Fishing forecast for Richmond, VA

Richmond is a fall-line city: the James drops through rapids inside the city limits and turns tidal below the 14th Street Bridge, the point where the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources ends its non-tidal James River. Above that line, DWR says, the rocky Fall-Line section has long supported smallmouth bass, catfish and sunfish fisheries; below it the tidal fresh water holds largemouth bass, a trophy blue catfish fishery and a spring run of shad and striped bass. Chickahominy Lake, east of the city, adds bowfin and chain pickerel.

Best fishing times in Richmond this week

Majors run an hour either side of the moon crossing the meridian over Richmond, VA; minors, half an hour either side of moonrise and moonset. Where those widths come from: best fishing times and how we compute these times.

When these windows are not the right tool

Solunar theory is John Alden Knight's 1926 prediction; the ±60 and ±30 minute widths are convention, not calculation. The times are computed astronomy, the claim that fish feed inside them is not. The day rating follows moon phase — identical nationwide, so every city shows it the same. A moving front beats the moon: apps that read pressure.

Where to fish in Richmond

This page is built around James River, with Chickahominy Lake, Swift Creek Lake and Shields Lake in reach — fresh water, about 10 minutes from the middle of Richmond.

The Department of Wildlife Resources calls the nine non-tidal miles from Bosher's Dam to the 14th Street Bridge the Fall-Line section, a mix of rock outcrops, long runs, deep pools, riffles and hard rapids. Its surveys find smallmouth bass at every site and rate the reach from the Powhite Parkway bridge to Belle Isle best for them, and DWR sends catfish anglers to the deep pockets above Pony Pasture.

Below the falls DWR lists public boat access at Ancarrow's Landing in the city, Osborne Landing and Deep Bottom in Henrico County and Dutch Gap in Chesterfield; Osborne adds three double ramps, a canoe and kayak launch and a pier for shore anglers. Upriver, the vertical-slot fishway DWR opened at Bosher's Dam on March 1, 1999 gave migrating fish 137 miles of the James and 168 miles of tributaries.

The City of Richmond's James River Park System is a 600-acre linear park on both banks from Huguenot Flatwater to Ancarrow's Landing with four public boat ramps. Virginia State Parks keeps a concrete ramp on Swift Creek Lake in Pocahontas State Park, which DWR places west of Chester, south of the city.

The nearest grids we publish are Virginia Beach, VA (150 km, Chesapeake Bay mouth) and Baltimore, MD (208 km, Chesapeake Bay). Different water, and different minutes.

What you can catch in Richmond

State listings put these 6 fish in the water around Richmond. Plan around the peak, not the open season.

Shad, striped bass and white perch push up the tidal James to the foot of the falls each spring. DWR's fish passage coordinator puts the heart of the fishery for all three between Rocketts Landing and the 14th Street Bridge, the agency says the shad run usually peaks from mid-April into early May, and it points striper anglers to topwater lures around the I-95 bridge.

DWR traces the tidal James blue catfish to stockings that began in the 1970s; the former state record, 102.25 pounds, came from the James in 2009, and most citation fish are caught between Dutch Gap and Sturgeon Point. Since abundance peaked around 2011 the population has shifted toward smaller fish, and DWR says blues over 50 pounds have become harder to find, though big fish remain.

DWR describes Chickahominy Lake, the 1,230-acre cypress reservoir behind Walkers Dam on the New Kent and Charles City line, as long known for bowfin and chain pickerel. Most pickerel action comes in February and March, with spawning toward the end of February in backwater coves and marsh. A 2017 survey boated 213 bowfin at a record rate, and DWR still finds them abundant, if smaller on average.

Tackle sits outside a forecast page: start with how to catch catfish.

Water temperature and season in Richmond

Air here swings 41.1 °F across the year, from 38.3 °F in January to 79.4 °F in July. No gauge measures water temperature here, so the chart below is air only.

Monthly climate for Richmond, VA. The air line is the NOAA NCEI climate normal for 1991–2020 — the thirty-year average of a calendar month, not the weather of any one year — measured at RICHMOND INTL AP, VA US (USW00013740), 11.3 km from the middle of town, with 27–29 of the thirty years behind each month. No gauge measures water temperature here, so this chart is air only. Water lags air by weeks and the lag grows with depth — a deep reservoir turns later than a shallow bay — so air is never a stand-in for a thermometer in the water. Read into this site on 2026-10-26.

These normals are air alone, from the airport east of the city. July afternoons average 89.5 and January nights 28.8. Rain is spread across the year, from 2.61 inches in February to 4.90 in August, 45.5 in all, and a normal winter brings 8.8 inches of snow, 3.7 of them in January.

Sunrise, sunset and daylight in Richmond

The moon window moves daily; the sun does not. Plan a season against this block.

The longest day of 2026 is June 21, 14h 45m; the shortest, December 21, 9h 34m. The meridian passing drifts about 50 minutes later daily: a dawn window this week is an afternoon window in a fortnight.

Shields Lake, a 7-acre lake in the City of Richmond's Byrd Park with its whole shoreline open to anglers, is fished mainly for trout from November through April, according to DWR. The agency's Urban Fishing Program stocks trout there five times between November and March, and does the same at the 5-acre pond in Dorey Park in eastern Henrico, usually in the first week of the month.

On the tidal rivers DWR finds bass along grass and spatterdock edges, in water 2 to 3 feet deep, before the spawn, then on woody cover near channel drop-offs as the water warms. In summer most large James River blue catfish are caught at night, and on Chickahominy Lake hydrilla and other plants thicken from summer into mid-fall and choke some creek arms.

In fall DWR finds striper fishing on the James usually best below the I-295 bridge and in the larger tidal creeks, until the water cools, typically by mid-December, and the best spots shift farther downriver to the James River Bridge. In a dry autumn salinity climbs up the James and the Chickahominy, and DWR biologists have found the larger largemouth bass moved upriver into fresher water.

License and seasons in Virginia

Rules for Virginia come from Virginia DWR, and the calculation behind the table is set out in how we compute these times.