The kaleidoscope of colors on a speckled trout dazzle in the morning sun.
Fall’s second face is its prettiest face. Another cold front triggers the leaves to change. The marsh grass begins to take on a golden hue, drowning out the subtle green undertones, reminding us of the fading warm weather. Ospreys are leaving, replaced by cormorants and ducks. The water can be nippy, especially on a cool morning, and on a mid-October trip to my favorite spot, I wore my Gore-Tex trout waders. I was late for the sunrise, and as I hustled down the beach, a rough seam rubbed my ankle raw. Upon arriving, I discovered that my waders leaked, and my wound was treated with a dousing of salt water. Numerous fish breaking the surface quickly erased any angst I had about the long walk back in my soggy waders.
I fished the inlet like a steelhead angler would, making a cast, letting it swing past a marshy bank and into a seam, then taking two or three steps down current and repeating to thoroughly cover the area. The upper, narrow stretch of the inlet where the current was fastest yielded several 15 inch rockfish on a four inch olive over white half-n-half. I slowly worked down current to the broad inlet mouth where the water slowed as it met the larger bay.
A cast into this mixing trough quickly drew a hard strike – much bigger than anything so far this morning. The fish quickly put me onto the reel and almost into my backing. Surely a surprise while standing in 68 degree thigh-deep water on the Chesapeake. My first thought was a big puppy drum by the bullish way he took line. Several minutes passed where I slowly regained the upper hand, pumping the strong fish against the current and slowly winding line back onto the reel. My forearms were burning by the time the fish broke the surface and showed his stripes. Surely one of the most formidable rockfish I’d ever fought on the fly. He easily measured out at 21 inches, and I made the decision that he would be dinner.
Lacking a cooler, I placed him in my stripping basket on the shore and waded back to the inlet, sans basket. The very next cast into this inlet produced an unmistakable bite – not hyperactive like a small rockfish, not a tug-of-war like a drum, but gently spirited like a speckled trout. You can almost feel the elegance of these fish through the line. What they possess in grace, they lack in stamina, and a sixteen inch trout was soon in my grasp. This trout was in luck, because if I hadn’t just committed that rockfish to the menu, he would surely be sitting in the stripping basket up on the shore. I took a few photos and then let the most beautiful fish on the Chesapeake slither back into the water.
This is fall at its peak – large fish are schooled up in the shallows, great weather makes for a comfortable day on the water, and the scenery is unbeatable as it changes from day to day. It’s a perfect intersection between the warm water southern fisheries for puppy drum and speckled trout and the cool water northern fishery for striped bass. All three are prowling the shallows in abundance during the second phase of fall, often sharing the same structure – piers, grass beds, inlets, riprap jetties, and oyster reefs in 2-10 feet of water. I hit my favorite walk-in spot frequently, prioritizing that magic hour where the outgoing tide occurs as the sun rises. The realities of the lunar cycle only offer up maybe ten days during fall where this happens at this particular spot. Otherwise, I’m chasing good tidal flow across structure throughout the waters of the Middle Peninsula in my skiff. I try to get out as many days as possible during this time, knowing that this opportunity is fleeting. Colder temperatures and shorter days on the horizon mean that bait and fish are moving out to open water. Larger migratory rockfish from up north will enter the Bay, offering fly anglers one final face of fall fishing.