Pacemaker Fishing Forum

Two coworkers and I left work early (5pm is early for us...) and headed down to the Occoquan for some shad fishing! They went on Saturday and were catching them on bare chartreuse jig heads! HA! I was out of town so I couldn't join them so we scheduled a time during the week. We got there around 6:15 and the water was brown from the rain today but there were tons of fish jumping, everywhere. From the looks of it, and based off our catching, I think they were all gizzards jumping around.

We were there for about 2 hours and used a variety of lures, bare jig heads, curly tails, shad darts, feather jigs, marabou jigs, and the like. Together we only caught one hickory, and it was on a chartreuse marabou jig with a white tail. There were several other people fishing, and a couple hunting for snakies, and we only saw one or two hickories caught. We snagged a handful of gizzards though. They pull hard, especially on light tackle, so we still got some pullage, but it was a bit disappointing not catching what we were after. Towards the end we decided to try for bass/snakies just for kicks. We just snagged more gizzards haha. I wonder if the shad run is

All in all it was a fun trip. I have never fished the Occoquan from shore. I always enjoy exploring new areas. My next expedition won't be until the first weekend of May. If the shad are still here I'll go play, but I might need to come up with a backup plan.