Maryland's Who's who!

[slaynbass365]

Wow, Kevin that's some outing you had. Thanks for sharing the pics, I better wipe this drool of my keyboard now!

Nice name btw, I'm also a Kevin.

Hey Kevin, Good to see you on here. Saw you out with your son (I believe) the other day, at BH.

Will probably run into you again here soon too...

Nick

[BrianinMD]

Got some fishing in on the lower Potomac yesterday, bite was very slow. The lipless crank bite I had been hearing about was nonexistant. Got a couple on plastics but I got none which would have measured for my tourney next week. My boater said he found a couple things so hopefully they pan out for us.

And I agree, Sean is "THE MAN"

[TheKingFisher]

Hey Kevin, Good to see you on here. Saw you out with your son (I believe) the other day, at BH.

Will probably run into you again here soon too...

Nick

Hey Nick! That was definitely me, also good to see you on here. I guess I should've known a lot of the local bassers are on here since Ken told me about the forum awhile back. Just now getting active on the forums as I'm starting to get out this year. I'll definitely see you around.

Kevin

[Boett43]

There is a pretty decent bite going on down at the PEPCO plant in Dickerson, I got 8 small mouth in about 3 hours on a tube. The biggest was around 2.5 but they feel 10 times bigger in those currents. Anyone been to DAM 4 recently?

[Bill Poch]

I made it over to the pond at Baker Park for about 90 minutes this afternoon from about 1:30 - 3:00. Although I didn't catch any bassholes I did see some baby LMB here and there around the bank, so they are in there. Like I said earlier, my tackle box is a little limited right now. I tried some 7" red power worms, 3" power grubs, and I had a little 1 1/2" shad crankbait.

I wasn't skunked, I got a 5 - 6" crappie on the crankbait, and it's the 1st fish of 2012, so at least I got that one out of the way.

So in a pond with very little visible structure, what do you target, or just keep working the bank until you find them?

I should be hitting Black Hills after work tomorrow, I'm gonna try to hit up Walmart at lunch to see if they have some lipless cranks.

[TheKingFisher]

I hit Black Hills today for about 90 minutes. Stopped at Wal-mart first and picked up a couple silver Rat-L traps. Went over by the sticks and caught probably the tiniest non-fry size LMB I've ever seen. Couldn't have been more than 9 inches long and so skinny it looked like a dart. He hit on a 1/2 oz Rat-L trap and somehow got 2 hooks on 1 treble in his mouth.

He gave me a good little thrill though and hit as soon as the lure entered the water and then I didn't feel much as I reeled in. Freed him up, thanked him and sent him on his way.

Stayed a little bit longer and lost one of my lures and eventually called it a day.

Kevin

[Fat Boy]

Wow, Kevin that's some outing you had. Thanks for sharing the pics, I better wipe this drool of my keyboard now!

Nice name btw, I'm also a Kevin.

Thanks Kevin! I think that Kevin must mean some sort of ancient language for "man addicted to fishing"!

[Fat Boy]

Bear with me on this detailed report, for yesterday marked a historic event!

March 19th, 2012 marked a new day in the history of Mr. Steve Kelley and his fishing career, the maiden voyage of his brand new Mako boat. And let me tell you that his boat transformed from an expensive piece of décor or jewelry to a fishing boat in a matter of hours. The floor of his shiny white boat was soiled by snakehead blood, snakehead poo, milfoil and other SAV fragments, algae, general dirt from our footwear, and the outside was stained by the mighty Upper Tidal Potomac. And we christened it with good sized fish. What a great trip.

We launched at around 11 AM, and on our way out from the ramp, debated whether to head toward the main stem of the Potomac, or to veer the other direction into the creek. Steve had main stem weed beds on his mind because of memories of past springtime success there, and the urge was well founded. However, I convinced him based on our experience (Mark and I) with bigger fish the other day to start in the creek.

