# What makes a bayou a bayou?



## Breeze (Mar 23, 2012)

Okay, I grew up on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. Spent many days hunting and fishing up there. But we did not have Bayou's up there.... the wife asked me the other day what a bayou is and I wasnt sure what to tell her.. So, what makes a bayou a bayou?? Looks to me like a bayou is just a river but I am sure there is more to it than that.. I mean, you have rivers here and you have bayous here, so what is the difference between the two? I need some kind of answer so next time the wife asks I can at least seem like I know what I am talking about.. LOL 

We live just down the street from Bayou Chico.. is that a good bayou for fishing in?


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## gator7_5 (Oct 4, 2007)

Webster defines Bayou as:

1
*:* a creek, secondary watercourse, or minor river that is tributary to another body of water 

2
*:* any of various usually marshy or sluggish bodies of water 

I think in the South, the second defintion is more accurate. A sluggish body of water fed from a larger body of water and tributaries. When I think of bayou, I think of Bayou Texar off of Pensacola Bay, and Tarkiln Bayou off of Perdido Bay. Big slow moving marshy bayous.


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## aroundthehorn (Aug 29, 2010)

Breeze said:


> We live just down the street from Bayou Chico.. is that a good bayou for fishing in?


There's a lot of pollution in Chico and Texar.


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## Duke S (Nov 26, 2011)

Our local bayous would be tidal creeks up in the Chesapeake.
Chico has a history of pollution, but then so do Grande and Texar. 
Think Patapsco river...


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## Charlie2 (Oct 2, 2007)

*Creeks and Bayous*

I spent some time as a youth in Louisiana and I never heard the term creek; everything was a bayou

Later in life, we moved to South Baldwin County Alabama where both terms where used.

I saw the other day that what we always called Graham Bayou forever, is now called Graham Creek. Go figure. C2


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## chicon monster (Mar 7, 2012)

I think a bayou is where there is brackish water.I live right next to bayou chico too.I wouldn't eat the fish out of here but there are a lit of fish.plenty of specks,reds, some Spanish.there is some big gar in here as well. There is some. Really good spots in there.I fish out of my jon boat every fay during the summer and we have a great time pulling in the fish


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## Orangebeach28 (Jun 3, 2009)

I had some good buddies In college from severna park, near there? 

I will never understand your state's obsession with Lacrosse


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## Play'N Hooky Too (Sep 29, 2007)

bayou http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=bayouLouisiana French, from Choctaw bayuk "small stream."


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## Breeze (Mar 23, 2012)

Orangebeach28 said:


> I had some good buddies In college from severna park, near there?
> 
> I will never understand your state's obsession with Lacrosse


No, Severna Park is on the West side of the bay. The west and the east are like two totally different worlds. Used to hate it when the western shore city people would come down during the summer and crowd our roads. Would take three times as long to get somewhere on fridays or sundays.... course most of us would use the back roads and avoid them as much as possible... LOL Lacrosse is more popular on the western shore. The eastern shore is still made up of alot of farms and most of those farm boys would rather play football... LOL There is some lacrosse on the eastern shore though.. but its mostly more recent. We never had lacrosse when I was growing up.. never even knew what it was until after I had graduated..


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## Breeze (Mar 23, 2012)

Duke S said:


> Our local bayous would be tidal creeks up in the Chesapeake.
> Chico has a history of pollution, but then so do Grande and Texar.
> Think Patapsco river...



Ahhh, so Island Creek, where my uncle lived and farmed, and where I spent alot of my child hood, would be Island Bayou.... but the Choptank River would still be the Choptank River.. 

Patapsco River?? ewww.. thats just nasty... lol


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## Captdroot (Jan 18, 2012)

*Thanks*

*Thanks for asking. My wife (63) is a Florida native from Live Oak Fl and I'm (62) a Florida native from near Deland, Fl. We had not seen the term bayou (other than literature) until we traveled to Panama City.** Just on the north side of town is Bayou George*.* From there westward, the term bayou begins to become stronger and stronger, while creeks, bays, and sloughs are terms that become less and less common.
*


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## oldflathead (Oct 3, 2007)

*Pollution BS*



aroundthehorn said:


> There's a lot of pollution in Chico and Texar.


There WAS pollution in Bayou Chico many years ago from wood treating processes. There is occasionally pollution from street runoff after a heavy rain.

I have only lived on Bayou Chico sixteen years. I often see dolphins feeding near my home on the north west arm close to Pattis Shipyard.
Dolphins do not frequent polluted water.

I have witnessed the alledged 'scientific tests' by some psuedo scientists off Lakewood Park. I am sure they are paid a lot of our taxes to ride their jon boats out to take samples. They get a sample just after a pelican poops and "Bayou Chico is polluted" is posted in the PNJ.

I am not attacking you personally, aroundthe horn, just questioning where you got the information to make a statement like that?

You are invited to come visit me, sit on my deck down by Bayou Chico, have a beer or so and show me pollution while we watch the dolphin play.

 Tom


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## chicon monster (Mar 7, 2012)

oldflathead said:


> There WAS pollution in Bayou Chico many years ago from wood treating processes. There is occasionally pollution from street runoff after a heavy rain.
> 
> I have only lived on Bayou Chico sixteen years. I often see dolphins feeding near my home on the north west arm close to Pattis Shipyard.
> Dolphins do not frequent polluted water.
> ...


the metal scrap plant is what is polluting the water.that is where the mercury and all the other crap is coming from.I see dolphins in there alot but I believe its just because of the abundance of fish in there.

Btw, there is excellent speck fishing at peoples dock lights.

