Blue catfish run hot on the Delaware as river drops to low summer flow

What's Biting

What's Next

With no meaningful rain on the horizon and water levels already running well below seasonal norms, conditions over the next few days will continue to favor species that thrive in slower, warmer, low-water environments.

**Catfish** are the clear standout heading into the weekend. Old School Outdoors reports blue cats running hot from Trenton south, and channel catfish remain active in the D&R Canal. Low water concentrates both species near deeper holes and current seams. Fresh cut bait — clam and chunk fish — fished on bottom during the moving portion of current is the go-to setup. Blue cats tend to turn on after dark, making late-evening trips worth planning around.

**Bass** will continue settling into their summer rhythm as the week progresses. Post-spawn fish are back on the feed at Carnegie Lake and Mercer Lake per Old School Outdoors, and JB Kasper in The Fisherman — NJ/DE Freshwater confirms decent bass fishing region-wide. As water drops and warms, the most productive windows will be the first two hours after dawn and the last stretch before dark. Shaded structure — log jams, undercut banks, bridge pilings — becomes the key midday address.

**Crappie** have locked into what JB Kasper describes as their summer pattern: early and late bites with fish holding tight to deeper docks and brushpiles through the afternoon. Small tube jigs and crappie minnows fished vertically will produce once you locate a school.

**Striped bass** in the tidal Delaware near Trenton remain a realistic target per Old School Outdoors, though the window tightens as June temperatures rise. Early-morning trips before the heat builds will offer the best odds on keeper fish.

For Pine Barrens tributaries, the 22.2 cfs reading at USGS gauge 01408000 means smaller streams are running skinny and warming quickly. Pickerel are still catchable in the back-country per JB Kasper, but expect them in shaded, deeper pools rather than flats. If any rain materializes over the weekend, even a modest flow bump will trigger a bite — worth monitoring the forecast closely before heading out.

Context

For the Delaware River and Pine Barrens region, mid-June typically marks the transition from spring to summer fishing. The shad run — which peaks through May and tapers in early June — is winding down, and angler attention shifts to catfish, bass, crappie, and pickerel. The low-water conditions documented this week are notable and suggest this shift is arriving ahead of schedule. JB Kasper in The Fisherman — NJ/DE Freshwater described the Delaware at Trenton as running well below normal as of June 7, and the USGS gauge 01408000 reading of 22.2 cfs reinforces that lean conditions have already set in across smaller Pine Barrens tributaries.

The slowdown in trout fishing noted across multiple reports is consistent with the seasonal arc: New Jersey's stocked trout waters peak in April and May, and by mid-June, warming temperatures and dropping flows push trout activity well into the background. The D&R Canal typically transitions to reliable channel catfish through the summer once trout season quiets, and Old School Outdoors confirms that pattern is already in motion — if anything, a bit earlier than a typical mid-June baseline.

On the catfish front, the blue cat action from Trenton south is consistent with, and possibly running ahead of, normal mid-June expectations for this stretch of the tidal Delaware. For broader regional context, The Fisherman — DE/MD/Chesapeake recently noted a new Delaware state record flathead catfish (36.20 lbs, from Augustine Beach) — a signal that catfish across the mid-Atlantic watershed are having an active season.

Without a rain event to reset flows, the summer low-water pattern looks set to lock in early. Anglers who adapt to dawn-and-dusk timing, seek shaded structure, and lean into catfishing during warm evenings will find the most productive path forward through the rest of June.