2018 year in review

This was another good year of fishing, Bass fishing off the shoreline at Loch Raven was really good with lots of nice size fish, April was the best month where I went on a streak of 6 consecutive trips catching at least one fish over 5lbs on each trip.
I took my boat out a couple times on the Chesapeake for preseason Rockfish but never did very good, once the season opened I went twice and caught a fish over 45" on both trips, not bad considering many people complained of it being slow and I only trolled with 6 to 7 rods and caught the fish in less then an hour on both trips.
The summer season for Stripers was really good, even when it got hot out the fish were stacked up in many different spots. then the rains came, it rained a lot this year. muddy water and huge amounts of debris was common throughout the second half of summer, I rarely even took my boat out, I mainly did shoreline fishing, I did  a few trips at loch Raven for Bass, And some urban fishing in Baltimore for Catfish, I was actually trying to get Carp but all I kept getting was Cats, but I can't complain, it was still fun,

I eventually got some Carp at Loch Raven.  I also did some Bass fishing in down town Baltimore, all the rain must of pushed the Bass down stream in the Patapsco. it was always amusing to hear some of the comments from people in the city, hardly anyone fishes in the city so people were constantly surprised.
Luckily the bay cleared out well for my favorite time of the year, Fall, and it turned out to be my best October for Stripers ever, maybe even my best fall, it was at least my top 3. In October I had another streak where I went 10 straight trips catching fish over 30", I would of went 14 straight trips but one trip my biggest was only 29".

Hopefully this year will be as memorable

Rocktober report

The fall has always been my favorite time to target Rockfish casting spoons, plastics and top water. I like when the big fish come in in the spring and summer and even winter fishing, but no matter the time of year, fall is the time I'm always waiting for. The larger schoolies always usually arrive around September, but every year is different in the upper bay, this year I caught fish over 30" in September but not as many as usual, October is when it got good. I went out on 14 trip in October and caught (and released) fish over 30" on every trip except one, and on that one trip the biggest fish was 29", I had a couple trips where I caught more fish over 30" that I could even caught, just one after another for hours. the biggest in October was 36", but I also had a couple days where the biggest was 35", and about half of my trips I managed fish to 34". Its been one of my best falls in about 5 years, and probably my best October ever.                                                                                                                                                                                  the real trick to getting them was fishing shallow lumps, and lots of stealth, areas where boats are running all over the fish were almost always avoided, the bigger fish don't like the sound of boat motors, they know we are their biggest predators. I would generally try many spots, until I find them, sometimes they were where I found them in the previous trips, and sometimes they were in other locations, but they always stayed in the same 3 mile radi
us. Ironically, as good as this fall has been in the upper bay for the larger fish, I haven't seen the large schools of smaller fish like usual, where you could basically run to many spots and catch all the smaller keepers you want for hours. this past summer was actually like that which was also unusual, I often commented that this past summer reminded me of the average fall, not sure where the smaller fish went, but some say they moved south to the mid bay already. It does seem like the reports are increasing down that way
EDIT...went out on my last trip (October 31) and got totally skunked, first skunk since March, to make matters worse I hooked up with over ten drag peeling fish, and everyone got off. Im not sure what was happening. I also thought I got a snag once, but it turned out to be a big fish, it took off and snapped my line, must be a Halloween curse LOL