First Striper Without A Guide

[mchunter]

Yeah, when that thing hit, he took off straight up river. The drag was singing! Don't know how long it took to get him in, but it was a while. Took me forever just to lip him once he was wore out enough to bring him in close. I didn't have my net with me. I just new my line was going to wear out on the eye before I got him in. I usually retie every five trout or so, when using 2 lb. line, but this thing put it through the work of a lot more than 5 trout!

[On The Fly 6]

Ill be down there this weekend. If the Striper are hanging out then Ill bring something other than my 4wt. Nice fish!

[mchunter]

I went down last Friday morning about 4:30am to try it before daylight. Only fished for an hour or so, because the rain ran me out and then had to be at work at 8:00. I caught one trout, had a few more on, two striper (2.5 lb and a smaller one), and one sandbass. Fishing was really slow for the trout. That was the first time I had tried it down there before daylight, though. Good luck this weekend!

[FlyfishinOK]

I'll be going down Sat morning early. I'll be at Marvel's with some friends. We are going to go after some striper out of our kayaks between Marvel's and Gore landing...hopefilly.

[Nick Williams]

I'm curious for all of you that are chasin Stripers, are you guys taking spinning tackle out or a fly rod?

[FlyfishinOK]

I usually take both

[mchunter]

I spoke with a worker in the fly fishing dept. at Bass Pro a few weeks ago and he was telling me about catching some really nice stripers (12 lb) somewhere down around the area you are going FlyfishingOK. He was using a fly rod and big streamers right around daylight.

I'm pretty much a trout fisherman and like to use a spinning rod, but do fly fish some. I go over to Beaver Lake to striper fish once in awhile. I have resorted lately to only using a guide, because I haven't been able to figure those stripers over there out on my own. The stripers I have caught on the Lower Illinois were just by chance while trout fishing. Good luck.

[Nick Williams]

I think I'll be heading tomorrow morning as well, not sure where I'll post up though.

[mchunter]

Man, you guys are sure making me jealous! I would sure like to go tomorrow too, but the job rules tomorrow. Oh well, it's overtime. Maybe next Saturday.

[FlyfishinOK]

Didn't get down to the river until about noon. Caught a few smaller stripers up to about 7 lbs. All caught sub-surface. Couldn't get a top water bite. They started releasing 1800 cfs around 3:30 and the striper were more actively running the shad to the surface for about the first 45 min.