This season

[belairfishing]

Was a pretty good one for me. Has the opportunity to chase birds and caught some decent fish in crab alley bay. One thing I noticed is I didn't see anyone getting tortured by cow nose rays. Curious if the conditions weren't right for the rays. Anyone have any thoughts on that?

[Big Mike]

They were plentiful here in St Mary’s and I snagged about the same number as I normally do. Perhaps salinity levels further north were even lower than here (hard to imagine) earlier in the year.

[ronaultmtd]

More than I wanted, that’s for sure...June through August had bunches...I avoided many shallow bays because of them...

[bluefishnc]

Slow start to the year for me. Lots of cats mid Potomac river. By July things improved as salinity rose. Late July, Aug, Sept, and Oct were all fair to good with an excellent/epic day or two mixed in. Zero cownose rays caught for me. Zero seen. Very weird. With salinity I expected them all over but not a one. Usually I catch them from shore on cut bait and from the yak via snags and you see them finning all over. Nothing. Maybe they were all down river which would make some sense. Supposedly all the oyster beds up by the 301 and down to around Coles were almost 100% killed off last year with the low salinity so the main forage for them (shellfish) may have dictated where they were and weren't. Crabbing was good as well. Only negative was the nasty algae/sewage fish kill back in August I think it was but that was only a week or so blip.