Late-December Chesapeake Bay Cold-Water Fishing Rundown

This is Artificial Lure, checkin’ in from the lower Chesapeake Bay, Virginia, with your cold‑water fishing rundown. Tide-wise, Virginia Beach and the CBBT are on a classic winter cycle. Tides4Fishing shows low just after daylight and a solid mid‑day high, with Virginia Beach running low around 6:23 a.m., high near 12:53 p.m., then easing back toward low again this evening. That gives you a sweet outgoing push mid‑morning and a strong incoming early afternoon—prime windows to fish around structure, channel edges, and creek mouths. Sunrise along the lower Bay is right around 7:20 a.m., with sunset a little after 5:05 p.m., so your best light and moving water line up nicely for a late‑morning bite and a last‑light jigging session. Weather’s winter‑gritty. The National Weather Service marine forecast out of Wakefield is calling for northerly winds 15 to 20 knots with gusts pushing 25 and waves 2 to 4 feet. Small craft should think hard before running wide open; tuck in the lee when you can, and if you’re in a jon boat, stay up the rivers or close to shore. Water temps are down in the low to mid‑40s in much of the lower Bay now, and the fish have shifted to their winter patterns. According to regional reports and local chatter, rockfish (striped bass) are still the headliners. Anglers have been putting steady numbers of 18‑ to 26‑inch fish in the boat trolling deep along the CBBT, the tubes, and the edges off Cape Henry. A few bigger slot‑class fish are coming on jigs when you mark tight bait balls. Best rigs for stripers right now are classic Chesapeake winter stuff: umbrella rigs pulling 6‑inch shad bodies in white, pearl, or chartreuse; tandem bucktail rigs with 1 to 3 oz heads and 6‑inch trailers; and big mojos on the deeper rods when you’re dragging the channel. If you’re jigging, tie on a one‑ to two‑ounce jighead with a 5‑ to 7‑inch soft plastic—BKDs, Z‑Man StreakZ, or similar—and work ‘em slow near bottom. The colder the water, the slower the hop. For bait soakers, bloodworms, cut menhaden, and live spot if you can still scare any up will draw strikes from schoolie stripers, speckled trout, and the odd puppy drum in the creeks. Fresh cut bait on a fish‑finder rig along deep bends in the Elizabeth, James, and York has been putting a mixed bag in coolers. Recent inshore talk has some nice specks and puppy drum hanging in the deeper holes of Lynnhaven, Rudee, and Little Creek. MirrOlures, 3‑ to 4‑inch paddle tails on 1/8–1/4 oz jigheads, and Gulp shrimp under popping corks are doing work on stable weather days. When that north wind howls and the water muddies, tip plastics with a little scent and slow your retrieve to a crawl. A couple hot spots to circle in grease pencil: • Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel – Work the down‑current side of the pilings and the tube edges on that mid‑day high. Slow‑trolled umbrellas and mojos, or vertical jigging when you mark arcs tight to the bottom. • Lynnhaven and Rudee Inlets – Stay inside if the Bay’s to