Weems Creek / Tucker Ramp

Planning on going perching on Weems tomorrow AM and wanted to launch from the Tucker Street ramp rather than paddling over from Jonas Green.

I've never launched from Tucker before. What's the best way to park/launch from there ? How far away from the ramp will I need to park my truck after dropping off my kayak ?

[Shady]

The tucker street launch looks like a ramp at the end of a neighborhood court. I park on the side of the street that the houses are on. Just abide by the no parking signs and dont block anyone's driveway and you should be good. This ramp is technically supposed to be for annapolis residents only, but as long as you dont have a trailer and you are courteous to the neighbors, you can launch your kayak here no problems. I usually end up parking maybe 100 ft up the street from the ramp.

[Excalibur]

Thanks shadyfisher. I'll take a look at seeing if I can get in front of one of those houses w/o blocking a driveway or mailbox. I looked at the satellite photos and it doesn't look like there's any no parking signs on the house side of the street. So...I'm hoping that's still the case.

Anyone else planning on hitting Weems tomorrow ?

This is somewhat of a newb question: I've never been particularly productive with fishing johnson beetle spins. Can anyone out there give me a very elementary step by step way I should fish them for perch ? Do I cast, let it sink some and slow retrieve or...do I let it settle all the way to the bottom and retrieve really slow so it bounces/runs across bottom ? Some other way ? Just want to do what tends to work for folks.

[jsquare]

This is somewhat of a newb question: I've never been particularly productive with fishing johnson beetle spins. Can anyone out there give me a very elementary step by step way I should fish them for perch ? Do I cast, let it sink some and slow retrieve or...do I let it settle all the way to the bottom and retrieve really slow so it bounces/runs across bottom ? Some other way ? Just want to do what tends to work for folks.

For beetle spins, take off the little grub thing and put on a 2" curly tail, white or chartreuse. Cast it in towards shore or structure and let it sink a bit. Give the rod a quick twitch to get the blade spinning, then bring it back to the boat with a slow retrieve. That's really the only way I fish beetle spins and it works for me. If I think I need some other technique, I'll usually use a different lure.

[J.A. Veil]

For beetle spins, take off the little grub thing and put on a 2" curly tail, white or chartreuse. Cast it in towards shore or structure and let it sink a bit. Give the rod a quick twitch to get the blade spinning, then bring it back to the boat with a slow retrieve. That's really the only way I fish beetle spins and it works for me. If I think I need some other technique, I'll usually use a different lure.

That is good advice. If you launch at Tucker St, go either direction and work the shallow area along the shorelines. You can either stay one cast-length out from shore and cast toward shore or position yourself near the shore and cast parallel to the shore. If you make a few casts in an area and don't get any bites, then move to another stretch of shoreline. Perch can be found in many sections of Weems Creek shoreline, but not everywhere.

Also if you are not getting many bites, try a different color or length of twister tail or small paddletail minnow. jsquare uses 2" white twister tails -- I have been using 4" white paddletail minnow (shad) to good success. If you have more than one rod with you, rig them with different lures and see which one get more bites.

I am meeting another angler there at 8:30 tomorrow we will fish for a few hours (he is not used to kayak fishing -- I suspect he will succumb to the dreaded butt fatigue within 2 hours).

[Excalibur]

Met up with John Veil around 9:00 while he was waiting on his angling partner. John was kind enough to give me a few pointers and shared some twister tails with me. From there, he set me off in the right direction. It made for a great day. Fished for 5 hours and the tally was 30+ white perch, 8 dink stripers (8"/under) and 1 yellow perch. Thanks again John !

[J.A. Veil]

Met up with John Veil around 9:00 while he was waiting on his angling partner. John was kind enough to give me a few pointers and shared some twister tails with me. From there, he set me off in the right direction. It made for a great day. Fished for 5 hours and the tally was 30+ white perch, 8 dink stripers (8"/under) and 1 yellow perch. Thanks again John !

Mark -

You did very well after just a few pointers. That was some fine catching you did today -- especially for not having full confidence in the beetle spin lure. You sure put it to good use today.

My fishing partner today was a DNR fisheries biologist who has worked in the Tawes office building (the DNR building) for 25 years. Every day he drove to work and crossed over Weems Creek but never realized that there was a good fishery and some real pretty habitats below the bridge. Although he owns two sit inside kayaks, I don't think he had ever fished from them. He and I had talked last winter about getting him out in my backup sit-on-top kayak to see how much fun it could be. Today was the day. I think he is hooked now and will buy a sit-on top kayak over the next 6 months.

While waiting for him to arrive, I fished within 100 yds of the ramp. The first 30 minutes I was on the water this morning, the bite was torrid. In 30 minutes, I caught 18 perch and 1 pickerel -- all on Woody's feather jigs. Ironically, after he arrived, the bite rate slowed down considerably.