Northern Virginia Reserviors Ranked for Largemouth Bass

[Extracted from the Outdoor Report published by the VDGIF - a great emailed publication!  Subscribe by filling in this form]

District fisheries biologists sampled major reservoirs in northern Virginia in spring 2005-2008. The samples were conducted during daytime with boat electrofishing gear targeting largemouth bass and were conducted in a manner that allows several comparisons to be made concerning these fish populations. Since many anglers seek largemouth bass, and fish considered over 15 inches are considered "preferred" nationwide; the following summary contains information about bass over 15 inches (preferred size).

The term "RSD-P" (below) stands for "relative stock density of preferred fish" - which is the proportion of bass in a population over eight inches (stock size or "recruits") that are also at least 15 inches. Thus, this index describes the size structure of the population... the higher the number - the larger the percentage of the population is composed of big fish. The index "CPE-P" stands for "catch per effort of preferred fish." This is a measure of how many bass over 15 inches are collected by biologists during a set unit of effort (in this case, 1-hour of electrofishing). Thus, the higher the number is, the more abundant big bass were during the sample.

Several factors can bias the data (e.g., weather conditions, fish behavior), but samples were conducted with efforts to minimize these biases. The following is a summary of these data with lakes ranked by CPE-P:

[Switchfisher note - I added my links to my reports on these lakes in the table.  The other links in this article are the originals]

All of these lakes are considered "small impoundments" except Lakes Anna and Occoquan; and Lake Anna is, by far, the largest. Therefore, it is not entirely appropriate to compare them all "head-to-head", as catch rates at large reservoirs are usually lower than in small impoundments (which makes Occoquan's first place even more impressive).

John Odenkirk, VDGIF Region V District Fisheries Biologist, noted many of the best district lakes (for big bass per hour) were consistent producers year-after-year such as Burke and Motts, but a few "sleepers" emerged after the 2007 sampling season. Of special note, Beaverdam Creek and Germantown made major moves up and offer anglers a change of scene and a chance of catching a trophy. Hunting Run, a new reservoir, has great potential, but anglers need to harvest sub slot (< 16 inches) fish to relieve stockpiling. For more information, contact Fisheries Division in Fredericksburg (540) 899-4169.

Purchase Switchfisher's books using the links to Amazon below for:

• Wade Fishing the Rapidan River of Virginia (more info)
• Wade and Shoreline Fishing the Potomac River for Smallmouth Bass (more info)
• Trout and Smallmouth Fishing on the North Branch of the Potomac (more info)

 Unless stated otherwise, this article was authored by Steve Moore

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