Deep Creek Lake Fishing Report

Type: Freshwater
Region: Western
Location: Deep Creek Lake

Thursday evening, Tom O’Connell and I fished Deep Creek Lake starting at around 5:30 in the afternoon. The bite was slow to start, but picked up as the evening went. Fishing mainly rocky shorelines and docks, we managed to boat 10-15 smallmouth, some rock bass, and a few chain pickerel. The hot lure was a white jig, marabou tail, casting in 2-8 feet of water.

Friday morning Alan Klotz joined us in the boat, launching a little past 6:00 a.m. The action was good from practically the first cast, with Alan and Tom showing me how to catch fish for the first hour or so. They were casting 3” plastic tubes and twitching them back, just below the surface. Similar areas were fished as the night before, and the fishing was fantastic. We lost track along the way, but a conservative estimate would be in the neighborhood of 30-40 smallmouth in the boat, up to ~13”, countless rock bass, and a pickerel or two. We took out around 11:30, with Tom catching a beautiful 13” smallie on the last cast of the morning.

The lake is fishing well right now, with water temps in the low-mid 60s throughout the lake and warmer as you move south. The bass are very close to spawning and the panfish should be turning on soon. A great time to visit Garrett Co.!!!

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Tags: Smallmouth Bass, Rock bass, Chain Pickerel

It's Time to Fish Deep Creek Lake!

Type: Freshwater
Region: Western
Location: Deep Creek Lake

The Western Region Fisheries Management staff conducted spring-time surveys in Deep Creek Lake this week, and now is a good time to fish for a variety of freshwater fish species. The shallow cove areas in the southern end of the lake are loaded with spawning golden shiners that are attracting walleye, largemouth bass, northern pike, and chain pickerel. Panfishing should also be good as the lake’s temperature in the coves is about 60° F, and we collected many yellow perch in the 8 – 13 inch range, pumpkinseeds, bluegills in the 8 – 9 inch size class, and brown and yellow bullheads that weighed about 2 lbs. The rocky shoreline areas showed good numbers of smallmouth bass in the 10 - 14 inch size class, along with a good numbers of rock bass. If you are into carp fishing, try the Green Glade Cove area, we observed some specimens there that were simply too large to fit in our dip nets.

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Tags: Deep Creek Lake, walleye, largemouth bass, northern pike, chain pickerel, bluegill, pumpkin seeds, rock bass, carp

Annual Deep Creek Lake Walleye Abundance Survey

Type: Freshwater
Region: Western
Location: Deep Creek Lake

The Western Region Fisheries staff recently completed the annual Deep Creek Lake walleye abundance survey. The survey results showed a high abundance value at 210 walleye per hour of electrofishing. Most of the adult fish were in the 15 – 18 inch size range (a few fish pictured in the live well are still stunned from the electrofishing, but recovered rather quickly). The season on walleye in Deep Creek Lake opened up on April 16, and one of the best locations to fish for these tasty gamefish is along the state park shoreline from the beach area right up to the boat ramp. The walleye are in very shallow water just after sunset, and casting Rapalas or Husky Jerks should produce action. We also collected some nice-sized chain pickerel, smallmouth bass, and jumbo yellow perch.

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Tags: Walleye, Smallmouth Bass, Yellow Perch

Tour de Garrett

Type: Freshwater
Region: Western
Location: Garrett County

Today was another day on the road visiting Award Centers in Allegany and Garrett Counties. It never fails to impress me how much the climate changes when you cross Savage Mountain; as soon as I began to come over the crest there before me was the last vestiges of a winter’s snow, covering the shaded north slopes. This was the first snow this flatlander from the eastern shore has seen since early February. Traveling down Route 219 I came upon this roadside historic sign that noted the Bear Creek Trout Hatchery; one of our oldest and still functioning hatcheries. At Deep Creek Lake the lake seemed to be hanging in a sort of limbo; stuck between hard ice and open water. Although most of the lake still was covered with rotten ice, the edges were open. At the Wisp ski slopes a few die-hard skiers were trying to make the last runs of the season; but it seemed to look more like ice skating to me.

I have always been intrigued with early American history and especially the Revolutionary War and the war of 1812 due to the fact that I grew up near several battle sites. Today I discovered this roadside sign above Deep Creek Lake in the town of McHenry and found it most interesting to find out how Fort McHenry in Baltimore got its name. Next year our nation will celebrate the 200th anniversary of the epic bombardment of Fort McHenry by the British during the War of 1812 that inspired composing of our national anthem.

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Tags: Deep Creek Lake, Citation Award Centers

The fall sampling for deep creek has been completed and things look good.