I opted to use the same blue/chrome Rat-L-Trap to start mostly since I had confidence in it and it was already tied on. The tide was low, water visibility had improved over two days ago to about 2 feet or so. Water temps were in the upper 50’s, the weather was beautiful with a few clouds and some annoying wind. Our plan was to focus on the vast emerging weed beds and toss lipless crankbaits and cover some water. Actually, the wind is our ally when fishing like this because if you position your boat correctly, you can use the wind to your advantage and cover some water.

We fished the same basic area that Mark and I fished a couple days earlier, but fished a little more South along the deeper channel where it met the weed bed. I proceeded to move the weeds around while Steve hookup up on his very first cast, catching his biggest tidal river largemouth to date, a stout 21 inch bass that I’d say easily weighed 5 pounds, although we didn’t have a scale.

Here is his first fish:

It wasn’t a few casts later that Steve boated another fat largemouth, this one a fat bass at 18 ½” and most likely about four pounds.

Meanwhile, while Steve’s boated 9 pounds of fish, I’m still cleaning weeds away so he can work his lure more easily. He proceeded to catch another nice 17” bass a few casts later. Not long after that, I was on the board hooking into a less than massive 12” skinny male largemouth.

The tide stopped moving, and although we both had a few more hits, the water was lower and it was difficult to work that pattern. We tried different lures and also worked the channel edges without any luck. We knew that staying in the creek would have produced, but Steve was itching to play with his boat and run it a bit, so out of the creek and out to the main stem of the river we went.

We stopped at the mouth of a popular creek to see if the weeds were growing and the bass willing. It was a bit slow in the crankbaits, no bites, but Steve managed to catch a white perch in his lipless crankbait. Steve changed tactics and worked the woody shoreline with the ringworm trying to see if he could get a few bass and some bonus yellow perch. He caught a couple chunky largemouth and a couple yellow perch. I decided to try something different and do a bit of finessing, so I pulled out my trusty spinning rod rigged with a ¼ oz. jighead, a Mann’s Sting Ray grub dabbed in Smelly Jelly (that actually smells pretty good), and proceeded to snag. I tried to straighten the hook with my strong braided line, but must have had a nick in it and broke it off…I could have waited for Steve to move the boat as he was willing to do so, but got impatient. LOL. So I tied on another one and proceeded to catch a yellow perch and a couple small but fat largemouth.

As we moved toward the creek mouth, we noticed that the tide was coming in, so I switched back to my trusty trap, and hooked up on a nice chunky bass that would have been about three pounds, only to loose it while trying to yoke it in the boat Bassmaster style! Dumb…when things are tough, I should have reminded myself to be more careful. I had a couple more hits and misses, but at least the activity was picking up. We decided it was time to move up to the flats.

We tried trolling a pass along the 12’ troughs to see if the breeder stripers had shown up. Although we marked a few fish of some kind, we didn’t see enough to warrant continuing trolling, so we moved in shallow and bass fished again, searching for the weeds. We pulled up to a spot that Mark and I found the other day that held fish, and I finally hooked up on a decent bass 18 ½” largemouth on the Rat-L-Trap. Steve has a neat scale on his cooler, so measuring the fish is pretty easy. I wish we had a scale to weigh them…(note to self: spend the money on a good scale).

I caught a couple more smaller keeper sized bass after that, then we moved out to the weed beds. I landed some more fat largemouth along the weeds, but we really had to work for them. Steve opted to head toward shore and work the wood with a ringworm. On his first cast, he landed a fat 17” largemouth, followed by a yellow perch. Not long after that, he hooked into a fish that catapulted out of the water on his hook set, almost doing a back flip. I yelled out, “snakehead”! Sure enough, Steve landed this fishzilla:

I’m not sure if it was the next cast or not, but he hooked into another one shortly after, not quite as big. We wondered if they were paring up to spawn and he caught the mated pair. If so, we spared the Potomac from a zillion more of these as we kept both of them for the table (Steve’s table).

