By Ken Lamb
The Tackle Box
Lexington Park, MD
In late October, we had rockfish, trout, and perch eager to take lures of trollers and casters.
The stripers are in the bay were breaking on occasion attracting birds, but most anglers found them on their fish finders and jigging both metal and bucktail jigs. The undersized fish were on the surface, the big fish were on the bottom under the top water thrashers.
Shore fishermen prowling the rocks and beaches around Cedar Point found eager stripers taking bucktails, sassy shads, swimming plugs, and Hard Head Custom Baits popper rigs.
There were great catches of rockfish made by lure casters working structure all around the mouth of the Patuxent, the Potomac, and creek entrances.
Shallow water trollers and lure casters caught rockfish all up and down the Patuxent and Potomac.
Speckled trout were schooled up in the Potomac in fifty feet of water near the mouth of the St. Mary’s River. The trout took metal jigs with shiny green, and chartreuse being popular colors. White bucktails with sparkly green curly tail grubs were excellent performers as well. There were plenty of stripers in the mix, mostly undersized, but a hefty 28 incher showed up from time to time. There were trout just north of the Targets below Cedar Point.
A big red drum near 50 pounds was caught at buoy 72. The big red represents the last of these big fish that are leaving for the Atlantic to spend the winter off Cape Hatteras.
My forecast of declining perch activity was blown out of the water as tide levels returned to normal and the perch were plentiful and hungry. The perch in the photo were caught in the afternoon and evening; the closer the sunset the better the bite.
Fresh water fishing continued to be excellent for bass, bluegill and crappie.