Type: Freshwater
Region: Western
Location: Deep Creek

The fall sampling for deep creek has been completed and things look good. Even with the fish kill that occurred earlier this year the lake is still alive and well. Nice quality fish of all species were collected including a Large Mouth Bass that topped the scale at around eight pounds. Fishermen have plenty of options this time of year. The walleye and perch bite will heat up and bass fishing is still good as well. I would recommend jerk baits or a simple slip bobber rig with minnows or a small piece of night crawler. Just a reminder, the fall trout stocking has been completed. While the streams are low and clear, a sneaky fisherman could still come home with a stringer of trout. Pictured is a carp that was shocked out of deep creek lake, it is not that common to see a carp of this size. Usually the carp that people see are much larger. If you need or want to include anything else be my guest, just let me know and I will do my best to get information.

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Tags: Deep Creek Lake, Stocking

Had to sneak up on the smallmouths today

Type: Freshwater
Region: Central
Location: Potomac River, Lander

Launched the kayak at Lander on the Potomac River Saturday Morning. Beautiful day to be out fishing the river, cool blue sky. Tried the main current down the center of the river with tubes, jigs and crankbaits with just one 10-inch smallmouth to show for my efforts. Then tried working the mid river current breaks (big rock formations) with tubes and jigs. Other than a couple of plump suicidal sunfish nothing doing there either. Drifted downstream to the Huffmans Rocks area to give the ledges a try. While I saw a several good sized channel catfish patrolling the ledges I was unable to get a rise out of any of the smallmouth bass.

I paddled over towards the Maryland shoreline and dropped my foot on a table sized rock to anchor the kayak while I pondered my next move. Absent minded I flicked a short cast into a small pool on the other side of that rock and the twister tail jig was almost instantly hammered by a twelve inch smallmouth bass. I landed that fish and got another smallie a little further back in that same pool. I thought I had stumbled across a viable pattern for the rest of the day and I proceeded to fan cast those small side pools off the main flow. However I soon found out that if I paddled the kayak into those pools I would not catch a thing. I was better off sneaking along with a low profile keeping a rock or a log between myself and the area I was fishing. The water was extremely clear (diminishing amount of daylight or the lower water temperatures this time of year have reduced the usual amount of suspended plankton in the water column?). The bright sunshine coupled with the clear water apparently made those smallies spooky. Made me feel like I was chasing trout in a crystal clear creek. The sun low on the horizon resulting in those long shadows was not helping matters either. Didn't take much to spook a pool. Before the day was over I managed to finagle a dozen smallmouths in the 10 to 12 inch range (green pumpkin 3-inch texas rigged tubes and pearl 3-inch curly tailed grubs on a plain 1/16th ounce jig head seemed to be the ticket). All bass were returned to the water to come back next year as slightly wiser 2-pounders for another angler to match wits with.

p.s. as an avid reader of the angler's log I must say reading the various reports from across the state has spurred me to trying out a bunch of new fishing locations this season. I've been up and down the Potomac from Williamsport to Seneca Breaks, made forays up the Monocacy and Conococheague Creek and I plan on running the kayak up to Deep Creek Lake in a couple of weeks. While it has not resulted in many big fish (bass in the 20-inch range) it has been a ton of fun and I've always managed to scratch out a few fish even on the toughest days to make the outing seem worth the effort.

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Tags: Largemouth Bass, Smallmouth Bass, Fallfish

The Youghiogheny River Catch and Release Trout Fishing Area

Type: Freshwater
Region: Western
Location: The Youghiogheny River Catch and Release Trout Fishing Area

The Youghiogheny River Catch and Release Trout Fishing Area was surveyed at Hoyes and Sang Run stations to document the status of the trout population. Cursory results showed that the river was supporting a high quality trout fishery (more than 2,000 trout per mile), with many quality-size brown and rainbow trout in the population. Brown and rainbow trout greater than 20 inches were collected during the surveys. We stocked 6,137 warmwater rainbow trout fingerlings after the surveys were completed. Temperature and flow enhancement in the river is made possible from the permit agreement with the Deep Creek Lake Power Plant, allowing Inland Fisheries to manage the river as a high quality Catch and Return Trout Fishing Area. Thanks to Western District II, Planning, and Garrett College’s Fisheries Management class for providing the workers to conduct the surveys.

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Tags: Brown Trout, Rainbow Trout

Question for DNR: Rock Bass common in the Potomac River?

Type: Freshwater
Region: Central
Location: Potomac River, Williamsport Area

I had the opportunity to fish for a couple of hours towards sunset on the upper Potomac in Williamsport Maryland (just above where 81 crosses the river into West Virginia). The location was "River Bottom Park" just below where "Conococheague Creek" dumps into the Potomac River.

