Fishing suggestions for Little Choptank sanctuary ?

[Slackdaddy]

I'm not much of a "bay" fisherman,, My MO is either mountain rivers or lilly fields in tidal creek.
Anyhow, we are spending a few days water front at a house the Little choptank sanctuary area (see picture).

We will be limiting to the area in the circle (in the picture)
What will I be fishing for? and how do I fish it? The Wife will be crabbing from her Kayak.
Like I said, I am clueless on this "open water" stuff.

choptank.jpg

[Slackdaddy]

choptank2.jpg

[dsaavedra]

I fished nearby last year, launching from Madison. I have only fished here once, but I did pretty well. I caught a good number of small to medium sized rockfish and a few speckled seatrout.

My main tactic was to troll 3" paddle tails on light jigheads (1/8 to 1/4 oz) along the shorelines in shallow water and particularly focus on points and other areas where the current was intersected or constricted by land. There are several small islands at the tips some of the large landmasses and these were productive for me as they constrained the tidal flow and resulted in localized areas of increased current. The tide wasn't moving fast that day and I suspect if it was moving fast I'd had done even better.

I see 3 prominent points in the yellow area you circled, and there are 3 more if you're willing to cross the creek and fish the opposite shoreline. These would all be good places to target. On each of these points there may be smaller "micro" points that can hold fish too. A quick peak at Navionics will give you an idea of depth in the area (it's mostly shallow) and it looks like at least one of these points is relatively close to deeper water in the main creek channel - that would be another good spot to try.

[Slackdaddy]

Dave,
Thanks for your response.
Like I said, I am clueless on "bay fishing"
When you say shallows, 1-2' of water? what if the bottom is featureless with no struture?

Are Drop offs productive?
The red X is where we are staying, I was trying to stay within 1-1.5 miles , the lowest yellow circle is 1.75, so do-able.

The short story is, wife grabbed an Air BNB for 3 days, figured there was water so it would be great fishing, did not consult me. we have 2 adult kids coming. And I am tasked with "getting them fish"

I fished nearby last year, launching from Madison. I have only fished here once, but I did pretty well. I caught a good number of small to medium sized rockfish and a few speckled seatrout.

My main tactic was to troll 3" paddle tails on light jigheads (1/8 to 1/4 oz) along the shorelines in shallow water and particularly focus on points and other areas where the current was intersected or constricted by land. There are several small islands at the tips some of the large landmasses and these were productive for me as they constrained the tidal flow and resulted in localized areas of increased current. The tide wasn't moving fast that day and I suspect if it was moving fast I'd had done even better.

I see 3 prominent points in the yellow area you circled, and there are 3 more if you're willing to cross the creek and fish the opposite shoreline. These would all be good places to target. On each of these points there may be smaller "micro" points that can hold fish too. A quick peak at Navionics will give you an idea of depth in the area (it's mostly shallow) and it looks like at least one of these points is relatively close to deeper water in the main creek channel - that would be another good spot to try.

[dsaavedra]

I don't remember the exact depths I was fishing in that area, but I usually like a little more than 1-2 feet of water. Somewhere between 3 to 6 feet of water. Drop offs can definitely be productive. If you find an area where a shallow flat drops off to a deeper channel or just deeper water in general, fishing right along the edge of the drop off can be productive, especially now that the water is getting hot. Fish like quick access to cooler deeper water and will feed along these edges. If you have electronics on your kayak it will help you find these areas. If not, do some scouting ahead of time on Navionics web app and/or google earth imagery to get a general idea of where the shallows and drop offs are.

It looks like there are a few docks in that creek that extend out to deeper water, fishing under these docks would probably produce some fish... white perch if nothing else.

[Slackdaddy]

I forgot to attach the chartchoptank3.jpg

[J. Rentch]

Fished there last summer- was a rough day. The bite was scarce, but it was my first time there. BTY-if you are in the market for some good soft crabs- check out Danny’s Soft Crabs. Picked up some after a day on the water and had them for supper. We great and the price was just as good.

[J.A. Veil]

Like many other places in our region, stripers are less likely to be in the shallows as the water temps get higher. I have observed that already in portions of Eastern Bay. I usually fish in the Little Choptank several times each summer and fall. I usually launch from Madison (southern side of the river) and once I launched at Ragged Point ramp (northern side).

My fishing style in the Little Choptank is to troll 3" or 4" paddletails parallel to the shoreline. I focus closely on depths from 2.5' to 5'. That does not mean that fish are not deeper -- it only means that I am not fishing for them in deeper areas. The ideal spots for fishing are (as Dave noted) any points that stick out from the shoreline. Even better is when the tidal current is moving past those points with a visible tidal rip. I experienced visual tidal rips only once, but it was an epic day (65 stripers with many over 20" in 4 hours of trolling). I returned a week later and did not see the visible rips -- the fishing was poor that day. Also look for structure, like submerged rock piles, old bulkheads, etc.

My last trip there was on June 10. Given the wide open spaces, it is important to pay attention to wind speed and direction. The wind turned out to be stronger than predicted that day and was from the NW (bad direction). Plus there was abundant floating grass that inhibited my trolling. I suspect the floating grass will not be an issue now. I fished hard (trolled 10.2 miles in an 11' paddle kayak) and caught only 4 stripers.

I am not very familiar with the area that you initially circled. I fished that far up only once and caught almost nothing in that area. I had to work farther south until I approached the main river. On many of my trips there, I cross from the southern shore of the river to the northern shore. Although I do troll several lines while crossing through the deeper sections of the river, I have never caught anything deeper than 8 to 10 ft there. I don't want to sound pessimistic, but I don't think your odds are very good of finding a lot of stripers in the area you circled in late June/early July. If you are able, work your way farther down to Ragged Point and work both the river side and bay side of the peninsula. I often catch a few fish at the next point up the river (Casson Point). Early morning or near dusk may improve your odds. If you are out during those times, throw some topwater to the points.