Quillback

A couple of weeks ago they were in some of the coves in the dam area on top early, but I have not been back there since then. Might try it later this week if there's a calm morning.

Thanks for the warning, I have an E7 that I picked up about a month ago, so far no probs, but it obviously bears watching.

My beans are now starting to bloom, I'm trying the purple variety this year. Planted several Patio tomatoe plants in containers, plants are doing well, and some small green tomatoes are starting to show. Got some crooked neck squash plants that are getting some of that gray mildew or whatever it is on the leaves. Don't know what to do about that. Cantaloupe is slow this year, but maybe with this hot weather they will take off.

Personally I think the next record will from the Columbia river. What's not mentioned in that article is that they used to stock rainbow trout in Greers, which fed the big walleye, no more rainbows in Greers, plus the added pressure and the huge walleyes are gone, probably for good.

Excellent! Looks like a lot of fun, nothing beats catching bass on topwaters.

Crappie are always welcome in my frying pan Here's a link to the walleye management plan for ADFG. It's somewhat out of date (2003), but it has some interesting historical stuff about walleye. In the appendix there's a cost breakdown on walleye rearing at the hatchery. It's very inexpensive, especially when you compare it to the cost of raising trout. http://www.agfc.com/pdfs/fisheries/mgmtplans/walleye_saugeye_plan.pdf

There are paddlefish in Beaver, I remember a few years ago the state record, 105 lbs I believe it weighed, was caught in Beaver. Accidentally snagged by a guy fishing for stripers. I think you're right about the alligator gar and sturgeon being gone. As far as the walleye, I see walleye as being a "catch and keep" fish rather than a catch and release fish like bass. And if the state is going to keep stocking them then they might as well lower the slot to something more reasonable. They gotta raise something in those hatcheries, right?

I caught 3 walleye Tuesday on plastics while bass fishing, none were keepers. I'm with JEB, they need to lower the slot to 15 or 16 inches. If you get the Benton County newspaper there's a walleye story in today's outdoor section, guys were bass fishing and caught several walleye including keepers. The article also mentions that 100,000 walleye fingerlings were released in Beaver last month by the state.

That's funny, I am thankful I can fish during the week now, the weekends, especially 3 day weekends, are crazy out on the water. Glad to hear you got a good mess of fish.

Went out in JEB's boat today, and he got this 4 lb. fish on a topwater about 5 minutes after we launched. Then a while later he got this 3 lb fish. The somewhat later in the morning, he pulled in yet another 3 lber! And he caught several decent fish in the 1 -2 lb range, it was his day to rock! I was happy to be along and learned a few things. As far as the fish yours truly caught, well here is a typical example: It was a great day to be out, and thanks John for having me on board!

Sorry Chris, I did not get the temp. I did see a lot of gar on some of the rocks, I guess they are spawning now. I've heard you can catch cats fishing around the rocks with shrimp under a bobber when they are spawning. Never tried it myself, but I bet it would be fun. I don't really know where those rocky areas are, I have heard the Sailboat bridge rip-rap can hold them, but's thats about it as far as I know.

That's some great fishing!

Horse creek cove was where the whites were today, near Rabbit island. A couple of guide boats were spooning for them, 3-4 guys in each boat and every time I looked over at them, sombody was swinging a fish into the boat. They were thick on the fishfinder. I did not have any spoons with me as I was planning to fish for black bass, but I threw topwaters at some whites busting shad and caught 8-10 doing that. Kept 6 for the fryer. Nice 1-2 lb fish. I did catch one black bass on a jig, but I threw the c-rig quite a bit on points and could not get bit.

Hey bferg, there always seem to be a few around the Honey Cove area which is south of the dam, if you can get there at dawn on a calm morning you should see fish busting shad, at least they have been doing it the last few weeks and hopefully will continue for a while. Surprsingly the smallies will be out there in the deep water with the Spots. There's also stripers, whites and hybrids busting shad there early in the AM. After the top water bite ends, I guess you should work the banks and points with C-rigs and jigs, but that did not work for me last time I was out.

Business end of a 3 lb smallie I caught last week on a topwater.

How far are you from Grand Lake in Oklahoma? It's a great catfishing lake, I usually do best in September/October fishing main lake flats slow drifting fresh shad on the bottom. August can be good also. Lots of blue cats which are really good eating. I hear you can catch channels in late May when they are spawning by drifting shrimp under a bobber in rip-rap areas. Never tried it myself, but might give it a shot this year.

Fished Lake Windsor this morning, started off real slow, only one dink by 11 AM. Finally found some fish after that on a c-rig, caught 8 total, biggest about 2.5 lbs, the rest were 12 inchers.

I imagine they will drop it once they move the water out of Table Rock, especially with no rain in the forecast. Have you been down by Hickory Creek? I am wondering what the water looks like down there? Or around Monte Ne? Chocolate milk?

Much bigger than any I caught. http://www.lagrandeobserver.com/News/Local-News/Another-monster-kokanee-caught-at-Wallowa-Lake

Fished Lake Windsor with JB yesterday, we caught about 12 bass, biggest in the 3 lb range. Caught them on quite a few different rigs, topwater, lizards, worms, and c-rigs. Looks like most of the bass are off their beds.

Nice fish! Thanks for the report.

I like to work a popper fast myself, but I'm no expert. The water up by the dam isn't quite as clear after the rains. My mistake yesterday was not getting there early enough.

As you can see I got these two at the same time on a surface popper, decent fish also, 1 was about 1.5 and the other 2 lbs. And when I brought these 2 guys to the boat they had a couple of other spots still trying to grab that plug. For you striper guys, lots of stripers busting topwater, I did not get there early as I would have liked so I only managed to catch the tail end of the surface action, but the stripers were really busting the shad, only problem was they would show up in one spot about 100 yds away and as I moved over there on the trolling motor they would go off somewhere else, really frustrating.. I did manage to hook up on 2 stripers on the redfin, but both spit the hook. One was a pig, sorry to have lost it. Could not get much of a bass bite, threw grubs, worms, topwaters and only managed a few dinks.

Great pics, good to see some folks having fun fishing!

Seems like the worst thing you can do is jerk it when they blow up on it, it's almost a reflex action for me, I try and tell myself to not jerk if I don't feel a fish and just keep retrieving it because they will usually come back for it if they miss it. There can also be several fish at once trying to grab it, the second hit you get after missing that first one could likely be a different fish. This spring when I'm in clear water whenever I get a fish on on the topwater it's not unusual to have 4 or 5 of his buddies follow him to the boat and try and grab the lure out of his mouth. If I could just keep my arm from yanking that pole on a blowup I could catch more fish. Just can't keep from giving it the yank.