Pacemaker Fishing Forum

This is a loaded post....too much to answer in a little time.......you can go through older posts on this site and get lots of answers to your questions.

Striper- Holy smokes! You want us to write a book? Stripers are in the rivers and tributaries but most are heading out....saying that, VA Beach (CBBT) is the best place but you need a big boat unless you know of a beach that they slam. Go to Tidal Fish and browse around the VA board. We catch them on 3/4-1.5 ox jigs with BAs, BKD,s and such. You can sometimes use Top Water but most of the time they are deeper. Trolling is always successful. If you have a boat, I can lend you the gear (it never gets used).

Smallies- I have never fished for them in the winter. Boating is dangerous at this time of year. Maybe Josh will see this and weigh in. The guys at River Smallies will also clue you in.

Perch- Yellow perch can be found in the Occoquan.....the same for LMB and stripers. To me, that's one of your best alternative locations.

Winter surf fishing- Maybe Capt. Mike or Paul Naj can weigh in but I don't think there is much going on in the surf at this time of year.

Lastly, tell us how long you will be home...maybe one of us will be in need of a crew member.

Charlie:

Your best bet for smallmouth would be to fish the area around White's Ferry. With you Kayak, you can put in at White's Ferry and head upstream to the mouth of the discharge canal at Dickerson Power Plant. Small jig 'n pig, tubes and grubs are all great baits for the smallmouth. Don't forget your Pop-R as there are a few tiger muskie around that area that love topwater. Most of the smallmouth will be in the 1-2# range and you will probably get a few channel catfish in the 6-12# class.

The next place to try would be Nolands Ferry. Take Route 15 across the bridge at Point of Rocks and turn right on Route 28. Follow this toward Washington until you see New Design Road. Turn right on New Design Road and follow it across the railroad tracks and on to a primitive ramp at the river. Just upstream from the ramp is the intake for the Frederick County Water Company. From that point to about 250 yards downstream, there are ledges crisscrossing the river. The deep holes between these ledges hold some good (3-5#) smallmouth. I have caught a bunch of smallmouth this size over the years on small grubs and jig 'n pig. I have even caught a few on small balsa crankbaits, retrieved very, very slowly.

The next place would be Lander. Cross the river at Route 15 and make the first left onto Route 464. Follow this west until you see Lander Road. Turn left and follow Lander Road to the Railroad Tracks. Turn left and cross the tracks. Continue on this road until you come to a primitive ramp at the river. Launch here and drift downstream to the power lines. You will see lots of large rocks all around you at that point. These smallmouth feed on minnows hanging around those large rocks. I normally use a small balsa crankbait, an in-line spinner (Mepps, etc.), a 1/4 oz. white spinnerbait or grub/jig 'n pig. This is another area where you can pick up some good fish (2-4#).

Good luck.

Cold water, small boat and fishing alone is not a good recipie for fishing the UP.....