Founder fishing continues to be a good bet in the back bay areas of Ocean City and Assateague Island. Flounder are being caught around the Route 90 Bridge south to the Thorofare area, the East Channel and behind Assateague Island. Natural baits of squid and minnows as well as white Gulp mullet baits are good choices this week.
At the inlet area tautog fishing remains good off the bulkhead areas, the jetties and the Oceanic Pier. Small 14” to 16” bluefish arrived in force last weekend and there were several times when the fishing was in blitz mode early in the weekend. The night crew has been catching striped in the inlet area on swim shads and bucktails, especially on a falling tide.
Surf fishermen are now seeing water temperatures around 62-degrees and new arrivals to the Ocean City/Assateague area. Fishermen have been catching some nice striped bass from the surf this week and bluefish are a big part of the catches now. There are a lot of skates and dogfish being caught and the first sting rays and sand tiger sharks were seen this week in the surf. The best striped bass fishing lately seems to be low tide.
The boats heading out to the wreck sites have been finding good numbers of sea bass on most of the wrecks and although the numbers are dwindling; tautog are still being caught. Bluefish are becoming more common in the area as are flounder and blue sharks and there have been rumors of thresher sharks lost and seen.
The offshore fishing fleet had its first taste of good fishing this week with boats bringing back dolphin from the Baltimore Canyon area and the season’s first mako shark and bluefin tuna. All were caught in the Baltimore Canyon where the water temperature has been about 64-degrees. Some fishermen have also been fishing deep in the area for tilefish and J D Eddy brought this whopping 47-pound snowy grouper to the dock this past weekend.
Real-time water information for selected points in the Coastal Bay
Click here to view recent bay region satellite images at mddnr.chesapeakebay.net/NASAimagery/EyesInTheSky.cfm
A Couple of Closing Notes...
Don't hesitate to e-mail your recent
fishing/crabbing photos and trip information. Send your photos via E-mail by the
following Monday in order to be included in the next update. The file should be
in .jpg format with the longest side sized at 600 pixels. Please keep the file
size under one megabyte if possible. The photo should clearly depict the angler(s), fish, and ethical
handling practices. For information on ethical angling practices please
reference the Catch and Release information located at URL:
http://www.dnr.state.md.us/fisheries/articles/catch_release.html
Include the following information:
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Date
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Angler(s)
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Hometown(s)
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Photo credit
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Location
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Weight/length of catch
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Bait/lure
Important Note:
If anyone in your picture is under 18
years of age, we must have a
photo release
signed by that person and a parent/guardian before we can post your picture. By sending any photos or art to the Maryland Department of Natural Resources you are giving DNR permission to use the image(s) online and in print. You are also giving DNR permission to distribute the photo for non-commercial purposes to other media, print, digital and television for their use. You are not giving up your copyright, but are allowing the photo(s) to be used for educational and news purposes.
Send your photos and information to
Keith Lockwood
The Fisheries
Service is pleased to have you visit. We want to make this
site as user friendly as possible, if you have any suggestions, please
mail them to
Paul Genovese.
