Memorial Day Bluegills - May 28th, 2012

Brad, Brian, and I did an early morning raid on the bluegills of Bluestone Lake. We fished from 6:30 to 10am then got the heck out of dodge before all the Memorial Day boat traffic flooded in. We used garden wigglers, Berkley Power Maggots, and Brad used a fly pole some as well. I ended up with 37 gills and a couple of small spots and a redeye. Brad got 70 gills and a couple spots. Brad did hook about a 2 pound bass on a flypole but after a struggle it broke him off. By the time we left the swimmers, skiers, and other fishing boats were really getting up there in numbers.

Sunday Morning Fog - May 27, 2012

This being a very warm weather Memorial Day weekend the rivers around Hinton have been loaded with people. On this Sunday morning Brad and I waded down the backside of the arm crazy early. We started at 6am and we were off the water before th fog got started off at 8am. We used spinners and white gitzit g-tails. We ened up with 20 smallies each in our short but very productive 2 hours. All of them were smaller fish between 6 and 14 inches but they sure are fun to catch. The best part is we got our fish and got out of dodge before the holiday weekend river crowd got outta hand.

High Water Float Trip - May 19, 2012

Brad, Greg and I floated from the Dam to the Highschool this morning. They were running 6 gates. The water was high and stained. Fishing was tough. Greg caught 12, Brad 13, and I got 17. The biggest being under or around 2lbs. Had we not stopped on an island or two our trip would have only taken 45 minutes in those high flow rates. CW Cabins shoals were serious buisness today, but we made it throught no prob. It was a perfect weather day for fishing. That afternoon Brad and I ran up Lake and Amy's pond before dark. I caught 10 and Brad caught 3 ten to twelve inch LMB's. I caught mine on a fluke and Brad's came off a G-tail. They didn't seem to want senko or a spinner for some reason.

Slow Day on Bluestone Lake - May 18th, 2012

Greg and I fished Bluestone from 7am to 1pm with little success. I caught 2 keeper LMB's and Greg caught 2 keeper LMB's and a bluegill. The water was falling and stainded. The fished just didn't want to cooperate at all. We fished the pit, Bull Falls, the slide, and below Bertha. It was high skies and tough fishing. My Olympus camera is being sent off for repairs so the next couple post are gonna be lacking in the pic department.

Finesse Largemouths - May 15th, 2012

With the river up, muddy, and unfishable Greg and I took our yaks and headed for smaller stiller waters. The technique of the day was finesse tubes, shakey heads, and even small jigs. The fish would not chase but would hit small stationary baits. Almost all of our fish came while the lure was on the inital drop. In 5 hours of fishing I caught 16 and Greg caught 12. In those 28 we each had a 5 and a half pounder along with a couple 3's, and 4 or so 2's. We put together a five fish limit close to 20lbs. A little overcast and water stain help aid our efforts.

Hard Rain - May 14th, 2012

Greg and I floated from the Dam to the High School in the pouring rain. They were running about 4 gates and with all the feeder creeks dumping muddy water it only took from 9am till 12pm. The fishing wasn't as good as I would have thought today. I caught 12 and Greg caught 19. We had four fish or so over a pound. Greg lost a 4lbs+ fish below the Hinton Bridge. I don't know if the colder nights are taking their toll or what, but today was a step back for the spring river bite.

Two Rivers One Float Trip - May 10th,2012

Greg in his new Ocean Prowler Yak

Greenbrier Smallie

New River Smallie

Island Hopping with the Coosa

Greg and I floated from in front of my house on the Greenbrier down to where the Greenbrier and the New merge then on down to the first ranger station take out. We started at 9:30am and were down by 1pm. The bite on the Greenbrier was noticeably slower and the water was a little colder than in the New. As usual G-tails and tubes were the order the day. By 11am the wind blew hard enough that you couldn't float fish a tube effectively so G-tails become the ticket.  Today it seemed the smoke with chartreuse out fished white, maybe due to the stained water. We hit our best fishing below the Hinton bridge. It had the most ravenous bite and the biggest fish. Greg caught 27 and I landed 23 on our float. We caught a lot of 2lbs+ fish on the New River side. All of our fish were smallies, no redyes, LMB's or spots this time. Things on the river are heating up and pending weather in another week the fishing should be some of the best of the spring.