I tried the worm and caught a couple yellow perch, but really wanted to catch a snakehead at that point. I lost interest in tossing the traps. But, it wasn’t meant to be. I had a bite and got cut off, so unless chain pickerel are in there, my guess is that might have been a snakehead. Time was running out and we wanted to save the rest of the time to go back into the creek in search of hawgs. I’m still snakehead challenged.

We went back to the spot where Steve caught his big bass, and worked it thoroughly. The tide was up, so it was much easier to work the tops of the weeds. We had a couple hits, but no fish landed, then decided to let the wind drift us toward the Northern shoreline. We noticed a bass, definitely a bass, in shallow water doing some sort of evasive maneuver, leaping out of the water several times. It didn’t look like it was feeding, it looked like it was leaping for its life. We thought it might have been chased by a snakehead.

I managed to catch a couple more fat bass on the trap while probing a new weed bed area, a place to keep in mind for next time. We moved to the point where I caught my 21” fish the other day, and a few casts later, I hooked up into a monster. This 21 ½” fish was barely hooked by the back treble of my crankbait…my biggest fish in a couple years. Man was it fat and heavy.

After that, I managed to hook and lose another one on a nearby weed bed that we found. Then, hooked up and caught another one so I wouldn’t be stuck on 13. Time ran out and Steve needed the remaining time to get his boat out and ready to go home. Newbies!!!! LOL.

I started slow, but finished with a bang and equaled my last trip, 14 bass, including a 21 ½” fatty, a 18 ½” bass, and two 17” fat bass, and three yellow perch that thought they were largemouth. Steve landed 10 bass, including his biggest Potomac largemouth to date on his first cast, and a four pounder, along with two yellow perch, a white perch, and two fishzilla snakeheads (dead with the gills ripped out, probably filleted last night by Mr. Kelley).

[TheKingFisher]

Bear with me on this detailed report, for yesterday marked a historic event!

March 19th, 2012 marked a new day in the history of Mr. Steve Kelley and his fishing career, the maiden voyage of his brand new Mako boat. And let me tell you that his boat transformed from an expensive piece of décor or jewelry to a fishing boat in a matter of hours. The floor of his shiny white boat was soiled by snakehead blood, snakehead poo, milfoil and other SAV fragments, algae, general dirt from our footwear, and the outside was stained by the mighty Upper Tidal Potomac. And we christened it with good sized fish. What a great trip.

We launched at around 11 AM, and on our way out from the ramp, debated whether to head toward the main stem of the Potomac, or to veer the other direction into the creek. Steve had main stem weed beds on his mind because of memories of past springtime success there, and the urge was well founded. However, I convinced him based on our experience (Mark and I) with bigger fish the other day to start in the creek.

I opted to use the same blue/chrome Rat-L-Trap to start mostly since I had confidence in it and it was already tied on. The tide was low, water visibility had improved over two days ago to about 2 feet or so. Water temps were in the upper 50’s, the weather was beautiful with a few clouds and some annoying wind. Our plan was to focus on the vast emerging weed beds and toss lipless crankbaits and cover some water. Actually, the wind is our ally when fishing like this because if you position your boat correctly, you can use the wind to your advantage and cover some water.

We fished the same basic area that Mark and I fished a couple days earlier, but fished a little more South along the deeper channel where it met the weed bed. I proceeded to move the weeds around while Steve hookup up on his very first cast, catching his biggest tidal river largemouth to date, a stout 21 inch bass that I’d say easily weighed 5 pounds, although we didn’t have a scale.

Here is his first fish:

It wasn’t a few casts later that Steve boated another fat largemouth, this one a fat bass at 18 ½” and most likely about four pounds.

Meanwhile, while Steve’s boated 9 pounds of fish, I’m still cleaning weeds away so he can work his lure more easily. He proceeded to catch another nice 17” bass a few casts later. Not long after that, I was on the board hooking into a less than massive 12” skinny male largemouth.

The tide stopped moving, and although we both had a few more hits, the water was lower and it was difficult to work that pattern. We tried different lures and also worked the channel edges without any luck. We knew that staying in the creek would have produced, but Steve was itching to play with his boat and run it a bit, so out of the creek and out to the main stem of the river we went.

