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Piscataway, 4/1
Since it sounded like the Mattawoman was slow yesterday, Kevin (kevinfry) and I decided to hit the Piscataway in search of bass and whatever else we could find. I really wanted to find some nicer bass than the dinks I catch at St. Mary's Lake.
We launched at the end of Wharf Road right around noon, which was early flood. The wind was blowing harder than forecasted. I don't know why that still surprises me.
We headed across the creek because we could see some woody debris in the water. It was kind of pretty over there.
The depth going across was between 2.5 and 4ft. I trolled a firetiger 1-minus but didn't have any hits. I started working the shoreline with a white and chartreuse spinnerbait, a black and white paddle tail fluke, my firetiger Rapala, and a blue and black chatterbait. I didn't have any luck, and the wind was moving me pretty quickly. I went around the corner to get out of the wind. Kevin picked up a couple yellow perch, but I still didn't have any strikes. I switched to a chartreuse curly tail grub on a stump jumper head and hooked two small bass that came unbuttoned. Both fish bent the hook despite being small.
I switched to a different jig head, but didn't have any more strikes.
We went up a little creek near the back of the bay in an attempt to get out of the wind, but the creek was oriented perfectly with the wind and offered no protection. However, there were fish in the creek. Kevin was having some luck using spinners, so I switched to a white Rooster Tail and finally got rid of the skunk with a small crappie:
There was more structure in the creek, a harder bottom, and a little more depth (5-7ft). I picked up a 12" bass on the chatterbait. I actually caught it between a log and a dock and managed to flip the bass over the log bass pro-style:
On the next cast, I hooked a fat 16" bass. I was thankful that it swam toward the center of the creek and not toward the logs or dock. I also attempted a smile:
That pic definitely has a Mona Lisa quality to it.
I saw a bunch more submerged woody debris and switched to a white 2" Storm shad to try and scare up more crappie. It worked:
All three fish were around 12-12.5" and fought like bass. After that, I got snagged several times and couldn't line up properly on the stop, which prevented me from coaxing any more fish out of there.
I also picked up a 10" yellow perch while my chatterbait sat on the bottom of the creek as I picked out a backlash:
I don't know how that perch jammed a hook that big into its mouth.
I met up with Kevin again after that.
It was about 4pm and high tide at this point, and we decided to head back since we were going to have to fight the wind the entire way. Since it was high tide, we were able to use some of the auxiliary channels to work our way to the leeward shore, which was a good plan (thanks, Kevin).
Now for some artsy shots:
All told, I got exactly what I wanted today: a nice bass and some fat crappie. It probably would've been more productive to start in the creek at the outset. It's hard to beat a day of good company and good catching.
We launched at the end of Wharf Road right around noon, which was early flood. The wind was blowing harder than forecasted. I don't know why that still surprises me.
We headed across the creek because we could see some woody debris in the water. It was kind of pretty over there.
The depth going across was between 2.5 and 4ft. I trolled a firetiger 1-minus but didn't have any hits. I started working the shoreline with a white and chartreuse spinnerbait, a black and white paddle tail fluke, my firetiger Rapala, and a blue and black chatterbait. I didn't have any luck, and the wind was moving me pretty quickly. I went around the corner to get out of the wind. Kevin picked up a couple yellow perch, but I still didn't have any strikes. I switched to a chartreuse curly tail grub on a stump jumper head and hooked two small bass that came unbuttoned. Both fish bent the hook despite being small.
I switched to a different jig head, but didn't have any more strikes.We went up a little creek near the back of the bay in an attempt to get out of the wind, but the creek was oriented perfectly with the wind and offered no protection. However, there were fish in the creek. Kevin was having some luck using spinners, so I switched to a white Rooster Tail and finally got rid of the skunk with a small crappie:
There was more structure in the creek, a harder bottom, and a little more depth (5-7ft). I picked up a 12" bass on the chatterbait. I actually caught it between a log and a dock and managed to flip the bass over the log bass pro-style:
On the next cast, I hooked a fat 16" bass. I was thankful that it swam toward the center of the creek and not toward the logs or dock. I also attempted a smile:
That pic definitely has a Mona Lisa quality to it.
I saw a bunch more submerged woody debris and switched to a white 2" Storm shad to try and scare up more crappie. It worked:
All three fish were around 12-12.5" and fought like bass. After that, I got snagged several times and couldn't line up properly on the stop, which prevented me from coaxing any more fish out of there.
I also picked up a 10" yellow perch while my chatterbait sat on the bottom of the creek as I picked out a backlash:
I don't know how that perch jammed a hook that big into its mouth.
I met up with Kevin again after that.
It was about 4pm and high tide at this point, and we decided to head back since we were going to have to fight the wind the entire way. Since it was high tide, we were able to use some of the auxiliary channels to work our way to the leeward shore, which was a good plan (thanks, Kevin).
Now for some artsy shots:
All told, I got exactly what I wanted today: a nice bass and some fat crappie. It probably would've been more productive to start in the creek at the outset. It's hard to beat a day of good company and good catching.
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