The dog days?

When I was "into" fishing during my teenage years, I kept reading articles in the fishing magazines about "The Dog Days of Summer."  Temperatures heated up, water temps heated up, and the fish were hard to find.

Little Patuxent River running under I-95.

This year has been the most I've fished in ... maybe ever?  And now I wonder if I'm in The Dog Days of Summer.  It has been hot and humid around here, and my last two trips to the Little Patuxent River haven't netted (ha ha, get it?  "netted") me anything except a couple hits.  When the weather has been nice, it's always after a rainstrorm, and the river is high and muddy.  When the river is down to normal levels, another thunderstorm hits with flash flood warnings.

I've had good luck with the Rapala Shadow Rap and the small Rebel crawfish crankbait on the Little Patuxent, but I think I might have to be more open to switching gears if I'm not getting any action.  Tube baits -- which I had good luck on at Antietam Creek in April when the water was cooler -- or plastic worms.

Karen and I also haven't gotten a chance to go camping on the Potomac for a month or so for whatever reason.  We were all set to go a few weeks ago, but I needed front brake pads and rotors on the Lightning.  We've become dependent on taking our mountain bikes now, so it was a no-go without the pickup truck.  No options for the next couple weeks either, maybe not until mid-August.

A "fishy" pool on the Little Patuxent.

Anyway, besides a post with "this is what I caught, this is what lure I used," here are a couple photos on location, location, location on trying to target smallmouth on the Little Patuxent.  The first picture is just downriver from I-95.  Just beyond that section is a really nice pool that I've caught one smallmouth and had numerous hits.  The next picture is further down river.  Click the picture to see the big picture.  I haven't caught anything here but have had four or five hits.  The last time I was there, a smallmouth jumped out of the water shaking off the Shadow Rap even before I felt the fish!  These pools are where I target smallmouth.  Better if they are just after fast moving water and "rapids."  Further up in the rapids seems to be trout/failfish territory, but the tailwaters seem to be more enticing for the smallmouth.