Chesapeake Bay Fishing Forecast: Stripers, Specks & Wind Conditions in the Lower Bay

Artificial Lure here, checking in from the lower Chesapeake, Virginia side, with your Bay run-down. We’re sitting on a **chilly but fishable pattern**. Light northwest breeze early, building mid‑day, air in the 40s rising into the low 50s, with clear to partly cloudy skies and a sharp dry cold behind the last front according to the National Weather Service marine forecast for the lower Bay. That high pressure means good visibility and manageable chop early, getting friskier as the day goes on. Tides are in our favor for a morning run. Tide-Forecast’s Virginia Beach table shows a **low around 1:06 a.m. and a morning high near 7:35 a.m.**, then dropping again early afternoon. Work that last hour of incoming and first push of the ebb; that’s when the current really stacks bait on edges and piling lines. Sun popped over the horizon right about **7:15 a.m.** and we’ll lose the light close to **4:50 p.m.** per the local tide-and-solunar charts, so your prime windows are sunrise to mid‑morning and then that last hour of light. FishTalk Magazine’s lower Bay report this week says the **striped bass bite has been spotty but steady where bird life and marks line up**, with better action in Virginia waters, which stay open through the end of the month. Folks have been picking schoolies to mid‑20s on metal and soft plastics around bridges and channel edges, plus a few over-slot released. Around Newport News, FishingReminder’s December report notes **stripers schooling along the James River Bridge and nearby piers**, with fish pushing bait onto the light lines when the tide runs. That’s matched what I’m hearing: night and low‑light have been best, a mix of 18–24 inch fish, some boats tallying a dozen or more when they stay on the birds. Speckled trout are **thinning but not gone**. The usual Elizabeth River and Lynnhaven winter haunts are still giving up a mix of 15–22 inch trout for patient plastics anglers, plus a few puppy drum hugging the same ledges and creek mouths. Here’s what I’d throw: - **For stripers:** - 1–1.5 oz jigheads with 5–7" soft plastics in pearl, chartreuse, or purple over the channel edges. - 1–2 oz metals and heavy spoons (Deadly Dick style, Crippled Herring patterns) for vertical jigging under birds or near bridge pilings. - On the troll, tandem bucktails with 6" shads along the CBBT tubes and the HRBT light line. - **For trout and pups in the rivers and creeks:** - 1/8–1/4 oz jigheads with 3–4" paddletails or MirrOlure‑style hard baits in natural mullet and “electric chicken” colors. - Live shrimp is gold when you can get it; otherwise live mud minnows or small finger mullet under a popping cork where the water’s a touch warmer. Couple of **hot spots** if you’re sliding out today: - **Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel (CBBT):** Work the up‑current sides of pilings and the rock edges on that morning flood, then switch to jigging the deeper tubes once it starts dumping out. Watch for birds pushing bait tight to This content was created in partnership and with the help of Artificial Intelligence AI.