Lower Chesapeake Bay Fishing Report, 12/28/2018 Update:
Hey there FishTalkers, and welcome to the final fishing report of 2018! Don't worry - despite the chilly weather and difficult conditions the next few months will hold, we'll keep bringing you current reports right through the winter. They may be shorter at times and the options may be a bit more limited, but we know there are plenty of die-hard anglers out there who will want to wet a line whenever the opportunity presents itself. Come rain, sleet, or snow, let's keep on casting!
The C & R light tackle front hasn’t changed much, except for going up in size in order to keep a big profile for cruising fish. Upgrading to two-ounce jig heads and nine or 10 inch soft plastics like a BKD will be some handy tools of the trade. Grey, white, chartreuse, and natural/alewife will be some good starting points. Switch to purple when the light is low. This last haven for rockfish is still keeping the dream alive, with some true monsters being caught in between the finicky schoolies. If you didn’t see last week’s report, you may want to be seated for this... Down south about 10 days ago a very lucky Eric Packard landed a 48-inch, 45 pound rockfish in a Lower Bay location. The details are foregone in true angling fashion, but the sheer curiosity and chance that there are still fish in this caliber lingering in the Bay is a catalyst enough. Anglers looking for a change in tactics won’t find much in that department, but sure enough, it is still worth it to head out there and take a crack at going face-to-face with a rockfish like this!
Trolling is still the most efficient way to catch fish, especially ones such as Mr. Packard’s. Big shads on umbrella rigs can nab the fish that decide to stay in the middle of the water column. Chartreuse and white are the stars here, keeping fish fired up and interested. Pearl and purple-flecked come into their own on cloudy, low-light days. Shads on the bottom will be your best friends right now, so pulling big shads with inline weights at the nose will get ‘em down to where the mouths are. Trolling in tandem isn’t a bad idea either, especially when paired with the ye’ old white bucktail, letting it skip across the bottom of some oyster beds or hard bottom. Thirty five to 45 feet and deeper water has been the zone. Out near the channel edges and off Smith Point have been the best spots to find the fish, as well as the lower Potomac. Any spot that has stretches of deep water will be a good place to start for your trolling endeavors.
The white perch have been biting on the regular as well. They’re loving the bloodworms on tandem rigs and have been schooled deep, in the tributary mouths. Best reports have still come in from the lower Pax, though the numbers do seem to be on the decline at the moment. If bloodworms aren’t available, then dropper fly rigs will do the trick.
Lower Chesapeake Bay Fishing Report, 12/21/2018 Update:
Merry Fishmas, to one and to all! It seems like the best striper fishing of the year for the BIG fish in the Lower Bay may have waited for the expiration of the season... some very nice ones have started showing up for catch and release anglers trolling out in the 70 to 72 zone. They aren't around in huge numbers, but some of the fish are, in fact, quite huge. The standard umbrellas and tandems in white, chartreuse, and gray or smoke colors are doing the trick.
Jiggers are still taking fish in the lower Potomac as well, although the weather and at times thick fog has been a persistent problem. Color selection for the season is getting crucial with the fish being ever so tight-lipped at times. No, red and green for the holidays won’t work. White, grey, and especially natural/alewife colors will be more festive to them (and appetizing). Don't forget that some sections (excluding river tributaries) are still open to catch-and-keep through the end of the year; visit the Potomac River Fisheries Commission to see the current regs.
Lower Chesapeake Bay Fishing Report, 12/14/2018 Update:
The Lower Bay hasn't exactly been red hot, but it does offer the best opportunity in Maryland's portion of the Bay to end the year off with a great fishing day (if you don’t mind getting rained on, according to the weatherman). The mouth of the Potomac River from St. Georges Island down to the Smith Point zone has some deep channels to drop a few white bucktails and umbrella rigs, to troll up the fish. Jigging around these same areas with skirted soft plastics in chartreuse or purple has been working for anglers this week, mostly over hard bottom in 35 to 45 feet. Plastics and jigging spoons are both proving effective, and the fish seem to be keen to bite on outgoing tides. Thanks to all the freshwater flow this year the blue catfish have expanded their range, and jiggers are taking blues with startling regularity around the mouth of the river.
The stretch of open Bay from buoy 72 down to 64 has also been a popular zone for anglers pulling a spread. Heavy inline weights are a must, so keep those attached to tandem sassy shads in chartreuse to get to depths of around 35 feet.
Note: The season may be ending, but some sections of the Potomac are also open past the 15th: The river and its tributaries on the Maryland side of the river, from the Woodrow Wilson Bridge to the mouth of the river, will be open to striped bass fishing until December 31.
What about white perch? They’re staying in the same deep areas like the rockfish are in, with the mouth of the Patuxent coming up as a strong sopt to find ‘em. As you move further into the tributaries, pickerel and catfish are extremely abundant with the dropping temperatures triggering their predatory activity. The catfish are being caught on just about any cut bait, whereas the pickerel are loving bull minnows under bobbers as well as crankbaits and swimbaits. Large spoons (gold) are another option they seem to be going after.
Lower Chesapeake Bay Fishing Report, 12/7/2018:
The Lower Bay is the best bet for Maryland anglers in search of stripers right now. They aren’t always easy to catch, mind you, though there have still been some flocks of birds working in the lower Potomac off Point Lookout up to the edges off St. George’s. Many of the breaking fish are throw-backs but there’s a mix of bigger fish with an occasional 30-incher being reported. Just outside the river there’s a better average grade of fish and fewer throwbacks but many are deep and have a lethargic attitude. Trolling umbrella rigs (chartreuse, white, and pearl) does the work but you need to weight them and get them down near bottom in 35 to 45 feet of water. Letting a lone sassy shad drag near the bottom with an in-line weight has yielded fish too, and same goes for bouncing a heavy white bucktail off the bottom. The eastern side of the shipping channels (buoy 72) has also been a target for many trollers, so be sure to try over there if you’re having trouble locating the schools.
Angler in Chief Lenny Rudow reports that a trip fishing the zone between Point Lookout to Smith Point produced a box of fish ranging from 20 to 26 inches, and jigging was best with white and chartreuse skirted heads in the 1.0 to 1.5 ounce range, paired with pearl BKDs, then cast out away from the boat and hopped back slowly along bottom. Fish were scattered throughout the river’s mouth where it meets the Bay, mostly in 35 to 45 feet of water, both on the MD and VA sides. A vertical presentation, either with a jig or a spoon, did not produce as many bites, and either way the takes were mostly subtle. One nifty surprise was a blue catfish, jigged up in 40 feet of water SE of Point Lookout. According to the chatter on Facebook and the like, others are catching them, too.
Last but not least, the perch have been in crazy depths this week. We’re talking 40-plus feet in the lower Patuxent near shell bottom. Bloodworms on bottom rigs will be your best bet due to the depths that they’re holding at.