Will Power Walleyes - May 7th, 2012

Our crew got to the dock to meet Captain Steve at 6am only to retreat to a little greasy spoon for fishermen and wait out the lightning storm that was passing by. The storm finally left at around 8:30am but it left a lot of heavy rain and wind behind it for us to fish in, how thoughtful. It was noticeably colder, windier, and rougher than the day before. But the fish were biting and they were good quality fish. We fished heavy jigs pounding walleye spawning beds and managed to get 12 fish in the box that weighed a combined 38lbs. on this half day of fishing. Between the cold Canadian air, the driving rain, the waves, and the wind you had to really endure to outlast these fish to catch em. Once the wind pushed out the morning storm and the waves died down and the bite totally died. We called it quits around 1:30 so we could head back to WV. We caught a lot of  drum again today and by we I mean Chad. We also caught seveal white perch. This offshore walleye trip on Erie was a great time despite rough conditions and I will definitely be back. The size of this lake and the quality of this fishery are unimaginable until you've seen it for yourself, and after you see it you'll want to see it again. Thanks to Captain Steve of Fishy Business Charters for a great couple days. If he can put on you fish in these conditions I shutter to think what he could do with some descent weather and cooperative fish.



What wonderful weather for a little Drum fishing.




White Perch




Sharp Teeth of the Wall Eyed Pike





Chad with a Nice Walleye



The Drum King

Lake Erie Walleyes - May 6th, 2012

 Grandpa Craigo, Arnie, Chad, Jack, Pete and myself headed to Lake Erie for a couple days of walleye fishing. We fished with the trusted Captain Steve Connors owner of Fishy Business Charters out of Oregon Ohio. Arnie, Chad, Pete and Grandpa have used Captain Steve's charters many times before.Captain Steve was excellent. I would highly recommend him to anybody looking to book a charter on Erie for Walleye, Smallmouth, or Perch. I had a blast on my first trip to one of the Great Lakes. It's totally weird to me to be fishing for freshwater game fish in 3 to 5 foot waves on open water when all you can see is water and sky.  On a down note the weather was unforgiving with rain and driving wind for our 2 days on the lake, but Captain Steve still put us on some really good fish during our time there. Jack, who is only 10 years old, caught his first ever walleye. Way to go Jack. Besides walleye we also caught a lot of drum (especially long lining Chad), white perch, regular perch and even a few white bass and a hybrid or two. We left the dock at 6am and came back in around 3pm. We kept 30 walleyes that weighed 93lbs when we dropped them off to be processed.  The biggest fish of the day came from Pete and weighted around 6lbs. We used heavy hair jigs tipped with a night crawler and a trailing stringer hook. John Deere Greene, Purple and Chartreuse seemed to be the best colors.

Daybreak on Erie

Captain Steve's Island Hopper

Pete with the 1st Eye of the trip

Ground Pounding Jigs

Jack's 1st Walleye!

Grandpa and Jack on Erie

Fish in the Net

I CATCHED EM ALL!!!

The Lonely Perch. Later won in the Perch Lottery by Chad.

