Kayaking in the heat

July 7, 2012

It was one of the hottest days of the year and I had just finished a full days’ worth of field work delineating wetlands inside the Beltway.  I had consumed over a gallon of water and was about wiped out by the time we made it back to the office.  But Route 50 wasn’t that bad and my kayak was still on the roof from our trip to Kent Island visiting Pete for his birthday.  I never got a chance to use it.  Part of me wanted to get into a few fish since my wife and kids were at the beach.  By now it was peak rush-hour on route 50 catching the workers going home and mad weekend traffic making a mad dash across the bridge for some fun in the sun.  What the heck…. 20 minutes wait at the bridge but I’m across.  Head to Ace Hardware to build a tackle /rod storage device out of milk crate. It comfortably and confidently held 4 rods.  I dropped the kayak in at Hemmingway’s (no idea if that was legal) to hit the eastern shore pilings.  Why the eastern when the western side is so close and easy?  Because it just fishes better.  You have the sewer pipe there enclosed in tons of rip rap and the eastern side pilings just before the channel tend to almost always hold fish.  Sometimes, even now, past peak migration, they can be trophy size with the magic wand in the proper hands. 

Usually jigging ¾ oz head behind the pilings just before the drop off does the trick when rigged with long skinny plastics to cut down on drag and then popped violently off the bottom quickly enough not to get snagged and aggressively enough to entice a strike.  The strikes almost always come on the drop of the violent jig or whip of the rod.  Braided line is a must, as is a good heavy leader. 

I picked away at some fish with the sun still high in the sky but there were all dinks.  Around sunset the tide was waning and I thought my chances were useless.  I picked a bad day to hit the bridge with the tide at its weakest at the magic hour of the day.  But, with a little luck I drifted over a school.  First I hit the pipe in the deeper section with a few other boats from 16’ bass boats to 26 foot offshore center consoles.  The water was like glass out there tonight. 

There weren’t any fish taking top water or the jig for whatever reason.  Then I moved shallow once the sun had completely set and figured I’d work the pipe towards shore on my way home.  Well, there was one good hump with some decent disturbance and sure enough the fish were there.  First was the jig to get hit by a respectable 22 inch fish.  Then a bunch more dinks.  Then they were all over the surface but wouldn’t touch the spook for whatever reason.  They wanted that jig and they wanted it near the bottom.  Multiple hits per casts, many hook ups, many many fish to the kayak in that magic 30 minutes of ambient light when the blistering sun had finally set.  It’s almost as if the fish were waited for that magic hour.  The tide couldn’t have been any slower but that sun was just relentless all day long.  Once she was gone… look out.  It’s smart to only fish that first and last hour of light this time of year.  You’ll probably triple the number of fish in an hour’s fishing during that magic hour than you would all day otherwise. 

Get out there… easy close to home fishing.