The fall of 2011 was a tough season for catching stripers. As one who takes pride in catching a limit of stripers for himself and those aboard, it was rather humbling. The upper Chesapeake Bay was inundated with an influx of fresh water from heavy rains and a tropical storm in the first two weeks of September. The salinity level has stayed near nil as we got more than our fair share of showers through the rest of autumn.

Many anglers might not buy into the fact that fresh tidal waters deter the striper bite. A rockfish has the tolerance to live in the saltiest of ocean waters to many fresh water lakes and rivers throughout the country.

I contend that our Chesapeake Bay stripers expect certain conditions and will not enter a particular part of the bay or a river unless those conditions are met. Could the balance of salinity and fresh water have thrown stripers off kilter? It’s more than likely. Most sections of the bay and rivers have its resident schools of fish, but an influx of new schools is what makes fishing thrive.

Also factor in that a striper’s food source needs a certain amount of saline to move into said waters. In my journeys to the Gunpowder and Patapsco River, there was a remarkable lack of forage visible with my fish finding electronics. Stripers follow their food source. If menhaden, silversides, and bay anchovies are scarce so, too, are the stripers.

Much of the early fall season was spent off of the water. Debris from heavy late summer rains was lurking on and just below the surface of the bay and tributary waters. I, for one, was not going to risk losing a lower unit to a partially submerged log. Debris could be spotted on the water throughout autumn. Two-day long rain systems would routinely flush more debris from the banks of feeder water ways.

Mother Nature threw even more dastardly elements my way this fall. Forecasts with winds from the south at 5 to 10 miles per hour were in reality 15 to 20 mph with gusts to 25. Twice I was socked in by fog until noon at the railroad bridge that spans the Gunpowder.

I don’t know what it is about foggy days, but it seems that there is little if any tidal movement when the air is as thick as pea soup. There were also frosty mornings where corkers would have been the best foot attire to walk across the pier to get on the boat.

True, this does seem like a lot of griping, but the challenges are what drive us. I found myself looking for new areas, or casting lures I would not ordinarily use in my favorite spots. In mid-October I fished a long riprap bank in the Patapsco that I had only tried previously for white perch. I was greeted by two explosive strikes on a Smack It Jr. popper along the bank. Yet as quickly as the bites were had, someone hit the “off” switch and the action died.

On an early November Saturday, winds were forecast to be light from the south. In actuality, we fished in the Gunpowder River with winds 10 to 15 mph with gusts to 20 mph. The trolling motor batteries were put to the test that day for sure.

Nonetheless, the railroad bridge was where my coworker friend Arthur Spring and I caught our limit of stripers on Clatter Shads. All things being equal, I’ll fish with the wind rather than being fogged in at the bridge with no water movement and no bites worth speaking about.

I made my final trip to the Patapsco River on a morning that would have made an Alaskan Eskimo proud. Tom Gittins and I threw on several layers for the run to the outer harbor. There is one spot (not to be divulged to the general public) that is the premier spot on a falling tide and we only had 45 minutes left to fish it. Sure enough, Tom got his first strike 10 minutes into casting.

Things were looking good, but the tide soon subsided as did our prospects of catching fish. We ran farther into the outer harbor to be in position for a good catch as the tide started to rise. Little did we know that we were in for a long day.

We hit locations such as (code names only for those in the know) the Comfortable Spot, The 12-Pack, the Cannons, the Slag Pile, and a few others without as much as a thump, nudge, or nibble. My last option was to head back to the early morning honey hole with hopes that the end of the flood tide would at least be as fruitful as the end of the ebb.

I was downhearted while casting to the manmade structure. I watched my lure come back toward the surface as I ended a retrieve, and out of nowhere came a rockfish foolhardy enough to strike my soft swim bait. I am still beaming that I actually got to see my last fish of the year strike my lure. The moral of this days’ fishing was, “If you are only going to get two bites in a day, it’s great that they were both keepers.”
Through I struggled to catch stripers this past fall, I appreciated the challenge. It can be humbling not to catch as many fish as you expect too; but it, indeed, makes you appreciate the ones you do catch even more.