Slaughter Creek MD - 9/15

[Johnsfolly]

My Betterhalf wanted to get some more time crabbing before the fall hit hard and the crabs become scarce. We headed out Early Sunday armed with some redworms, razor clams, and chicken necks. Baits for fish and crabs. Sue got her gear onto the Slaughter creek bridge. I put on a #20 hook with a small piece of redworm to catch mummichogs or silversides to use for bait for possible seatrout or schoolie stripers while my wife was crabbing.  The last time out at this bridge it was easy to catch a few mummichogs. This time the minnows were not as abundant. I did find a few small schools of minnows. I caught a couple of mummichogs and missed a few more. When my bait was near the rocks, some small dark fish came out from under the rocks. They moved like sculpin and were aggressive. I landed my first one and wasn't sure if this was just a juvenile toadfish or something else. Regardless was a pretty neat little fish. I caught at least five before I stopped trying to catch more. I looked at a some references and determined that this is likely a naked goby.

 

Caught more minnows and fished for bigger fish. I caught quite a few spot, helped my wife corral the feisty blue crabs that she was catching. Several were close to 6 inches across their carapace, the largest ones that we have caught all year. We had a couple of laughs as more than one crab took off crab crawling across the bridge to get away from us crabbers. Ultimately we had the last say. Over 5.25 inches and they went into the cooler with the others. I was fishing live minnows under a float I got several bites that took the float so deep that I lost sight of it completely, but could not get a good hook set and never landed one of those fish ! I did catch a silver perch, my first in Maryland. This is another species related to drum. That can be seen by the shape of the tail which is similar to that of the freshwater drum.

 

We left after we had a dozen keeper sized crabs in the cooler. Even after being on ice they were still feisty!

Happiness is a bunch of crabs in your drawers !

[Ham]

Yeah....never put Blue Crabs in your livewell. Just sayin.