Striper Slayer
Active Member
We finally made it to Blue Notch this weekend. The road was in surprisingly good shape! I still would not pull a boat down there because of some of the sharp turns and drop offs but the ride in/out was quite enjoyable. The water was very murky. 6" visibility at best. And there wasn't much water in red canyon. It's LOW.
The carp were spawning EVERYWHERE. It didn't take us long to figure out that pretty much everything was following them around eating the eggs as the spawned them. I tied on a jerk bait and the first cast with it hooked a 7 lb catfish in the tail. (That was fun!) Next cast hooked what felt like another catfish but lost it. Third cast I hooked a Razorback Sucker! By the tail!! (Pretty sure everything was slapping at it and I was snagging them when they did.) That's the first Razorback I have ever caught. We took a couple quick pics and sent it back. We saw several groups of Gizzard shad spawning up against the bank amidst all the carp. Most of the time there were Stripers mixed with them and it looked like they were trying to spawn with the Gizzard shad?? Maybe they were just trying to eat the eggs, but the way they were rubbing up against them reminded me of Joe Biden at a sorority party......
After that we started fishing for cats with carp meat and started catching Stripers. A school would come through every 10-15 minutes and we would catch a couple. The catfish would bite in between Striper schools. Most of the Stripes we caught were skinny, but considering the conditions we were happy to get them.
We did fish Farleys first thing Saturday morning. Water was murky but not as bad as Blue Notch. I don't think the lake has come up enough yet for the river to murk it up. Caught several Small Mouth, Large Mouth and Walleye on Neko rigs and jerk baits there. Water was about a 10 minute hike from the end of the dirt road. You could see where someone had taken a 4 wheeler to the water from where the road ended but it was soft enough we didn't dare try it in the truck.
Only fished a day but it was a great trip! Even being confined to the bank we still caught 50+ fish.
The carp were spawning EVERYWHERE. It didn't take us long to figure out that pretty much everything was following them around eating the eggs as the spawned them. I tied on a jerk bait and the first cast with it hooked a 7 lb catfish in the tail. (That was fun!) Next cast hooked what felt like another catfish but lost it. Third cast I hooked a Razorback Sucker! By the tail!! (Pretty sure everything was slapping at it and I was snagging them when they did.) That's the first Razorback I have ever caught. We took a couple quick pics and sent it back. We saw several groups of Gizzard shad spawning up against the bank amidst all the carp. Most of the time there were Stripers mixed with them and it looked like they were trying to spawn with the Gizzard shad?? Maybe they were just trying to eat the eggs, but the way they were rubbing up against them reminded me of Joe Biden at a sorority party......
After that we started fishing for cats with carp meat and started catching Stripers. A school would come through every 10-15 minutes and we would catch a couple. The catfish would bite in between Striper schools. Most of the Stripes we caught were skinny, but considering the conditions we were happy to get them.
We did fish Farleys first thing Saturday morning. Water was murky but not as bad as Blue Notch. I don't think the lake has come up enough yet for the river to murk it up. Caught several Small Mouth, Large Mouth and Walleye on Neko rigs and jerk baits there. Water was about a 10 minute hike from the end of the dirt road. You could see where someone had taken a 4 wheeler to the water from where the road ended but it was soft enough we didn't dare try it in the truck.
Only fished a day but it was a great trip! Even being confined to the bank we still caught 50+ fish.
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