The ride over to Smith Island from Crisfield alone is worth traveling to this Trail site, whether by ferry or mailboat or your own boat. You can even make arrangements for the transport of your own kayak or rent one on the Island. Be sure to make time to explore the Island and its towns, but don’t forget you also made the trip to hook into the striped bass, speckled trout, redfish, flounder, and bluefish[...]

Because of its relatively remote location in Green Ridge State Forest in Allegany County, Town Creek receives little fishing pressure from other anglers. This stream has great structure provided by tree root balls and small stream falls, all resulting in an ideal habitat for trout and other species. The creek’s flows and temperatures are usually good enough to support the stocked rainbow and brown trout until mid-summer. Smallmouth bass and sunfish provide other target species[...]

A prevalent—and delectable— gamefish, perch can be found on the Atlantic Coast from South Carolina to Nova Scotia. Maryland’s reservoirs, lakes, and the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries provide a wide variety of habitats for both white and yellow perch. In fact, this tasty species is one of the most abundant in Maryland.

White perch are semi-anadromous members of the family, Moronidae, that migrate to tidal fresh and slightly brackish waters each spring to spawn.​ Silver in color with a slightly projecting lower jaw and teeth, white perch may reach a mature length of 19 inches but are more commonly found around 7 to 10 inches, weighing from 8 ounces to 1 pound.​ The largest was caught in the Chesapeake Bay and weighed 2.6 pounds. Seasons While the[...]

Cobia Cobia have a long body that is blackish on the back and brown on the sides, two silvery bands run along its sides from the head to the tail and it has a yellowish or grayish-white belly. They usually grow 3 to 4 feet in length and weigh more than 50 pounds. Known to be strong and stubborn, Cobia will try to make a run for it once they are hooked making for a[...]

Spanish Mackerel They have a green back and their silvery sides are marked with three rows of elliptical yellow spots. Spanish mackerel have a single row of cutting edged teeth in each jaw (around sixty-four teeth in all) are large, uniform, closely spaced and flattened from side to side, these teeth look very similar to those of the Bluefish. Those caught in Maryland waters tend to be between two and four pounds, though a record[...]

Black Crappie Distinguished by their broad, compressed body mottled with dark spots, black crappie also have large eyes, rounded back (dorsal) and belly (anal) fins. Many of Maryland’s tidal systems such as the Upper Choptank, Nanticoke, Marsheyhope Creek, Wicomico, Blackwater, and the Pocomoke have historically yielded both healthy size and numbers of black crappies on the Eastern Shore. White Crappie White crappies are marked by vertical bars, rather than the irregular spots of black crappie[...]

Summer Flounder This left-eyed flatfish has both eyes on the left side of its body. Its "eyed" side is scattered with 10 to 14 eye-like spots which blend in with the ocean floor and it has a white belly. Its belly or underside is white.​ Summer flounder average between 3-6 pounds and 15"-22" (40-56 cm.) long.​ They spend most of their lives on or close to the bottom, as other flatfishes do, and use their[...]

Red Drum Red drum are generally iridescent silvery-gray in overall color, with a coppery cast that is usually darker on the back and upper sides. They also have one (or more) black ocellar spots on the upper sides near the base of the tail and elongated and robust body. Their Maximum adult size is nearly 5 feet (1.5 meters) total length and the largest caught in Maryland in 1977 in the Tangier sound weighed just[...]