Norfork Lake Fishing Report

The Norfork Lake spring fishing bite is in full swing. It is very hard to say what is the current best bite on the lake, but I guess I would have to say it is smallmouth, largemouth and spotted bass. Coming in a very close second would be hybrid bass and striped bass. The walleye and crappie bites are picking up and the catfish are hitting trotlines and jugs. Oh yeh, throw some white bass into the mix and you have the full spectrum of fish on Norfork Lake. Pick your species and go out and have fun. I guess I am making it sound easy, every day has its ups and downs, but I believe this is a great time of year for fishing. Norfork Lake is a very dynamic place right now, the fish are continually moving, the lake is dropping rapidly, the water is trying to clear-up and Mother Nature has thrown in a few cold fronts on occasion to make sure we get fishing changes. After our 11foot rise in water a few weeks back the bite stalled for about 4 days after the rise, but boy has the bite come back with a vengeance.

The smallmouth, largemouth and spotted bass bite for this spring is the best I have ever seen. You can find fish on shallow points as well as on deep bluff lines. Crank baits that dive about 10 feet are catching nice fish. Spinner baits on windy days are working great. Probably the most productive baits are the tube jig, jig and pig, and Texas rigged worms worked slowly along the bottom. Start your baits in around 5 feet of water and work it through 25 feet depths before you bring it up. Crawdad colors of the green to the deep reds are working well. Of course, swimming minnows / grubs worked close to the bottom are also effective. I am finding bass up very shallow early in the morning with some top water activity. If you see the top water action throw a Zara Spook. I have caught many smallmouth this way early in the morning. As the sun comes up I have found the fish dropping back to 10 - 20 feet depthsr. The largemouth and spots are typically in the 10 - 15 range and the smallmouth seems to be in the 15 - 20 range. You can find bass all over the lake. Live bait is working exceptionally well.

The striper and hybrid bass bite are improving by leaps and bounds. Just today one of my guide friends, Tom Reynolds of STR Outfitters, caught a limit for 2 clients in 50 minutes and continued to catch and release thereafter. Tom was fishing the dam area with live shad. I have been catching hybrids and stripers up close to the banks early in the morning with Zara spooks, Flukes and free swimming live shad. After the sun rises fishing with swimming minnows should also work. Live bait is still one of your best options. Drop a couple baits down about 20 feet and also have a few free swimming baits thrown towards the shore. The fish are continually moving and if they are in the area they will find your bait. The dam area has been one of the better bites lately, but the fish are starting to bite in the Bennetts area, Float and Panther creeks as the water in these areas are starting to clear. I am going to concentrate my striper fishing to these areas next week. I will let you know.

Walleye fishing has improved. Several of our bass fishermen have been catching some nice fish off the ends of deep bluff lines with crawdad colored crankbaits. The walleye seem to be in about 10 feet of water. I caught a nice 22 inch 3.5 pound walleye the other morning before daylight throwing a suspending rogue at the ends of docks with lights.

Channel cats are coming into shallow water to feed and spawn. A couple of our Bass Cat guest set a couple of trotlines and were baiting them up with live shiners. They ended up catching a bakers dozen. the best part of their catch was that they ended up catch 4 nice cats on bare hooks. Yes I did say no bait. They had set their lines one evening then a storm rolled in and they didn't get a chance to bait them up. The next evening they went out to bait up the lines and ended up finding 4 cats with no bait. These fish must really be hungry.

The lake level is currently falling about 8 inches per day and sits at 555.84. The Corps has forecast to be at normal pool of 552 by April 22, 2012,  The quick drop in water level will slowly diminish over the next week until the level stabilizes. This will also enhance the clearing process. The surface water temperature yesterday morning was from the mid to upper 60s. This should help spur on some top water action. The lake is still stained, but is having color changes showing the clearing process has started.

Happy fishing and see you on the lake.

Norfork Lake Fishing Report

Early spring fishing on Norfork Lake is starting to take off. Striped bass are hitting during the morning hours and the after dark "night bite" is getting exciting. Largemouth bass and walleye are in shallow water and the crappie should be staging for their spawn. What more can you ask for?

I have been fishing the "night bite" for the last 3 evenings and am catching walleye, largemouth bass, spotted bass, striped bass and the occasional gar. All fish except for the walleye have been released, some at the dock after their photo op, some at the fishing location. We had stuffed fresh Norfork Lake walleye last evening and it was really really good! Some of you may ask what is the "night bite"? The striped bass and walleye are on the shoreline feeding after dark. I have been casting Smithwick Suspending Rogues to the shoreline. I get the bait as close to the shore as possible. Then let the bait sit for about 15 - 30 seconds before I start to reel it back to the boat very very slowly. If you think you are going slow try to go even slower. I have even stopped reeling half way back to the boat to let the bait sit for a couple seconds. I typically go out around 7PM and return around 10PM to the resort. I'm sure the fish will still bite later if you want to fish though out the night. 10 PM is late enough for me. I use a 6.75 ft medium light action rod with a spinning reel which has 8 pound Ande green monofilament line. So far this year, I have been fishing main lake points that the wind is blowing into. Typically you find the wind will lay down after dark. This wasn't the case last night. I fish points in the Cranfield area, Benetts/Fout area, Bidwell area, Float Creek, and have gone as far as the Diamond Bay area. I like to venture out and try different areas of the lake. Last evening was very windy which made it very difficult to control both the boat and the cast. I did manage to land one nice 14.75 pound striper which had a belly on it bigger than mine! I also caught a 4 foot gar, no fight until it was sitting next to the boat then it decided it had enough, it flipped, cut the line and swam off with my lure! You never know what is going to hit your bait. The morning bite for stripers is also starting to take off. Jeff in the above photo landed this nice 28 pound striper yesterday morning fishing in 20 feet of water. I fully expect the topwater bite for stripers to start very soon. Have your topwater baits ready. We carry a good supply of rogues and topwater baits in our resort store at reasonable rates.

