Patuxent Water Trail kayak kamping

[NoDakYak]

This weekend a few friends and I took advantage of one of the Patuxent Water Trail campsites. There are four campsites on the trail that are water access only (http://patuxentwatertrail.org/ for more info if you're interested). We had the Milltown Landing campsite, which is about a half mile downriver from the Clyde Watson boat ramp.

The campsite itself was fantastic; right on the water, with a fire ring, picnic table, and port o potty. Well-maintained site, isolated, and beautiful (especially at night).

The plan was to stage cars/gear at Clyde Watson, but put in the kayaks upriver a ways for a nice float on Friday. Unfortunately we misjudged how strong the full moon tide was, and what we planned to be a 4 hour leisurely float and fish turned into 7 hours of determined paddling just to make sure we were set up in camp by dark. This made apparent the shortcomings of my Lifetime Teton--it's a perfectly adequate fishing platform for calm water, but it's definitely not suited for long distance paddling or for fighting the wind/current. I've only been at this hobby this year, and the Teton is a great starter, but I'm already considering upgrading.

So Friday wasn't much for fishing, we had to focus on distance instead. We trolled, just to say we were fishing, but had zero bites.

Saturday the plan was to paddle around the campsite, explore some creeks, and fish at our leisure. Unfortunately the wind and current were higher than forecasted, and between the conditions and our exhaustion from the day before, we didn't get much fishing done from the kayaks. I tried to work the shoreline with some small spinner baits, one of my friends worked some topwater out in the river, and a couple more tried to explore some smaller creeks with frogs for snakeheads. No luck on anything, and we gave up after not too long.

So we didn't catch a single fish from a kayak. We spent most of the day/evening in camp with catfish rods out, and were very successful in that. Caught bunches of blue cats, most in the 3-7 pound range, but several larger fish in the 10-12 range and our biggest fish at 15 pounds. Two small channel cats as well, which were released. The blues were all good eating size and now reside in my freezer.

To be honest I'm not sure what other fish we should be targeting at that point in the river. I believe there's snakeheads up in the creeks, but that bite has probably slowed down as it's cooled off. Are there perch in that stretch? Do the stripers come up the Pax that far?

Despite the lack of fishing success from the yaks, we had a great time sitting by the fire right on the bank with catfish rods, and had lots of fun reeling in some nice cats. Looking forward to trying it again, maybe at one of the other sites, and applying some lessons learned. Hopefully get a chance to see if there are any fish other than cats in the middle Pax!

[dsaavedra]

Great report, thanks for sharing. Kayak camping sounds like a lot of fun and something I would be interested in trying.

The tide certainly rips through those middle stretches of the Patuxent, I'm not sure what it is but that stretch of the river has some of the strongest tides I've ever experienced. Sounds like you guys made the best of the situation.

Regarding fishing in that area, I think catfishing takes center stage by a wide margin. Stripers will come up there but I think at this time of year they are further down the river. In early spring there may be a run of yellow and then white perch. I always read in the reports that there are snakeheads in the marshy areas of the tidal Patuxent but I have been entirely unsuccessful catching any, I have given up trying.

[Jigsup]

As Dave wrote catfish will dominate that area. Specially this time of year. I’ve seen people catch very small perch and spot in that area but that’s about it. Further up the river there are bass and brim. With the temps dropping now I’d have to figure spot are headed back out. You can catch the yellow and white perch run in the late winter. Rockfish do venture there also but at a time when they are off limits. As far as snakeheads go I’ve seen a monster snakehead at a size I believe they call “dragon” by the lower Marlboro pier but never caught one. I’ve targeted them only once in that area without success. However I did spook one in a shallow part of the river off the main channel at low tide that day.

Camping sounds fun. And you can’t go wrong with fresh fish.

[paxmule]

I have it reserved later this month. Me and a friend are gonna paddle in from clyde watson and he's gonna be in a my backup kayak, a lifetime teton. The plan is to strictly bank fish for blue cats at night. Quick question, what did you do for firewood? Did you forage or bring it on the kayak?

[NoDakYak]

We packed in firewood on the kayaks. Couple guys in my group had hobie mirages that had a lot of capacity to stack wood on.

There is plenty of fallen wood around, you could forage if your brought a camp saw to cut stuff up, but given all the recent rain and the fact it’s all lying on the ground, it seemed pretty damp. I’d recommend at least bringing some nice dry stuff in, to get a good fire going before you start foraging.