Potomac River Blue Cats

[Jim Gronaw]

Got to do a little catfishing with my buddy Patrick today. We fished the Potomac River near Ft. Washington from 7 to about 10:30 am, totaling 14 cats on various cut bait options. Most of our fish ran from 3 to 5 pounds, which is very small, yet abundant in the tidal Potomac. Some of you may not know that this waterway is among the top blue cat fisheries in the nation, with high numbers of 20 to 40 pounders decked every year, and a new Maryland record of 80 pounds 12 ozs. this past February. We kept it simple with cut bait on 8/0 hooks and 6 ounce in-line flat sinkers to keep us down in the strong tidal currents.

Top cat of the day was Patricks' new personal best of 27 pounds...a great fight!

This fishery was featured in last months In-Fisherman and I did a research piece on the tidal Potomac blue cat gig in the 2009 In Fisherman Catfish Guide. This is a great, 'big-fish' option for many anglers in the Mid Atlantic region, along with Virginia's James River. The Potomac is overlooked and underfished for blues...might want to give it a try!

[Allen Morgan]

I've read a lot of stuff about the Rappahannock, Appamatox, Chickahominy, and James rivers.  Both from In-Fisherman and other sources.  You are correct about those fisheries being loaded.

I've actually heard that some F&G/DNR folks are encouraging folks to keep all the smaller blues they can legally catch.

I've done battle with a 50 lbs-class Blue once here in OK.  Conditions have to be "just right" in Pre-Spawn to tangle with them.  I'd love to be able to fish over there.

[Jim Gronaw]

Allen...the James is still the premier east coast fishery for blues in excess of 50 pounds. The first blue I ever caught, a 34 pounder, was in the Appomatox. The 'Rapp' has been on the down swing for many years now, but still has fishable populations of decent, if not smaller, fish.

The Maryland and VA authorities want unrestricted commercial and recreational harvest of invasive blues and flatheads in Chesapeake River systems. In time, it will destroy what are dynamite fisheries...this is a very complex and heated issue.

[Allen Morgan]

Yep, I've heard that.  The folks I heard talking about it said that it was mainly a lobby effort backed by the commercial fishermen that want to rape those fisheries.  The "hook" they have in the politcos is that those cats aren't "native" to those waters.

Honestly, if commercial fishermen want to rape and pillage a good fishery of non-native fish, they need to head to the Mississippi River system and harvest all the Asian Carp they can.

[JBplusThuy]

Absolutely! They could certainly sell those things here in California.  If they're cooked right (and my wife knows how to cook them) they taste just fine. They're big sellers in Asian markets out here; they even sell live ones in tanks, along with live tilapia and channel cats. The other day in San Diego I saw what were claimed to be wild-caught LMB (on ice, not live) from Taiwan for $2.99/pound. A market where we used to live sold live LMB for $8/pound.

Out here in California, there's a movement that wants to do to the striped bass in the delta what they want to do to the blue cats in the east. It sparked quite a bit of outrage when the plan became public. It's that same "non-native species" card, too. but heck, almost all of the worthwhile fish in California are non-native, so that's hardly a good reason.  Native species here are trout, salmon, steelhead, Sacramento perch, and a bunch of rough fish, basically.  LMB, SMB, stripers, all species of sunfish except Sacrament perch (and I'm not certain if that's a sunfish), crappie, most or all species of cats, even some of the trout and salmon, are all introduced.  That's fine by me, the fishery here would not be very good without them.