We stopped at the mouth of a popular creek to see if the weeds were growing and the bass willing. It was a bit slow in the crankbaits, no bites, but Steve managed to catch a white perch in his lipless crankbait. Steve changed tactics and worked the woody shoreline with the ringworm trying to see if he could get a few bass and some bonus yellow perch. He caught a couple chunky largemouth and a couple yellow perch. I decided to try something different and do a bit of finessing, so I pulled out my trusty spinning rod rigged with a ¼ oz. jighead, a Mann’s Sting Ray grub dabbed in Smelly Jelly (that actually smells pretty good), and proceeded to snag. I tried to straighten the hook with my strong braided line, but must have had a nick in it and broke it off…I could have waited for Steve to move the boat as he was willing to do so, but got impatient. LOL. So I tied on another one and proceeded to catch a yellow perch and a couple small but fat largemouth.

As we moved toward the creek mouth, we noticed that the tide was coming in, so I switched back to my trusty trap, and hooked up on a nice chunky bass that would have been about three pounds, only to loose it while trying to yoke it in the boat Bassmaster style! Dumb…when things are tough, I should have reminded myself to be more careful. I had a couple more hits and misses, but at least the activity was picking up. We decided it was time to move up to the flats.

We tried trolling a pass along the 12’ troughs to see if the breeder stripers had shown up. Although we marked a few fish of some kind, we didn’t see enough to warrant continuing trolling, so we moved in shallow and bass fished again, searching for the weeds. We pulled up to a spot that Mark and I found the other day that held fish, and I finally hooked up on a decent bass 18 ½” largemouth on the Rat-L-Trap. Steve has a neat scale on his cooler, so measuring the fish is pretty easy. I wish we had a scale to weigh them…(note to self: spend the money on a good scale).

I caught a couple more smaller keeper sized bass after that, then we moved out to the weed beds. I landed some more fat largemouth along the weeds, but we really had to work for them. Steve opted to head toward shore and work the wood with a ringworm. On his first cast, he landed a fat 17” largemouth, followed by a yellow perch. Not long after that, he hooked into a fish that catapulted out of the water on his hook set, almost doing a back flip. I yelled out, “snakehead”! Sure enough, Steve landed this fishzilla:

I’m not sure if it was the next cast or not, but he hooked into another one shortly after, not quite as big. We wondered if they were paring up to spawn and he caught the mated pair. If so, we spared the Potomac from a zillion more of these as we kept both of them for the table (Steve’s table).

I tried the worm and caught a couple yellow perch, but really wanted to catch a snakehead at that point. I lost interest in tossing the traps. But, it wasn’t meant to be. I had a bite and got cut off, so unless chain pickerel are in there, my guess is that might have been a snakehead. Time was running out and we wanted to save the rest of the time to go back into the creek in search of hawgs. I’m still snakehead challenged.

We went back to the spot where Steve caught his big bass, and worked it thoroughly. The tide was up, so it was much easier to work the tops of the weeds. We had a couple hits, but no fish landed, then decided to let the wind drift us toward the Northern shoreline. We noticed a bass, definitely a bass, in shallow water doing some sort of evasive maneuver, leaping out of the water several times. It didn’t look like it was feeding, it looked like it was leaping for its life. We thought it might have been chased by a snakehead.

I managed to catch a couple more fat bass on the trap while probing a new weed bed area, a place to keep in mind for next time. We moved to the point where I caught my 21” fish the other day, and a few casts later, I hooked up into a monster. This 21 ½” fish was barely hooked by the back treble of my crankbait…my biggest fish in a couple years. Man was it fat and heavy.

After that, I managed to hook and lose another one on a nearby weed bed that we found. Then, hooked up and caught another one so I wouldn’t be stuck on 13. Time ran out and Steve needed the remaining time to get his boat out and ready to go home. Newbies!!!! LOL.