May Smallmouth - May 1st, 2012

Brad and I fished the Stone for a couple three hours this afternoon. The wind was tough when we started then it settled out. Brad hooked and lost a nice LMB on a spinnerbait. We took to bluegill fishing when it seemed the bass bite was going to be tough. After we started bluegill fishing we started catching some bass, including this 2.7lbs. smallie that Brad captured in the above photo. The bluegills were up shallow and very active.  We ended up catchig about 40 blugills and a handfull of other bass.                                                                                                             

April Spots - April 30th, 2012

I fished Bluestone from 9am to 1pm today. The water had been up and had a lot of trash in it so I didn't run far. I caught 14, mostly on cranks. I did catch a couple on a spinnerbait and a couple on flukes. I caught 1 perch, 1 LMB, and the rest were sptted bass. The water was heavy stain and 62 degrees with bright sun. The fish all seemed to be willing to chase, which makes for some fun fishing.                                            

Last Day Before Going Home - April 20th, 2012

The fish held on the same shallow main lake cut fluke pattern today. We fished from 7am till around 1pm before packing up and heading back to Hinton. I ended up with 21 and Greg and Todd caught 24 today. I did pick up a couple around riprap on a squarebill today.  I talked to Jason who had just pulled back into town for the weekend as we were leaving to go home. I did find one pocked below the brick roundhouse that I caught 6 fish on 8 casts all over 2lbs off of a Strike King Caffiene Shad. It was a good day and has been a pretty productive fish.

A Pattern Emerges - April 19th, 2012

With Dad still under the weather I fished solo on main lake pockets from Bluestone to just below Clarksville. I figured out pretty early that heavy cloud matt had the fish up shollow on any kind of stickup or laydown bigger than pop can. If you twitched a fluke and then let if die they would really nail it. I ended up catching 37 bass, with 21 over 2lbs but he largest only being 2.8 lbs. Greg and Todd started off a little slower but went of to catch 29 fish as well. Todd lost one of the largest fish he's ever hooked on a crankbait. Greg also missed a really large bass  on a fluke on this day. A person could have beat your brains out trying to catch fish our of coverless creek arms but out of the main lake all the debris and trash made the bass some great cover to hold on.

The Best Western Mudcat - April 18th, 2012

I fished solo out of my boat, since Dad wasn't feeling good, I started off along side of Greg and Todd on a day were we started off in short and t-shirts and ended up in sweatshirts with bibs trying to stay warm. We caught some good fish off the Clarksville riprap on cranks and spinners early. Greg caugtht on that weighed 4lbs and 11oz. off a spinnerbait early.

After catching around 6 or so off the wall  about I headed over the lake motel side of the lake in front of the Best Western Hotel and started cranking main lake riprap about 11am. I was running a LC CB flat 12 when I felt a big thump. I set the hook and felt a huge headshake. The wind was blowing in hard on that bank and it was shoving my boat all over the place as the fish slowly started to head out to deeper water. I pulled and couldn't move the fish. In the heavy chop I started to wonder if I really had a fish or maybe the wind was playing tricks on me. Or maybe I had hooked a big turtle. The fish layed down and I couldn't hardly get it off the bottom with my medium heavy baitcaster and 10lbs test. I would pull real hard and then it would wiggle around a little and then lay back down. After about 20  minutes of this I decided I was either going to break off, straighten a hook, or catch this fish, but I have had enough of the mexican stand off. I started pulling up and reeling down as fast as I could before the fatiued fish could get another run back to the bottom going. I reached down and got the net ready and when I got the fish up to the surface I slide the net under him. I had to put my pole down in order both hands on the net handle in order to get the fish in the boat. As soon as I got the mudcat in the boat I ran across the lake and got Todd to help me get the crankbait out of the bottom of it's belly, takes some pics and get a weight. Unfortunatly my scale only went to 30lbs and this fish maxed them out. It took Todd holding his mouth open and Greg reaching all the way down to his elbow with pliars to get my LC back. If they didn't cost 20 dollars a pop I would have let him have it. After all this we shoved him back in an he swam off to fight another day.  He would have made some good eating, He was by far the biggest fish I have ever caught on a pole in freshwater.                                              

The Best Western Mudcat

Thank goodness for having a really big net.

Todd Holding Up my Catfish after being nice enough to help me get my crankbait back.

For the day I ended up catching 12 LMB's and the Mudcat. Greg and Todd got 17 with the largest being the fatty Greg caugtht that morning. The fish is getting better with cooler temps and most loved cloud cover. Man do I love cloud cover.