James River Questions

[Spinnaker]

I will be heading down for the week September 22 and have never fished the James River area. From the maps it appears it could take a week and a person could not hit all the points. I thought about going up stream and just starting pretty far up. Any suggestions on how to attack it?

[focused fishing]

KC,

How far up? Above Bridge Port is where the "river" really starts, everything down stream is pretty lakey.... If you are heading up the river a few baits / techniques to try: On flats throw buzz baits and shallow crankbaits in the morning, as the sun comes up stick with the shallow crankbait as long as you see shad activity. Once the shad move out switch up to a shaky head or a 10" worm (yea I know big difference in baits but stuff in the middle doesn't seem to work as well) and flip all of the laydowns and bushes on the flats. If you prefer channel swing banks pitch Eakins jigs to bluff walls with a Paca chunk trailer, color isn't real critical anything brown / green will usually do. A big worm will work here as well whenever there is timber present. If you are a deep crankbait fan work the points with a deep crankbait, try to maintain contact with the bottom as long as possible. These same areas will work with a football jig or Carolina rig. Further down stream the patterns are pretty similar to those detailed in the fishing reports on this site. Pay attention up stream of Flat creek and in Flat creek, allot of dead heads in the water and a few channel swings that can be tricky.

Good Luck

EP

[Spinnaker]

Many thanks for the tips. I hope to try this area a lot as I have read good things about it on the forum.