Tagging Bass in Mattawoman Creek

Type: Tidal
Region: Southern
Location: Mattawoman Creek

On June 26th I went out with Joe Love, DNR's Tidal Bass Manger. Joe took me out to the Unicorn Bass Hatchery on the eastern shore and to Smallwood State Park to electrofish for largemouth bass in Mattawoman Creek, a tributary of the Potomac River. Unicorn Hatchery is growing bass for Joe so he can plant them in different places for anglers. A worker and I got in one of the eight ponds and seined about 50 feet for the young bass. We seined the whole outer part of the pond in about 4 to 5 feet of water. After seining the fish were counted and tagged by cutting a piece of their tails. Then we drove to Marbury, Maryland to meet some of his co-workers at a DNR facility on tidal bass. Snakeheads are also now included in this field of work because where Joe and his co-workers electrofish in the Potomac snakeheads are very common and caught often. After getting the boat ready, we drove over to Statewood Park to launch and start electrofishing for largemouth bass in the Potomac. This electrofishing involved us staying on the boat and having two big probes hang off the front of the boat to shock the water, this was much more powerful than the backpacks, you couldn't touch the water. The fish would float up to the top as two of us use the fifteen foot nets to catch the largemouth and then put them in the holding tank. Other fish such as yellow perch, carp, lots of goldfish including huge five to ten pound bright orange goldfish, shad, catfish, bluegills, sunfish, and others would float up or shoot out of the water. Once we were done electrofishing the survey route, we stopped to count and tag the largemouth. Largemouth bass were only taken if they were over twelve inches in length, all others were thrown back or weren't caught. To tag the fish I punched a hole in the anal fin with a whole puncher, some of the fish we caught had already been tagged by his crew once or maybe twice with other tag marks. Some of the bigger fish we caught were really beaten up, with scrapes and open wounds from anglers, boats and other fish such as snakeheads. I learned that when a fish is caught and released most anglers think that just because they see the fish swim off means it survived, this is not true. The fish get stressed out and if handled too long the slime on the fish rubs off causing the fish to get bacterial diseases more easily. The main thing to keep in mind while fishing is to handle the fish as little time as possible, and get the fish back in the water as fast as possible.