This was the first time I had fished in this area. I was fishing from the shoreline and wading with a small white buzz-bait hoping that a largemouth or smallmouth bass would reveal their location. Something kept taking a weak swipe at the buzz-bait and after the fifth time that happened I was thinking to myself that I really needed to investigate adding a trailer hook to that type of lure. Fortunately the sixth time it happened I managed to hookup with the mystery fish. Much to my surprise it turned out to be a plump little Rock Bass.

From this Angler's log I had read with much interest about another angler (Richard Berke) who had caught a few Rock Bass from the Monocacy River. I have also gazed in admiration at the new state record 1.5 pound Rock Bass swimming in the small tank over at Bass Pro Shops caught by "master" angler Earl Jenkins IV (who if I calculate correctly is not yet 4 years old!).

I had caught Rock Bass years ago fishing in up-state New York where they are as common as bluegills. I had also heard that they are very commonly caught up in Deep Creek Lake but I had never caught one in Maryland before. After that first Rock Bass on the buzz-bait I switched to a 2.5-inch original Rapala Floating Minnow and hooked up with ten more Rock Bass. A couple of them were quite chunky (nothing approaching Earl's fish of course!).

My question for DNR is: Are Rock Bass fairly common in the Potomac River or are there just isolated populations? I have fished fairly extensively from Point of Rocks down to Seneca Breaks and have never caught one before. I normally toss lures that would target bass but in the course of doing so many other fish wind up on the end of the line. One of the truly great things about fishing the Potomac River is that when you toss a lure out you really never know what might strike.

DNR's Response:
Rock bass are common throughout the Potomac watershed including the tributary rivers (Monocacy and Conococheague) and most of the the smaller streams as well. As their name implies, they generally have an affinity for rocky habitat. They can be very aggresive at times, viciously striking full size bass baits. Most of the time, however, you will have better luck using smaller aritificials such as a 2" grub on a 1/16 oz jighead or a micro-sized crankbait or topwater. Downsizing your tackle will open up opportunities to catch some of the other interesting, lesser known species such as rockbass, longear sunfish, redbreast sunfish, and fallfish.

John Mullican, Fisheries Biologist

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Tags: Middle Potomac River, Rock Bass, Smallmouth Bass

Deep Creek Lake Report 6/26

Type: Freshwater
Region: Western
Location: Deep Creek Lake

I fished Saturday Morning from about 5am until 9am. Fished some live shiners from the boat in deeper waters but spent most of my time fly-fishing the shallows. I marked water temps of 76 and 77 degrees, which is pretty warm for this time of year. Water was clear to slightly stained. Top water action ruled the day with many fish brought to hand. I got out of the boat and wade-fished shallow coves with emerging grass and overhanging cover for large-mouths and brought a few nice ones to hand using large poppers with a good patient rest between movements. Small mouths were more aggressive taking poppers cast up to rocky shallows and docks. A sneaky Pete was the small mouth popper of choice. Some of the smallies hit so hard they came out of the water and took the flies pretty deep. My 10 year old daughter caught some nice smallies around the docks on a 4-wt using a cone-head muddler minnow. We also caught some gills on some standard bead-head nymphs. Top water really has been the way to go for me over the last few weeks. Watch out, here come the dog days.

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Tags: Largemouth Bass, Crappie

Deep Creek Lake Mayhem!

Type: Freshwater
Region: Western
Location: Deep Creek Lake

We took our annual trip to Deep Creek the week of June 21. While I`m sure things will change quickly, we found the lake pleasantly un-crowded and the weather fair with the exception of a few thunderstorms. The fishing was unsurpassed. Of course, the pickerel were playing well.

Yellow perch up to 14 inches, those huge bluegill were targeted for the freezer and we loaded up on them. We managed several nice sized walleye in the 18 to 19 inch class, and loads of smallmouth bass, but the highlight of the trip were the several nice Northern Pike that we landed. All but one went back, the one we turned into pike steaks had been compromised with a hook in the gills and was bleeding badly.

That`s been our mantra for a while now. We fished live bait, only keeping legal fish that are hooked in a manner that would seem to prevent their survival upon release, and let the rest go. We manage to catch quite a bit of good eating this way, while still releasing most of the catch.

Pictured are Bert Taylor of Lake Linganore with his Pike and Walleye, Michael Kirby of Derwood, MD with another nice Pike, Matthew Kirby of Derwood with his Walleye, and myself again (Mike Kirby of Derwood) with a dandy yellow perch and smallmouth bass that I took at the same time on two different rods. Talk about mayhem!

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Tags: Deep Creek Lake, northern pike, smallmouth bass, yellow perch, walleye