Walleye are also hitting at night. I caught this nice 20 inch fish Monday evening fishing the Cranfield area. Walleye fishing should just get better in this area soon. The fish have been spawning. The spawn should be complete soon if it isn't finished already. Walleye will start to move down river to feed heavily at night. Dragging a crawler harness works great or casting rogues up to the banks works for me. There are plenty of walleye fishing methods, use your favorite and it will work on Norfork Lake.

Largemouth bass, smallmouth bass and spotted bass are all up in shallow water early and late in the day. Casting rogues, working the bait as a jerk bait is working. Any jerk bait lure, soft or hard will work. Casting the Alabama rig is also catching fish. It is more difficult to cast and work with, but it will catch fish once you find them.

I don't have much news on crappie as I have been targeting stripers lately, but they should be staging for their spawn. The water temperature is getting right and the dogwoods should start to bloom very shortly. Find brush and fish shallow.

The Norfork Lake water level is falling slowly and currently sits at 552.13 feet above sea level. This is only slightly above normal pool of 552. The Corps is generating heavily to bring the lake back to normal pool. The lake temperature is in the mid 50's. In fact, I found the water temperature would change by 3 degrees depending where I was last evening. The main lake is clear and the creeks and coves are starting to clear, but still a nice stained color exists.

Happy fishing and see you on the lake.

Norfork Lake Fishing Report

The weather has been gorgeous the past week on Norfork Lake. The forecast is calling for warm sunny days with light winds for the upcoming Memorial Holiday Weekend. (We still have a few openings for those last minute plans.)

I have fished the last 5 mornings and have done well. I've caught largemouth bass, Kentucky bass, white bass, walleye, crappie and striped bass. The striped bass are are both deep and also pushing the shad to the surface. The past several days I have been using a spoon and vertical jigging, but today I got into some nice top water action. I caught these two stripers (one 14 pounds and one 10 pounds)on a Zara Spook. I caught these fish on 8 pound test monofilament line. I used my favorite spook, a junior sized one with a white body and chartreuse head. Stripers are being caught in the Fouts area, Float Creek, Panther Creek, Fall Creek, Cranfield area and the Robinson area. As you can see they are throughout our end of the lake.

On Sunday, a father and daughter team (Kevin and Abbie) took a guided trip with Tom Reynolds of STR Outfitters and landed 4 nice stripers and lost 8 others. Tom was using live gizzard shad and caught the fish in 25 - 40 feet of water. He was fishing the Fouts / 6A area. The second photo is of Mary Ann, one of our Collinsville, IL guests. She spooned up this nice 10 pound striped bass suspended in 40 feet of water in the White Rock area. Doug and Mary Ann also caught white bass and black bass both on top water and vertical jigging and also trolled up a nice 6 pound hybrid in the Cranfield area. Another one of our fishing guests (not in a photo) has been catching nice sized largemouth and Kentucky bass. He has also caught several walleye, one 18 inches. Larry loves to use a jig and pig and last winter he made up over a hundred jigs in various colors. He also uses real pork rind instead of the plastic ones.

As you can see fishing has been pretty active lately. For the top water bite you need to be out on the lake before sunrise as the fish start to go deep as the sun gets above the tree line. Even though this morning the striper top water bite lasted until 9AM and was still going on slowly as I left. The top water action is spotty and the fish come up quickly and go back down. If you are in the right place at the right time your spook will catch these fish.

The Norfork Lake surface water temperature this morning was in the low to mid 70's, The lake level is rising slowing and currently sits at 560.18, 8 feet above normal pool. The main lake is clear and the creeks and coves are slightly stained.

Happy fishing and see you on the lake.

Arkansas Ozarks, Norfork Lake Fishing Report

It has been a couple of beautiful days on Norfork Lake, but very, very windy. The wind is supposed to keep up for the next several days with temps in the 80's. Too windy for me to fish, hopefully it dies down this evening. The forecast is still calling for 15 - 25 mph winds.

The lake level is rising slowly at 554.1 which is 2 feet over normal. This warm south wind is warming the lake temp and it is ranging from the mid to upper 50's. Still minimal generation.

I went baiting with one of the guides the other day and learned a lot. But still it is more work than I am looking for, so I guess I will stick with artificial baits, which is my preference anyway. We fished a little, but only got two striper hits.

A group of our guests (4 guys) went striper fishing with a guide and did OK, but not great. They caught several nice hybrids, a couple of striped bass, a walleye and some white bass. The guide was using live shad and was fishing the dam area. Yesterday the same group went to the river with two guides and caught so many rainbows and browns that their arms were starting to ache. During the early hours two generators were running and they caught some really nice sized fish. Once the generation stopped and the river level lowered, they started catching the smaller fish, but got a fish on every cast. They all had a blast. Hopefully I will get some of their pictures and post them later. I believe they fished the White River up from the confluence with the Norfork River.

The word is out from many fishermen that the largemouth are sitting and making their beds. I have also heard that the smallmouth are finally coming up to shore to feed. Soft plastics (3 in. grubs) are working with a slow retrieval. Largemouth are hitting soft plastic, spinners as well as crank baits. I guess you throw what you are comfortable fishing, they are hitting them all.

To all the Basscatters that are traveling soon have a safe trip and see you all soon.