Chesapeake Bay Fishing Report: Trout, Tog, and Bluefish Updates for Virginia's Lower Bay

Here’s your Chesapeake Bay fishing report for Tuesday, November 4, 2025. It’s Artificial Lure here, and this one’s for all the salty hands and dock talkers along Virginia’s lower Bay. Skies this morning started cloudy with temps hovering in the upper 50s, climbing toward 62 by afternoon. Expect a stiff northwest wind, 15–20 knots, with water chop rough enough that a Small Craft Advisory stands until at least 1 PM, as reported in the latest Marine Forecast from NOAA. Bundle up if you’re braving the spray. Tides at the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel run as follows: we had low tide at 6:29 AM and the next high tide peaks at 12:57 PM with a solid 2.9-foot swing. Sunrise was at 6:39 AM and sunset winds up early at 4:57 PM. Water clarity’s fair on the outgoing, but incoming tide should bring cleaner pushes through the afternoon per Tide-Forecast.com. Now, the fishing’s been a mixed bag, but word on the docks is spot are thinning fast, with only a handful picking near Lynnhaven Inlet. Speckled trout remain the main event—good catches coming out of the Elizabeth River and up around the Poquoson Flats, mostly schoolies but a couple pushing 24 inches in the deeper bends. Striped bass—rockfish—remain tough. Most local headboats this week reported a slow pick, echoing the Chesapeake Bay Foundation’s warning that numbers are dangerously low this fall. A few shorts have hit jerkbaits and bucktails along lighted structures at the HRBT after dusk, and lucky trollers found a pod or two up near the Gooses Reef artificial reef, mostly slot-sized. But don’t plan your day around them— ASMFC’s latest update admits stocks are still struggling to rebuild. Tautog action’s fair around bridge pilings and wrecks. Crab chunks are gold standard—if you can find them—with green crab or fiddler being the hot bait. Cast a half-crab around the CBBT pilings at slack tide, and you’ve got a real shot at a 20-inch tog this week. Bluefish have mostly moved out, but a few snappers are still hanging near the oceanfront inlets if you throw a metalspoon into the rips. Best lures this week for trout have been MirrOlures (especially the 52MR in chartreuse), soft plastics like Gulp! Swimming Mullets in “nuclear chicken,” and 1/4 oz jigheads slow-rolled across drop-offs. Twitching suspending crankbaits around marsh points can also get the bite. Reports from charter boats like Tight Times Charters say live bait—peanut menhaden and mud minnows—are out-fishing artificials for both trout and red drum this week. However, given the menhaden quota cuts and price hikes reported by The Southern Maryland Chronicle, best savor those baits. Hot spots right now: - **HRBT and CBBT lightlines:** especially for speckled trout and a shot at stripers. - **Poquoson Flats and the Elizabeth River:** top bets for consistent trout action. - **Gooses Reef:** a gamble for slot rockfish and the odd blue. For the crabbers out there, blue crab numbers are down and bait prices are up—chalk that up to the menhaden This content was created in partnership and with the help of Artificial Intelligence AI.