Weems Creek 5-22-12

[bignose]

Gave Weems Creek a quick look see today.

Good news and bad news.
Good news: the water from Tucker Street to the Severn is exceptionally clear. Even with today's overcast, I could see 2-3 feet into the water. Above Tucker Street to the bridges, the visibility is about 1-2 feet. The creek is full of pods of baitfish-baby menhaden-all about 3/4 to1" long. You can see large areas of "nervous" water where they flash on the surface, and they appeared as clouds on the FF. I did not fish above the bridges today.
The pickerel are still biting, I found several about 5-10 feet offshore and around weeds and fallen timber. 3-4 feet deep. Mostly hammer handles, but a couple in the 15" range. My green Spinner jig was the ticket. I even caught a 10" rockfish, not far from the Tucker Street ramp.

Bad news: the perch don't seem to be there in numbers yet. I caught maybe 5-6. None were over 8 inches. Didn't do much under the docks or along the bulkheads.

Still, it was a lot more fun than working as a first mate on a charter boat. No chum to scrub off, and no tangled lines to straighten out. lol.

[J.A. Veil]

Thanks for the report. I tried for perch last Friday in several spots near Jonas Green last Fri and came up empty. Your report of perch and pickerel in Weems sounds good. I hope to get out there in the next few days.

[Shady]

Thanks for the report on Weems creek.
I plan to launch there and head out to the main river for crabbing and fishing with my wife on Saturday. Hopefully the perch bite will improve even more by saturday.

[ictalurus]

Thanks for the update on Weems Creek. Fishing clear water is fun. Too bad the big perch didn't come out to play.

[Grady-Black]

Thanks for the report Bignose. I was there last Saturday 5/19 with the same results as you. I was wondering what those baitfish were, they are all over the creek!!

GB

[J.A. Veil]

I launched at Tucker St at 8:30 this morning. I spent 2 hours fishing Weems upstream of the Tucker St ramp. The water was an unpleasant brown color. I cast steadily during those two hours but hooked only about 5 perch (none larger than 8") and three hammer handle-sized pickerel.

I did not head out to the main river or fish the outer sections of Weems today.

Despite the slow bite today, I am happy to see that the perch are moving back into their summer locations. I would like to see cleaner water though.

I would characterize my trip as the "Day of the Snakes". As I prepared to launch, a water snake swam by just 10 ft away. I saw about 5 more water snakes during the outing. To top things off, at home I unloaded my kayak and moved it to the back of the house to enter the walk-out door to the basement. I saw a 3-ft long black snake sitting on a table less than 3 ft from where I was pulling the boat. I jumped back and got the camera out for a photo.

[Grady-Black]

That water was so clear last week!
Thanks for the report John..
GB

[ronaultmtd]

I launched at Tucker St at 8:30 this morning. I spent 2 hours fishing Weems upstream of the Tucker St ramp. The water was an unpleasant brown color. I cast steadily during those two hours but hooked only about 5 perch (none larger than 8") and three hammer handle-sized pickerel.

I did not head out to the main river or fish the outer sections of Weems today.

Despite the slow bite today, I am happy to see that the perch are moving back into their summer locations. I would like to see cleaner water though.

I would characterize my trip as the "Day of the Snakes". As I prepared to launch, a water snake swam by just 10 ft away. I saw about 5 more water snakes during the outing. To top things off, at home I unloaded my kayak and moved it to the back of the house to enter the walk-out door to the basement. I saw a 3-ft long black snake sitting on a table less than 3 ft from where I was pulling the boat. I jumped back and got the camera out for a photo.

I have a bunch of blacksnakes in my pole barn where I park my lawn tractor and have my kayaks stored. The mama snake has been here since 1998 and is easily six-seven feet long and as thick as my bicep- great mouse catchers so I put up with their shedding skins, scaring the daylights out of me when I open the doors and she is laying next to the door...her babies are four to six feet long and I sometimes cacth them in the yard and put them in the edge of the woods so I won't run over them with the mower- if you are careful and gently lift them with a garden fork, they are calm and let you move them. Otherwise, they get pissy and coil up like a bad snake.

