Maryland

Fishing in Maryland

Fishing in Maryland offers exciting opportunities of both freshwater and saltwater fishing.

Freshwater Fishing

Allegany and Garrett Counties:

Bradford Lake: Located in the Garrett County, the lake has an area of 140 acres and it gives the fishing of largemouth and smallmouth bass, tiger muskie and panfish.

Savage River Tailwater Trophy Trout Fishing Area: Flows through Savage River State Forest in Garrett County, southwest of Frostburg and gives brook and brown trout.

Casselman River Delayed Harvest Trout Fishing Area: Located at Grantsville in Garrett County and is extremely popular for delayed harvest for stocked rainbows and brown trout.

Piney Reservoir: Located at Frostburg in Garrett County and gives the catches of largemouth bas, tiger muskie, yellow perch, panfish and rainbow trout.

Youghiogheny Reservoir: Its Maryland access is sought from the ACOE Mill Run Campground access point on Mill Run Road. Largemouth and smallmouth bass, northern pike, chain pickerel, yellow perch, rainbow and brown trout are the main fishes.

North Branch Potomac River: Brown, brook, and rainbow trout and smallmouth bass are main fishes here.

Rocky Gap Lake: It is situated on the east of Cumberland in Allegany County and gives the fishery of largemouth, and smallmouth bass, crappie, brown, and rainbow trout, channel catfish, and sunfish.

Town Creek Delayed Harvest: It is located nearly 1mile from Oldtown. A portion lies in Green Ridge State Forest and it gives brown, and rainbow trout, smallmouth bass, rock bass and redbreast sunfish.

Washington, Frederick and Carroll Counties

Blairs Valley Lake: It is situated in Washington, Maryland and Franklin County, Pennsylvania. It gives wide variety of fishes like largemouth bass, tiger muskie, black crappie, bluegill, redear sunfish, brown bullhead, yellow perch and carp.

Cunningham Falls Reservoir: It is located in Frederick County and gives catches of largemouth bass, and panfish, (bluegill, redear sunfish and black crappie).

Patapsco River: It is located in Carroll, Baltimore and Howard Counties and gives smallmouth and rock bass, redbreast sunfish, hickory and American shad, and rainbow trout.

Potomac River: Wide variety of fishes like largemouth and smallmouth bass, crappie, tiger muskie, channel catfish, walleye, redbreast sunfish and carp.

Piney Run Reservoir: Sykesville, Carroll County. Largemouth and striped bass, sunfish, bluegill, channel catfish, yellow perch, and tiger muskie are the main catches.

Liberty Reservoir: Northeast to Sykesville, Carroll – Baltimore County. Wide variety of fishes like largemouth, smallmouth, and striped bass, walleye, channel catfish, crappie, yellow and white perch, bluegill, rainbow and brown trout, and carp.

Anne Arundel, Prince George’s, Calvert, Charles and St. Mary’s Counties

Potomac River, Tributaries, Piscataway and Mattawoman Creeks: (A Chesapeake Bay Sportsfishing License is needed to fish in the River Potomac and its tributaries till their freshwater dividing lines.) Mattawoman Creek lies in the west part of Charles County, where freshwater fishing license is needed, so also in Piscataway Creek which flows through southeast Prince George’s County near Clinton, above Livingston Road; largemouth, and striped bass, crappie, chain pickerel, yellow and white perch, carp and bluegill sunfish are the main catches.

Wheatley Lake: It falls in Charles County in Gilbert Run Park and gives largemouth bass, redear sunfish, crappie, bluegill, and channel catfish.

St. Mary’s Lake: 250 acres in St. Mary’s Park. It gives largemouth bass, crappie, chain pickerel, bluegill and redear sunfish

Cecil, Kent, Queen Anne’s, Talbot, Caroline, Dorchester, Wicomico, Somerset and Worcester

Johnson’s Pond: Wicomico County in Salisbury, 104 acres. It gives largemouth bass, crappie, chain pickerel, yellow and white perch and bluegill sunfish.

Unicorn Lake: Queen Anne’s County, in Millington, 43 acres and gives largemouth bass, bluegill, pumpkinseed and green sunfish, channel, and brown bullhead catfish, chain pickerel, black crappie, white and yellow perch, creek chubsucker, American eel, margined madtom, pirate perch, eastern mud minnow, and blacknose dace, in short a wide variety. The Unicorn Dam tailrace offers excellent spring fishing of bluegill, blueback herring, and white and yellow perch.

Transquaking River: It comes in Dorchester County and gives largemouth and striped bass, bluegill, yellow and white perch, channel catfish, crappie and carp.

Saltwater Fishing

Saltwater fishing in Maryland offers a wide variety of fishing, from striped bass on the Susquehanna flats, to the Chesapeake Bay, and from Fenwick Island to Virginia coast. On the ocean side there is surf fishing, inshore fishing, and jetty fishing for flounder, bluefish, bluefish and other fishes. The open sea offers you a chance to try wreck fishing, deep dropping, and offshore fishing.

Chesapeake Bay: The Bay includes thousands of miles of open bay, streams and rivers, making the Bay the largest estuary of North America. Fishing here varies a lot because of the varied environments. You can fish here with bait, artificial lures and employ fly-fishing or other techniques. The Bay is well-known for crabs and oysters along with fishes. It is a major breeding ground for striped bass or ‘Rockfish’.

The Bill Burton Fishing Piers State Park: The Choptank River Fishing Piers in Dorchester County has been renamed after Bill Burton, a reporter, writer, and a fisherman, who worked for preserving the Choptank River Bridge to serve as fishing piers since its construction. It is a popular fishing destination and is open year-round and 24-hours.

Offshore Fishing: The offshore fishing in Maryland City is world-famous. The city proclaims itself “white marlin capital of the world” and hosts one of the country’s top marlin fishing tournaments. The top attraction for the anglers is the trip to offshore canyons. The area of canyon walls is very productive of dolphins, which attract larger marlin, swordfish and sharks which feed on them.

With this information in hand, you surely must have been excited to go for fishing in Maryland! So when are you starting?