Fishing Fletcher’s Cove on the Potomac, and where to eat after
Four miles up the river from the White House, Fletcher's Cove is where Washington has fished the Potomac for a century: a Park Service landing with a boathouse that rents rowboats, a bank below Little Falls where the shad and stripers stop every spring, and catfish and perch the rest of the year. The District licence, the advisory on what not to eat, and the snakehead rule. A guest guide from Smells Like Fish, ending at three Georgetown tables on the way home.
Four miles up the Potomac from the White House, on Canal Road below the palisades, Fletcher’s Cove is a National Park Service landing on the C&O Canal where the city has fished the river for a century. The park says “Fletchers Boat House is open seasonally for boat or bike rentals” and that the lot has “plenty of parking and accessible ramps,” and it applies District of Columbia rules: “license required for persons aged 16-65.” A mile upstream at Chain Bridge the Potomac stops being tidal, and by reputation this is where the spring shad and striped bass end their run and where Washington goes to meet them; the rest of the year it is catfish, bass, and perch from the same rocks and rowboats. This is the fishing half of a day that never leaves the District. The eating half is at the end, in Georgetown, on the way home down Canal Road.
I write the guides on Smells Like Fish, a bait and tackle site, and I am a guest here. Top of DC asked for the water. They supplied the tables.
The day, in order
Be at the cove at first light, when the lot by the Abner Cloud House is empty. If it is spring, tie on a shad dart and fish the current below the boathouse, or rent a rowboat and anchor on the seam; if it is any other month, put a chunk of cut bait on a slip-sinker rig for the catfish and a small jig for the perch. Fish the morning. Late morning, drive back down Canal Road into Georgetown for lunch on M Street. If you want an afternoon, Chain Bridge is a mile up, the District-side rocks below Little Falls where the river runs fast and the bank fishing is real, or Hains Point at the tip of East Potomac Park is the city’s deep tidal bank for blue catfish. Dinner is back in Georgetown.
What is in the water
Striped bass and shad in the spring run to the fall line. Blue and channel catfish in the tidal river all summer. Largemouth and smallmouth bass, white and yellow perch, carp, eels, and the northern snakehead, which the Park Service tells every angler on the canal to handle one way: “If you catch a Northern Snakehead, do not release the fish alive.” Then the advisory, which matters more here than on most rivers. The District says: “Do not eat: Eel, carp, striped bass or largemouth bass.” The Park Service’s Anacostia guidance allows up to four monthly servings of sunfish, three of blue catfish or white perch, two of largemouth bass, or one of bullhead or channel catfish, and encourages release. Fish it, and put most of it back.
Where to fish from shore
- Fletcher’s Cove, 4 miles: the boathouse bank and the rocks downstream, free parking, DC licence.
- Chain Bridge, 5 miles: the District rocks below Little Falls; fast water, stay on the bank.
- Hains Point, 4 miles: the deep tidal bank on both sides of East Potomac Park.
- Kingman Island and Anacostia Park, 4 and 5 miles: the Anacostia banks, DC licence, no bait dumping, advisory posted.
- Gravelly Point and Jones Point, 6 and 12 miles: the Virginia banks by the runway and under the Wilson Bridge; the tidal river below the District is Maryland and Potomac River Fisheries Commission water.
- Burke Lake, 20 miles: Fairfax County’s 218-acre lake stocked with walleye, muskie, bass, catfish, and crappie, with a bait house; Virginia licence at 16.
Licences and the limits
Three governments, one river. Inside the District, the Department of Energy and Environment’s licence, sold online, required from 16 to 64. On the Maryland side, a nontidal licence at $32 for a resident or $55 for a nonresident for the lakes and creeks, or the $15 Chesapeake Bay and Coastal licence for tidal water; Maryland says a Potomac River Fisheries Commission licence holder “may fish any portion of the tidal waters of Maryland.” In Virginia, $23 resident, $47 nonresident, $8 for a nonresident day, at 16. Under 16 fishes free in all three. Maryland’s tidal limits below the District: largemouth bass 5 in aggregate at 15 inches from March 1 to June 15 and 12 inches otherwise, catfish and white perch with no limit, yellow perch 5 at 9 inches, snakehead unlimited and illegal to possess alive, and striped bass under rules the state revised April 1, 2026 that you should read before keeping one.
The gear side
Which shad dart for the spring seam below the boathouse, how to rig cut bait for a tidal blue catfish at Hains Point, what to do with a snakehead on the bank, and which of the three licences covers which rock: that is my beat, and it does not belong on a restaurant site. The full Washington, DC fishing guide on Smells Like Fish has the map of all 15 spots with drive times from the White House, the live Potomac temperature at Hains Point and flow at Little Falls, the three licence links, the Maryland and Virginia limits, Burke Lake, Lake Needwood, and Great Falls, the advisory, and the tackle list.
Where to eat after
Canal Road becomes M Street at the Key Bridge, and Georgetown starts there. These three are on the Top of DC Georgetown list. The scores are theirs, not mine.
Sources. National Park Service, Fletcher’s Cove and C&O Canal fishing pages, Anacostia Park fishing page, and Great Falls Park fees; DC Department of Energy and Environment, “Fishing in the District” (consumption advisory); Maryland Department of Natural Resources licences, tidal limits, and the April 2026 striped bass change via eRegulations; Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources licence fees and limits via eRegulations; Fairfax County Park Authority, Burke Lake. Drive distances computed on OpenStreetMap roads from the White House.
Ray Dodson writes for Smells Like Fish. Ray is the pen name of that site's research desk: every recommendation is built from documented angler consensus, state fish and wildlife guidance, and published testing, with sources named in every article. This piece was written for Top of DC.
