Norfork Lake Fishing Report

She said her arms were sore.

Big hybrid and walleye Day 2



Big Bass Day 2 - 5.28 pounds



Big hybrid Day 1

Finding the Big Bass in this limit of fish.

We would like to thank all the Bass Cat Owners who came to Norfork Lake this past week end. We know you were disappointed with the cancellation of your Owner's Invitational Tournament and appreciate those of you that still came to enjoy Norfork Lake. We look forward to your visit each year and are glad you came to participate in our first Norfork Lake Fishing Derby.

We had two great days for our 2011 Fishing Derby on Norfork Lake.  54 Bass Cat boats registered for the 2 day tournament and we mainly had good weather. The afternoon of day 1 brought in a few storms, but it ended during weigh-in. We weighed-in a total of 240 black bass at a total weight of 523.58 pounds. The stringers were somewhat light due the fish being spawned out in the last week or so. Big heads and skinny bodies. They are really starting to feed and will fatten up quickly. The overall winning team of Hannaford/Cooley weighed-in 10 fish at 24.14 pounds and were paid $2,015.00. Second place went to the team of Thorne/Mitchell with 9 fish at 23.61 pounds. Second place paid $1,140.00. Third place went to the team of Moser/Ziegler with a 10 fish limit weighing in at 23.56 pounds. Third place paid $685.00. The Fishing Derby paid a total of 11 places. Big Bass for day 1 went to the team of Stone/Stone at a weight of 4.72 pounds and paid $520.00. Big Bass day 2 went to the team of Drumright/Reihm which weighed 5.28 pounds and also paid $520.00. We also had a couple of fun pots for big walleye 2.52 and 3.33 pounds and big striper/hybrid 6.39 and 7.78 day 1 and day 2, respectively. Hugh Ethridge won for big striper/hybrid day 1 and the team of Hideyudi Manura/Todd McCoy won big walleye for both days and big striper/hybrid day 2. All fishermen and spectators seemed to have a great time and enjoyed watching  the fish being brought in to be weighed.

The fish were caught all over the lake in shallow to 25 feet of water depths. Spinner baits shallow and jigs worked deep seemed to be the baits of choice.

We want to thank the Norfork Lake Chamber of Commerce for sponsoring this event. Thanks also goes out to the Arkansas Game and Fish for helping us keep these fish alive and delivering them back to the lake. Thanks goes out to the Army Corps of Engineers for all the help in expediting our tournament application and with the clean up at the Panther Bay boat launch and at  Cranfield Park. In addition to the above many thanks goes out to Panther Bay Marina for the use of their facilities for take-off, the Lake Norfork Inn for the use of their restaurant for registration and dinner, The Norfork Lake Bass Club for the rental of their weigh-in equipment, Sean's restaurant for providing the yummy food at registration with such short notice.  Thanks also to  the Baxter County Sheriff's Department for providing a courtesy boat at take-off and lie detector equipment and personnel for the final weigh-in. Finally many, many, many thanks to all the Norfork Lake Chamber members that volunteered to helped make this event a great success and a fun fishing derby.

Keep watching for future details of fishing events that the Norfork Lake Chamber of Commerce and the Norfork Lake Resort Owners are starting to plan. They will be a lot of fun with great fishing.

Happy fishing and see you on the water.