Always a hoot when you fish with Knute: Ohio river report
Results of the river trip or "Things are a hoot when you fish with Knute":
The boat had not been started since our trip to Lake Barkley but I figured (erroneously) that it would be better for me to back the trailer and allow Knute to start the boat motor. I gave him explicit directions in the parking lot to NOT USE THE COLD START.
I backed the boat in the water and what do I see in the mirror? Knute using the cold start in his attempt to start the motor. After some yelling and a few words from me concerning his ancestry he finally got it started. Truck and trailer were then parked by me with no problem.
We motored just a little way down river from the launch to catch some bait. Me? No success with my Sabiki rig. Knute caught one Skip-Jack with a small blade bait. We had plenty of chicken liver so we then motored upstream to start fishing.
Knute cut up the Skippy he had caught and used a chunk of the cut bait while we drift fished.
It wasn't long until Knute got hung up. Nope, he wasn't hung up, he was hooked up. It just took a while for the fish to realize it was hooked to come off the bottom. After a nice fight on Knute's light rod he reeled in a good 27 pound Blue cat. I of course, was the expert "net boy".
The current from the upper dam was a little too strong for us to properly drift fish so we went and anchored up below the Hydros.
Now it was my turn. I was getting a lot of bites but no hook ups when I decided to down size my hook size to see what the heck was doing the nibbling down in the deep. My first fish was a fiddler sized channel cat, followed by three good sized hybrid bass. All were caught on chicken liver, all were released.
I really wanted some cats for the freezer but Knute's cat was too big, my sole cat was too small and I don't like to eat the hybrid striped bass.
All in all, a very pleasant fishing trip.
