CatchWindow fishing intelligence

Yorktown USCG Training Center, VA Daily Water Report — August 23, 2026

Boating owns the day at Yorktown. The score sits at 8.7 out of 10, with diving at 8 and sailing and kayaking both at 7.5, on light west-northwest breeze, nearly flat forecast seas, a dry sky, and only a 0.2 m/s current setting east. Fishing is a workable 6.8, wildlife 6.4, and surfing stays parked at 4.5 because there is almost nothing to ride. Those marks are not a safety stamp, just each activity ranked on its own recipe. Open-Meteo current and forecast conditions put representative wind near 7 knots, gusting only to 8, inside a 1.2-to-10.2-knot envelope. The day’s strongest gust, 17.3 knots, is timed at midnight. Air runs a representative 29.3 C that feels like 32.3, spanning 20.3 to 30.8 C under 19 percent cloud, with humidity 55 percent and a rising 1012 hPa barometer. No rain is indicated. UV near 7.35 and a mostly clear afternoon are the real tradeoffs—heat and sun, not chop. Atmospheric visibility is 31.8 kilometers; that is air, not a view through the water. The marine forecast keeps waves at 0.1 meters and 3.5 seconds, swell a token 0.06 meters from 140 degrees, and wind waves essentially nil. The day’s wave range is only 0.1 to 0.2 meters, calmest near 21:00 at 0.06 meters. Marine sea-surface temperature is 30.4 C, and NOAA CoastWatch has the surface 1.6 C above average. Surfing’s 4.5 follows that tiny height and short period. Boating and kayaking get the inverse: wind, waves, current, and a dry forecast all cooperate, with cloud cover helping the boat score a little extra. NOAA tides are modest—lows of 0.20 meters at 00:45 and 0.19 meters at 12:18, highs of 0.58 meters at 06:35 and 0.75 meters at 18:57. Fishing’s 6.8 is built from solunar timing, tide state, pressure, wind, and available clarity, so the major periods at 07:10–09:10 after the morning high and 19:10–21:10 after the evening high are the cleanest windows on that method. Wildlife uses those hours, the midday low, and the easy wind, and still only reaches 6.4. Against yesterday’s reconstructed scores, fishing and sailing improved from 5.8 and 6.9, boating edged up from 8.4, diving and surfing held, and kayaking and wildlife slipped a little. The outlook stays quiet through Wednesday—peaks under 10 knots, scant rain, waves still mostly below half a meter—before Thursday and Friday lift rain odds toward half. Best bet: take the boat out on the late flood and let that 18:57 high meet the flattening evening surface.