bass and catfish for shore anglers. If you want a quieter experience, the esplanade docks offer safe footing and surprisingly good action as the sun sets.

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