[Southerly]

i have noticed similar conditions - the clear water with brown color, lots of menhaden but have had perch on/off.

i have different theories. one is perch can see my lures too well in this clear water and it gives enough time for them to hesitate. another is that they're well-fed from tons of bait. or that they are simply moving around en masse (this is my gut feeling).

the brown color doesn't necessarily bother me as it might be from tannins from rotted leaves etc on bottom. dunno. i like the high clarity since i do not believe it is full of nutrients and clear, brown microbes.

i think if there was a lot of nutrients, it would soon turn green from the clorofilled algae. the tons o menhaden also points to it being good water quality, at least in my eyes.

in any case - the 10"+ perch bite was ON last night just before dark. they rode in close to shore on the high tide to feed. i hit them on beetlespin, sm gold kastmaster, and super-duper.

[bignose]

I fished for perch today for about 1 1/2 hours in Martin's cove just above Cantler's and Leo James. The creek had some color to it and the water clarity was only about a foot. Still, I managed to pick up about 20 perch mostly from 6-8 inches, and invited the 10 biggest home for dinner.
Green Spinner jig did the damage. Best area was rip rap and wood, none under the docks.
Still waiting for the bigguns.

Yeah, I saw a lot of water snakes on Weems on Tuesday too, almost reminded me of Mattawoman Creek which is water snake heaven. They wouldn't be there if there wasn't something there for them to eat.
The real fun is when a blacksnakes drops out of a tree and lands in the canoe. Yee Haa!

[Southerly]

yesterday, i dipped some menhaden to put in the aquarium. the resident bull minnows sucked their eyeballs out as soon as they hit the water

the menhaden then settled in at the bottom, without eyeballs. and i think the white perch finished them off later. the grass shrimp sort of disappeared too.

i was disappointed that my perch fishing last nite wasn't up to the previous nite's action, but i managed a couple small ones on a kastmaster.

glad you got into them good!

[ronaultmtd]

menhaden are a fragile fish to try to keep alive- When i use them in live bait fishing I keep the pump running constantly- when I have spot small craokers and big river minnows- i run the pump from time to time to keep the water fresh in my livewell. White perch are all over Cobb Island flats- I use UL spinning gear with a 1/16 jighead and a natural body swim shad- can't miss- I usually thow back white perch even the big ones- seems to me to be too much trouble cleaning these little fish- gives me something to do when fishing is slow- I am not fishing this weekend- went groundhog shooting (notice I didn't say hunting) yesterday in southern PA- we met a couple of new farmers. Funny story- we were hunting on the edge of the property of a farm we always hunt when the next door (640 acres next door) farmer rode by on his Gator- he stopped and talked to us- asking us what we were doing, very curious about our rifles, scopes, binoculars, rangefinders, etc. We spotted a big groundhog on his property about 350 yards out in his alfalfa field- he asked if our rifles could reach out and kill the groundhog- when I said sure he offered the back of his Gator as a shooting platform- to make the story short I killed two off his gator- each with a single shot- he was hooked! He couldn't believe anyone could shoot accurately that far- We ended up hunting the rest of the day on his farm- killed 16- and he gave us permission to hunt three other properties that totaled over 2500 acres- you can't make this stuff up- farmers hate groundhogs-

[Tyrone Shoes]

How far back do you go in Weems Creek? I used to fish the dock of a house we remodeled a few years ago........beautiful area!

Ron, what are you shooting the groundhogs with? 22-250? Ever play with a .17 hmr?

[ronaultmtd]

I have a stainless bull barrel Savage bolt action .17HMR with a 6.5-20X44 Scope that I use around the house for popping close ones, but it runs out of gas at about 175-200 yards- just doesn't have enough energy to put them down past that and southern PA fields have shots that average 300 yards- my custom Remington 700 varmint rifle is a bull barreled .22-250, with a Timney trigger, sitting in a laminated thumbhole varmint Boyd's stock I pillar and glass bedded. I have a Nikon Monarch 6.5-20X44 FCH scope on it and use a Bushnell Scout laser rangefinder to range my shots-ended up with 16 yesterday-it was hot and humid- I walked six miles around the edges of field in the rolling hill country- my rifle weighs 13 1/2 pounds with a magazine full of ammo- I carry a Ruger GP100 six inch stainless .357 mag for quick unexpected shots at groundhogs in hedgerows when we are walking around- the pistols got six yesterday-

[Tyrone Shoes]

Nice gear!

What a great way to spend a day!