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So far this winter I caught over 80 pickerel in the Severn. Until today, all the pickerel were caught in shallow (6" to 3') depth. With the cold air temperature last night and throughout the morning and no sun to warm the surface water layer, the surface layer of water was colder than the water several feet deeper. As a result, the pickerel moved away from the shallow water into slightly deeper waters.
Raptor and I launched from Jonas Green at 11:00 and headed to our target tributary. It was cold and breezy when we launched. I was fishing without a FF today, but have a pretty good idea of the depths in the places we fished. It was low tide when we began fishing. None of my fish today were shallow. I suspect that they were in the 2-5 ft depth range today. Raptor expressed a similar opinion.
The bite was fast and furious today. I caught 8 pickerel and Raptor caught a similar amount. We both had numerous fish grab the baits and drop them a few seconds later and had other fish that followed the bait to the boat then veered off. Had we worked only the shallows, as I have been doing, we might have been skunked today. Instead, we had a pleasant and active time for about 2 hours before calling it quits.
Raptor got a nice 21" pickerel today on a Gulp minnow. I did not catch any that long but had a huge one lunge at my live minnow as I lifted it from the water after a retrieve -- then it was gone.
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I won't report where we fished on this public board, but I will tell those anglers who show up to fish the meet and greet on Sat morning. If you are fishing for pickerel in cold weather, be prepared to change your casting locations to find the warmest water.
Raptor and I launched from Jonas Green at 11:00 and headed to our target tributary. It was cold and breezy when we launched. I was fishing without a FF today, but have a pretty good idea of the depths in the places we fished. It was low tide when we began fishing. None of my fish today were shallow. I suspect that they were in the 2-5 ft depth range today. Raptor expressed a similar opinion.
The bite was fast and furious today. I caught 8 pickerel and Raptor caught a similar amount. We both had numerous fish grab the baits and drop them a few seconds later and had other fish that followed the bait to the boat then veered off. Had we worked only the shallows, as I have been doing, we might have been skunked today. Instead, we had a pleasant and active time for about 2 hours before calling it quits.
Raptor got a nice 21" pickerel today on a Gulp minnow. I did not catch any that long but had a huge one lunge at my live minnow as I lifted it from the water after a retrieve -- then it was gone.
001.jpg
I won't report where we fished on this public board, but I will tell those anglers who show up to fish the meet and greet on Sat morning. If you are fishing for pickerel in cold weather, be prepared to change your casting locations to find the warmest water.
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