I personally wouldn't eat anything out of bayou chico but I know quite a few people that do.you aren't going to grow a third leg from eating the fish in here but I don't think its worth getting mercury poisoning over


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## SHunter (Jun 19, 2009)

As a kid we called areas off a lake a slough. When I came down here bayous reminded me of sloughs. It likely depends on the part of the country that you come from.


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## BentStraight (Dec 27, 2008)

This thread brought back a lot of memories for me. I graduated from Severna Park High School in 1975 and spent my days fishing the Eastern Shore rivers like the Nanticoke, Pocomoke, Choptank, Wicomico, Marshyhope and Tuckahoe and Smithville Mill Pond always produced great bass action. 
Now I fish the bayous, creeks and basins along Blackwater Bay and river! To me a bayou is someplace you can catch blue crabs and green trout (bass)!


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## aroundthehorn (Aug 29, 2010)

oldflathead said:


> There WAS pollution in Bayou Chico many years ago from wood treating processes. There is occasionally pollution from street runoff after a heavy rain.
> 
> I have only lived on Bayou Chico sixteen years. I often see dolphins feeding near my home on the north west arm close to Pattis Shipyard.
> Dolphins do not frequent polluted water.
> ...


No worries, Tom! I've met you before and you're a super nice guy. FWIW, I would never take a comment or response here personally. I'm a super nice person, too, as you might recall.

I was really thinking of the runoff. Chico is second hand, Texar is stuff I've seen first hand (I live off of Texar). I've seen fish kills and all kinds of nasty junk and film in Bayou Texar. Texar is a smaller channel, etc. though and gets all that runoff from yards and other things in north Pensacola. Maybe the new oyster reefs in Texar will help in some way. 

When it rains, there is only one way for the water to go. The gradient here is also the reason why the old sewer plant was where it was, for what it's worth.

I wouldn't make a habit of eating fish from either place, though. That's just my opinion. But hell yes, I would fish the heck out of both, especially under the dock lights at night.

Kind of sad in a way that people should even have to discuss pollution in the water? JMHO and peace.


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## aroundthehorn (Aug 29, 2010)

SHunter said:


> As a kid we called areas off a lake a slough. When I came down here bayous reminded me of sloughs. It likely depends on the part of the country that you come from.



SHunter, this reminds me of a very interesting survey of local dialects/pronunciation that was done years ago. I'll try and find it and post it here if I can remember to.


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## Duke S (Nov 26, 2011)

yeah, except when it is a "branch" like Foreman Branch near where I grew up on Double Creek Road between Chestertown and Crumpton City. cut, gut, slough, blackwater backwater, etc 

for any interested in local bayou pollution information:
http://uwf.edu/cedb/Analysis of Fecal Loading.cfm
http://uwf.edu/cedb/PERCH_Atlas_page.htm
http://uwf.edu/cedb/Perch_pollutants_in_Bayou_Grande.cfm
http://uwf.edu/cedb/Perch_pollutants_in_Bayou_Chico.cfm
http://uwf.edu/cedb/Perch_pollutants_in_Bayou_Texar.cfm

otherwise, ignorance is bliss, keep eat'n those fish and crabs out of Chico, and feed them to your kids too, it is all a big conspiracy....





Breeze said:


> Ahhh, so Island Creek, where my uncle lived and farmed, and where I spent alot of my child hood, would be Island Bayou.... but the Choptank River would still be the Choptank River..
> 
> Patapsco River?? ewww.. thats just nasty... lol


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## Breeze (Mar 23, 2012)

oldflathead said:


> There WAS pollution in Bayou Chico many years ago from wood treating processes. There is occasionally pollution from street runoff after a heavy rain.
> 
> I have only lived on Bayou Chico sixteen years. I often see dolphins feeding near my home on the north west arm close to Pattis Shipyard.
> Dolphins do not frequent polluted water.
> ...


Gonna have to spend more time out there to try to see the dolphins.... didnt have many dolphins up on the chesapeake... had to get down the bay to the Norfolk area to see dolphins..


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## Breeze (Mar 23, 2012)

BentStraight said:


> This thread brought back a lot of memories for me. I graduated from Severna Park High School in 1975 and spent my days fishing the Eastern Shore rivers like the Nanticoke, Pocomoke, Choptank, Wicomico, Marshyhope and Tuckahoe and Smithville Mill Pond always produced great bass action.
> Now I fish the bayous, creeks and basins along Blackwater Bay and river! To me a bayou is someplace you can catch blue crabs and green trout (bass)!


I lived on my boat for a year at the marina next to the choptank river bridge in Cambridge. The one with the big ferry boat. Only problem with that marina was my boat was a sailboat drafting 5 feet of water. The channel going into the marina was only 3 feet at low tide so I could only get in or out at high tide... When I wanted to go out for the weekend I would leave at the late night high tide and get out to the main channel then anchor just off of it till daylight.. ahhh those were the days...


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## Breeze (Mar 23, 2012)

Duke S said:


> yeah, except when it is a "branch" like Foreman Branch near where I grew up on Double Creek Road between Chestertown and Crumpton City. cut, gut, slough, blackwater backwater, etc
> 
> for any interested in local bayou pollution information:
> http://uwf.edu/cedb/Analysis of Fecal Loading.cfm
> ...


My brother lives in Chestertown. I grew up running the roads of Churchhill, Centerville, and Chestertown. Lived in Ridgely over in Caroline County but had alot of family in the Centerville area.. My grandparents lived in Price. Been through Crumpton many a time but dont know where Double Creek Rd is at, although I probably been on it a time or two..LOL Big thing on Friday or Saturday nights was riding between the parking lots in Easton.. Did you know any Middletons, Larrimores, or Stubbs? Shoot, you might be a distant relative..


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