One and a half fish

Under an I-95 overpass, the best view
as morning rush hour was winding down.

Not much doing on a Monday in October with water temps at 50 degrees.  A Columbus Day off directed me targeting non-indigenous fish of Maryland -- smallmouth bass!

After the remnants of Hurricane Ian stammered through the area last week -- just steady, moderate rain -- the Little Patuxent River was at its normal self this morning and actually wasn't very stained.  One cookie-cutter smallmouth slurped a Heddon Zara Puppy on my third or fourth cast and freed itself after a brief struggle.

Later another cookie-cutter smallmouth hit a Reaction Innovations Little Dipper and stayed on so I could take a picture.

Which didn't work out as planned.  I had purchased an Olympus Tough TG-6 to replace my aging (10 years old, LOL) Canon S90.  While replacing my Samsung Galaxy A6 with a newer variant might get me something that takes better pictures, I opted for the TG-6 because it's waterproof and a bit more rugged.  Duh, that's why "Tough" is in the name!  I can drop it in the water and even shoot pictures underwater of fish.  

I envisioned my first fishing expedition with the Olympus camera with me taking a picture with the camera submerged while setting a fish free.  But for some reason I got an error message because of the data card.  

So here are just some random underwater pictures taken with the new camera with no fish present:

Pictures seem better than the Nikon Coolpix I shot with a couple years ago.  I stopped using because of battery life and, well, the pictures weren't that good, although the little camera captured one of my top-five pictures of all time.

And here's a comparison of the Olympus TG-6 (first picture) versus the Galaxy A6 (second picture) at the same spot just seconds apart:

The Samsung phone isn't very good under low-light conditions and even the Canon S90 excelled there.  It looks like the Olympus is better for normal colors and not muddying things down.

Karen and I are scheduled to go camping on the Potomac in two weeks, then there's the first trip of the year with Susquehanna Smallmouth Solutions after that, but otherwise, I think the fishing season is winding to a close.