Add Two More Counties to the List

In regards to my quest to catch a fish in county in the state of Maryland I have had some recent success. I believe most of it can be attributed to the fact that spring is finally here and that fish are becoming more active. But I also think that some of it comes down to perseverance on my part for at least one of the counties.

Back at the beginning of April I was paging through the internet looking up various things about some of the music artists I like. In flipping through various pages, I stumbled upon the fact that one of my favorite music groups, The Choir, was going to be performing in mid-April in Columbia, MD. I immediately order a ticket for the show. The tour was in support of their new album, "Shadow Weaver" but it was also a celebration of the 25th anniversary of their "Circle Slide" album, my favorite.

April 19th came around and I headed up to the area for the show. I made sure that I had plenty of time before the show to find a spot to try a little fishing. I came prepared with my small spinning rod, spooled with 8 lb test line and a couple of small 1/32 oz jigs with soft plastics. When I got the Centennial Lake in Columbia, I was greeted by an incoming cold front that had winds blowing about 15 mph. Since I was on shore I decided to try and find a spot that might hold fish, kind of out of the wind. As things would progress that afternoon, I had a few "nibbles" as they say, but nothing big enough would really bite. The worst part of it for me was that I was standing along the shoreline that had a few rocks extending about 2 ft into the water. I could spot small fish darting in and out of the rocks. It was then that I decided that I wasn't going to be skunked, so I changed my set up to a small size 8 hook. Once I had it tied on, I began to look around for possible locations of "bait." I rolled over a couple of rocks and found a white grub. I slid it on the hook, cast it out about 4 ft past the rocks and reeled it in slowly. Seconds later I was holding this little guy.

I found a couple of more grubs as well as an earthworm and caught three or four more of this little guys, which happened to be "green sunfish" which I had never caught before. (I learned this after some research.) "Fish Across Maryland: Howard County" was on the list.

The most recent county added to the challenge is Prince George's County. This past Saturday, April 25th, I was returning from a visit to my mother in Salisbury when I had some extra time. I decided to detour a little and got to School House Pond, in Upper Marlboro. I had given the area a try before but was not successful. That day I showed up with the same set up as above, and immediately began getting nibbles. After a few minutes of casting to various area, I was able to reel in yet another bluegill. But this guy was large enough to take my soft plastic, Berkley Powerbait nymph. I spent a little more time in the area and also caught a small black crappie.

That brings the current list to 6 counties: Calvert, Howard, Prince George's, St. Mary's, Wicomico and Worcester. Here's to getting few more soon.