Crisfield Shallows Report - Nov 1

More reports available at Tidal Fish
http://www.TidalFish.com

Brandon writes:
Hi Gang,

Finally made it down to Crisfield to hit some shallow water fishing.
Matt Tawes and I used to fish at least once or twice a month together,
but with all the rain earlier in the year and the fishing much slower
then normal we never hooked up. So with a Indian summer weather
forecast for yeserday I packed up early and headed down to Tawesville.
I do not know what Matt¡¦s family is doing, he claims he not related
to ¡§all¡¨ the Tawes down there which I find hard to believe, but
whatever is going on with them naming more roads Tawes this and that
is getting out of control ļ Anyone that has been down the Crisfield
and driven down rt.413 knows you can see Tawes car dealer, Tawes
School Road, Tawes this Tawes that¡Klol..it only makes me laugh as I
head down that road every time. Bernie also decided to come along and
we all met at Matt¡¦s house around 9am.
We managed to splash Matt¡¦s new ride around 9:30am launching out of
James Island and we headed south for some shallow water haunts that
often good fishing. First spot started off slow, but the water clarity
was absolutely amazing. We could easily see down 8-10 feet, simply gin
clear water. The red coral that grows down there is beautiful to see.
Sometimes it amazes me that we have such beautiful coral right here in
our own Chesapeake Bay. We decided to move a little deeper then our
normal 2-3 feet areas because of the clear water and bright sun and
that seemed to be the ticket. Managed to pick up some fish on the fly
while Matt and Bernie were a little slower getting started (sorry guys
;-) ) , but both of them soon started picking up fish on their sassy
shads, which I will admit do seem to be the ticket down there when
using plastics outside of bucktails. Matt has been telling me for
years now, I have always said I thought the longer jerk baits where
better if you fish that type of bait, but after one of those boat
talks that often happen on a day of fishing I will concede that the
shads ¡§might¡¨ just waork better. I know Kevin will love that
too..lol¡K

So we continued fishing the islands and shallow water picking up a
fish here and there, not hot an heavy, but enough to keep us
interested. After the tide stopped moving on us we decided to move
further south towards Tangier Island to catch the first part of the
tide change at some larger pieces of structure that normal do well for
us. As in the past they once again produced for us.

After a while we ran into Greg M. and Mike S. who we knew were down
doing a little fishing for the day in the same area. We hooked up to
one another for a while and had a fun talk catching up etc. After a
while we all decided to get back to fishing. We headed a little north
and managed to find a good shallow water spot and Greg and Mike hit
some structure and found some breaking fish that provided great fun
for a while. After we fished the one spot we headed back south past
the south end of Tangier and hit another shallow water spot that
produced again. As the sun started getting lower in the sky we decided
to head back north towards Smith Island and Crisfield to see if we
could find some breakers at the Puppy Hole to close out the day. Nada,
nothing; a bunch of boats, but no breaking fish which I unusual. We
hit once more shallow water spot on the way in and managed to pick up
another fish or two and were blessed with a beautiful sunset as we
watched it go down while catching fish. Could not think of a better
way to end the day.

Gear used for those that are interested were light tackle outfits with
10lb test and 8wt fly rods. Matt and Bernie used sassy shads rigged on
3/8oz round heads and I used the fly rod all day with an 8wt and
sinkling line double fly rig rigged with my Blanco fly tied on a 2/0
in the rear chasing an un-weighted Joe Bruce Silver side up front.
When Matt picked up the long stick here and there trough out the day
he used a yellow and white Clouser on a 2/0 and a sinking line.

The fish today were not that big, all in the 15-17 inch range with
maybe a few 18¡¦s mixed in. While not big fish, I can not think of a
better way to spend the day then catching fish in the shallows around
all the islands in Tangier Sound.

Thanks Matt for another great day on the water! We will get back into
our normal fall schedule and start heading down to the CBBT for a few
of those regular grade fish soon ;-)

I have some pictures that I will add later today once I download them.

Matt searching for fish early on:
Pictures online for this report at
http://www.tidalfish.com/boards2/vie...5722&id=160994


More reports available at Tidal Fish
http://www.TidalFish.com