I started slow, but finished with a bang and equaled my last trip, 14 bass, including a 21 ½” fatty, a 18 ½” bass, and two 17” fat bass, and three yellow perch that thought they were largemouth. Steve landed 10 bass, including his biggest Potomac largemouth to date on his first cast, and a four pounder, along with two yellow perch, a white perch, and two fishzilla snakeheads (dead with the gills ripped out, probably filleted last night by Mr. Kelley).

Wow, what a day on the water and this following your success the other day! St. Patty's day is gone, but here I sit green with ***. Great day on the water and thanks for sharing. I for one don't mind all the detail one bit.

Kevin

[Fat Boy]

_{Thanks Kevin, glad you liked it! We are so blessed to have such a great river to fish. It can be tough down there, but at times, I can't think of a more fun place to fish. Something is always biting down there! I can't wait to get back. I'm going to try and match my wits against the largemouth at BH for a couple hours this evening. I hope that my luck continues. Who knows, maybe I'll run into one of you guys out there!}

[Bill Poch]

_{Thanks Kevin, glad you liked it! We are so blessed to have such a great river to fish. It can be tough down there, but at times, I can't think of a more fun place to fish. Something is always biting down there! I can't wait to get back. I'm going to try and match my wits against the largemouth at BH for a couple hours this evening. I hope that my luck continues. Who knows, maybe I'll run into one of you guys out there!}

I should be out there tonight as well. I'll be the guy out there getting snagged on tree's and losing the few crank baits I picked up today.

[JigMe]

What a day Fat boy, and I am struck in the freaking office doing presenetations. you guys are making me so jealous!

[TheKingFisher]

Bill I think we've all been that guy and on more than one occasion! That certainly was me on my last outing. I was lucky enough to get one of them back. I'll chalk it up as a sacrifice made to the fishing gods! Hopefully you guys will reap the rewards today.

Kevin

[wv]

Since I live in and work in Frederick, I think I'm going to see what the pond at Baker park looks like tomorrow (Mon) at lunch. I don't anticipate much of anything, going through my tackle tonight, all I have for LMB from last year are some plastic worms, plastic jerk baits, and a few cranks. I'm on a tight budget so I'll have to pick a few things up when I get paid this week. Tuesday after work I'm going to hit Black Hills and if we don't get much rain, I may run up to the Potomac at Harper's Ferry on Wed. I was up there last week but the river was still up a bit and couldn't get out of the shore line. Unfortunately the Hydrograph up there hasn't reported a river level since the 14th.

Harpers Ferry gauge was 3.44 feet at 2:00PM today. Good luck if you head out there.My son and I fished some there last year around one of the canal locks. Didn't do much but enjoyed watching some kayakers practicing going under the water and flipping back up.

[Munkin]

Fished the Upper Potomac Four Locks the past two weekends and the fishing has been good. Last weekend I caught a lot of small fish but I did manage 6 keepers. The thing the surprised me was most of the fish we were catching were LM? Normally only about 10% of the bass I catch in the UP are LM but last weekend it was like 75%. The fish are all in 5 FOW or less just look for areas without current and they should be there.

Allen

[Bill Poch]

Made it to BH tonight, fished what I think you guys call the "stick ups". I went with what has become the theme lately, lipless cranks. The is the 1st time I've used them and it paid of huge. Landed my PB.

I'm guessing he was pretty close the 4 pounds 19 - 20". I'm not used to catching big fish like this so I've never bothered with a scale, but homeboy was pretty thick and had the entire crank bait in his mouth. My dumb butt left my all purpose tool in the car that has my needle nose pliers and I was kicking myself. I had him hooked in the lip and deep down just passed his gills. I turned in to the MASH 4077th and managed some meatball surgery and was able to free the deep hook with a stick. I was going to be really upset with myself if I wasn't able to get this guy back in the water.

I was fishing the crank pretty slow and he was holding in about 2' of water and maybe 5 - 6' off the bank. I thought I got snagged, because I didn't anticipate him being so close, but then I realized, trees don't fight back. That was also my 1st of the year, so I'm pretty pumped right now drinking a victory beer or 3 tonight.

