razorbackfan4life

I think that it would serve the sport better if we cut down on the total amount of tournaments and upped the prizes. I love fishing regardless, but the competitive side of tournament fishing is a thrill. Trying to beat 100-200 other anglers is a challenge. And the reward to me isn't the money, it's the thought that I was the best angler out there during those days. I'm going to go out next weekend since the boat will be out of the shop. Gonna go check in on the smallmouth bite.

I found where Wheeler is fishing via satellite. I'll keep it in the memory bank if I ever want to go fish for jaws on TR. It would be nice if they'd bite the same style swimbait I catch them on Beaver Lake with.

Beaver is a solid lake, especially of late. Glad you had one of those days. Cant beat em.

Seems like all the lakes around the region are fishing the same. The bite is different from one area to the next. You fish an area that looks great and get skunked. You move up one pocket or creek and the bank doesn't look as good, but the fish are biting like crazy. It's been that way on Beaver lake, and even Grand Lake(I just fished there last week.). Good indicator that the fish are prespawn, spawn, and post spawn. You just have to keep hammering away and you will come across them.

Gill would struggle fishing traditionally for an entire tournament. Fortunately he's fishing during the spawn and the wacky rig bite where he's at has been good(it's what kept him with the lead). His live scope ability is top notch and has paid off tremendously both yesterday and today.

I don't know how I feel about them all going back to 0 after making the cut. One thing it does is add more drama. Typically two days after the cold front(tomorrow) the bite is the toughest. With that being said they are in the middle of the spawn so fish should still bite. Scopers will, once again, have a major advantage tomorrow.

Full moon on May 1. Last wave of spawners will be on beds. Will that be the winning pattern? Or will the post spawners feeding up on shad be the winning ticket? I think if the weight minimum is 2lbs then you will see more guys beating the banks up. If it's only 1 lb then I imagine the Kentucky's will come into play. Smallmouth should be a big player. If you can find one of those areas where they are piled in.

Good pictures. I'd be out there but we lost the lower unit on grand this past week. Should have it fixed early next week, I'll try to make it out before the MLF shows.

I was also shocked there wasn't anyone fishing swim baits, for Jaws, with that wind. You can put the trolling motor on high and just fan cast that thing till you find a group.

Thank you TJM I found a post on their facebook page from a few days ago. Sounds like the first round of spawners are up. Which means next two weeks should be gang busters. I've already cleaned the boat, tied on everything I want to throw. Hopefully its a memorable trip. Quillback, I caught my one and only wall mounted fish on Lake Eucha when I was maybe 12 years old. It was 6.45 lbs. Fish was almost big as me.. haha. It was part of the Like Father Like Son fishing circuit that my uncle and I fished together.(Dad fished it with my older brother). I went over there a couple of years ago looking for crappie, but didn't have much luck. Caught several bass though. It's a great little lake.

Great stuff. I told my dad Indian Creek would have been good today. We caught a lot, but water was cooler around Lost Bridge South 57-59. No bloody tails, all fresh fish.

I'm probably going to go over to Grove and bass fish this upcoming week. I cannot find any bass reports online other than the generic ODWC reports. Just curious if the spawn is just getting started, full boar, or over. Water temp etc.. Thanks

I already started noticing some white bass today when we went out. Not every pocket had them but they were mid way back to 3/4 of the way. Never realized that about the buck brush. I do remember it being thick several years ago, just never gave it much thought since then. We caught probably 25 today. 12 keepers. Lost bridge south area. 3 good blacks. one about 3.75 one about 3.2 and one about 2.75. Few solid brownies/meanmouth. That part of the lake is weird right now. Water temp is still running about 57-59. Smallies haven't spawned totally IMO. Either that or the numbers of them have gone down significantly. I fished all my typical spawn banks and half of the fish came in 10-12 ft and the other half were in 3-10 ft. Didn't catch but maybe 15 of them(and I was fishing hard for them). Main lake spawning areas I saw maybe one or two beds with fresh fish on them. Water was slightly cooler there so maybe we were a little early. Got more brown bites in coves and pockets than on main lake(saw a few more beds, but nothing crazy) We used to go out and catch 50 plus during the spawn, so I honestly think they still haven't fully committed. The black bass was kind of similar, one pocket I caught the two FRESH 3.2 and 3.75 and lost a couple more. The next pocket it twas tougher. No rhyme or reason. Maybe they haven't committed fully either. I imagine mid lake towards the river the spawn is full boar or close to over, but up by the dam it just seemed like it's just getting started. At least where I was fishing.