[Traveler2586]

"I was fishing the crank pretty slow and he was holding in about 2' of water and maybe 5 - 6' off the bank. I thought I got snagged, because I didn't anticipate him being so close, but then I realized, trees don't fight back. That was also my 1st of the year, so I'm pretty pumped right now drinking a victory beer or 3 tonight."

Congratulations on you PB - YES!

P.S. sometime trees do fight back One day my buddy & I were fishing the back end of a creek, I was on the bow fishing a small crank out in front, Ed was in the back doing "clean up" duty (catching everything I missed). I hooked something, so I gave it a split second a just the littlest bit of slack, and it pulled back with a bump! So I set the hook and yelled "got one". I was surprised at how Strong it was so I told Ed "get the net, I've got a big one"..... Well, I'm winding to beat the band, bending the rod, and I'm feeling tugs. I'm shouting "come on baby" and get it to the side of the boat. Then Ed starts laughing and shoves his arm deep into the water and I'm thinking "grab that sucker" when Ed pulls up ........ an old Christmas tree

Good fishin'

[TheKingFisher]

See Bill, my sacrifice paid off! Congratulations on your PB! That is a beauty for sure.

Kevin

[slaynbass365]

Bill I think we've all been that guy and on more than one occasion! That certainly was me on my last outing. I was lucky enough to get one of them back. I'll chalk it up as a sacrifice made to the fishing gods! Hopefully you guys will reap the rewards today.

Kevin

Too bad I wasnt there with 65lb braid this time haha

Very nice fish Bill!

[Fat Boy]

Nice fish Bill, congrats on your personal best! It's a beauty!

After arriving late after work with about an hour at best to fish, I fished at BH this evening with Monocacy and his buddy Mike (nice guy BTW). Mike caught one in the 13"-14" range as did I on soft plastics. But the interesting thing is that right at the end of the evening, I tied on a buzzbait, hooked a good fish near the bank that was probably 2-3 pounds. I wanted to land that fish badly, but it had other ideas, throwing the hook as I bellowed my frustration across the lake, scaring even the bats cruising around overhead. It would have been my first ever bass landed on a buzzbait in March in Maryland, but instead, became the first bass hooked on a buzzbait in March in Maryland. I just had a good feeling about it, frogs and toads everywhere, panfish surface activity everywhere, bugs in the air, warm temperatures and that evening calm on the lake...calling out for topwater. Could be a trend guys! More warmth on the way the next three days.

[301-fisherman]

Very nice fish! Congrats on the PB! I am headed to the stick ups at Black Hills tomorrow. Is anyone getting out? Should hopefully be getting some new cranks I ordered

[Bill Poch]

Thanks guys, I'm still pumped up about it.

Fat boy - I think it's suppose to be warmer tomorrow so now that you know they will hit the buzzbait you can land him tomorrow night.

TheKingFisher - your sacrifice has not gone unnoticed. Maybe next time I'm out there I'll have to build an alter on the banks and leave a crankbait as an offering to the fishing Gods.

[BrianinMD]

Seeing pics of some great fish congrats to everyone!!

Hopefully soon things will settle down a little bit and I get get over to BH to try my luck and hopefully meet some more of the guys. Have a tourney saturday on the lower so it won't be this weekend.

[slaynbass365]

Seeing pics of some great fish congrats to everyone!!

Hopefully soon things will settle down a little bit and I get get over to BH to try my luck and hopefully meet some more of the guys. Have a tourney saturday on the lower so it won't be this weekend.

Anybody have any thoughts on the spring meet and greet that was talked about last year? Only a few of us made it out last year, but had talked about doing another in the spring for those who were not able to make it.

[JigMe]

Anybody have any thoughts on the spring meet and greet that was talked about last year? Only a few of us made it out last year, but had talked about doing another in the spring for those who were not able to make it.

Great idea. haha!