Looks like West Fork got over 3" and Huntsville area was similar. We are currently sitting at 1116.14 which is about 4" higher than it was before the rain started. It appears that it will rise an inch an hour for the next 24 hours. That will put us up above 1118, and 2.5 ft shy of normal pool. Depending on if they start generating or not it could slowly creep up to 1120 after the short term gain. I wish this would have happened in early March, but I'll take it anyway we can get it. I imagine fishing will be really good for the next few weeks before the fish start to transition towards summer pattern.

I saw that. Looked 100 percent like a meanmouth. I grabbed a screenshot of it.

Sounds like a great day! Dad and I drove up from NWA to fish same day. He enjoys Indian Creek so we put in there. Caught 3 good keepers right off the bat at the fork of Big and Little Indian. Shad were thick in and around main channel. But didn't want to scope all day and we went back into Big Indian to try the jig bite. Not even a nibble in 1.5 hours. Tried wart on a couple of banks and didn't have any luck. We caught our 3 on Jerkbait, Swimbait, Spinnerbait.

We went to Table Rock(Indian Creek) only caught 3. Wanted to catch some shallow, but they were MIA. Could have caught more out in main creek channel, but didn't want to scope all day. Should have gone to Beaver.. Thought about it, but had heard the bite was good on TR and I haven't been up there in several months.

That's Arkansas weather for you. Wait 5 minutes and it will change.

I unfortunately didn't measure that 6.2 I caught in early January. But judging by that length chart the fish would have been 8/9 years old. I'm hoping the vegetation can grow more and more. I know it's tough on a highland reservoir due to the constant change of the lake level thru the corps of engineers. Any vegetation that was able to take hold would help the bass growth. Also I've always wondered if they could add a new species of bait fish that like to stay shallow. The more the merrier.

Great pictures.. Looks like I need to make a trip up there.

Appreciate the post! Love those days when you catch the trifecta of bass. Spawn is just around the corner.

I will add to this. Whether it's just luck, or a sign of things to come, I've caught one over 6lbs , three over 5lbs , and four over 4lbs in the past 1.5 years. I've also caught two smallmouth over 4 in that same time period. Two of the 4lb blacks I caught within 5 minutes of each other. There was a bunch of shad moved in a creek I was fishing. Thought I was about to win the fishing tournament, but the Striper nudged in on the area I caught the bass, and the bass just quit being aggressive. I tried everything I could think of to catch one more, but it just didn't happen. Beaver is weird, you will catch a lot of the 2-3lb largemouth certain times of the year, but the bigger ones are harder to come by at those times. Seems like winter up to pre spawn is when they are more available to catch. Which is typical on most lakes. So we know that there are quality bass in Beaver, but not the #'s we'd all like to see.

We went out yesterday to Little Clifty and Rambo. Caught about 15 in 5 hours, but no big ones. There was quite a bit of bait in Little Clifty. Caught mostly Kentuckys. Wiggle wart and grub(scoping). Then the striper moved in like they always do and the bass became apprehensive. We got into Rambo about 11:30 and I caught a couple of Kentucky's scoping moving across a pocket in 60 ft of water, they were down about 15 ft cruising along. One was a pretty chunky fella. Dad caught a few additional Kentucky's on ned rig. Tried the shallow bite and caught a couple of blacks, but they weren't as active as the K's. I didn't find much bait fish in Rambo. Before we left I was cruising around all over trying to find fish on the scope, but there was NOTHING. I think the last hour or so I didn't see a single fish or ball of shad.

I know, and our next full moon looks to be on March 3rd. Could have some early ones. I'll be down at Broken bow that weekend, and last year we went on the 3rd weekend of march. The males were on the beds all across the lake. Caught like 60-70 a day. Good times

Might be an early spawn this year if the water doesn't get much colder. We went yesterday, launched from Lost Bridge south. Water was running 43-45. Kinda shocked me. Bite was good when the clouds were overhead. Then the sun came out and that was that.