Thread: A Good Trip on Lake Ouachita

Had a great and windy day on Lake Ouachita yesterday. We say around here that when you are fishing, "The wind is your friend." Sometimes, though, it's almost too friendly.

We caught almost 50 bass and one crappie, but most didn't make the length limit. We managed to get enough to feed the family:

[img width=480 height=800]http://i1164.photobucket.com/albums/q567/Rich12012/Snapbucket/998EE266-orig.jpg[/img]

Sweet! I love crappie fishing with live bait. We used to do it to kill time while we let 300 trot line hooks sit with crawfish, cheese and ivory soap.

Nice! :headbang: Those are some healthy bass, a lot better than the ones I used to catch out of Lake Jordan over here in central Alabama :boohoo:.

That's a NICE mess of fish Rich! :headbang:

Are the ones above the crappie "white bass"?
What's the limit you refered to? on largemouth?

David, the black bass, both largemouth and kentucky, must be at least 13 inches to be legal on Lake Ouachita. There used to be a slot, and we basically still abide by that and throw the little ones and the big ones back. But on this day we didn't catch any big ones. That will come soon. What we kept were from 14 to 17 inches, all fat and healthy.

Those three you asked about are white bass, which remind me of the bluefish on the gulf. They have a lot of red meat, but remove that and smoke them and they are good eating. We had heard the whites were running up in the creeks pretty good, with some striped bass mixed in. We never found the large schools...those three small ones were it for the day. Whites and stripers (and hybrids which are a mix of both) are some of the hardest fighting fish in these parts, and 20 pound stripers aren't uncommon.

I was throwing a small swimbait. The package says they are squid flavored, and color didn't seem to matter. All I know is the bass bit them all day and when they did, they were eating 'em. They tore up so many I had to put in an order for more when I came home. :boohoo: I plan on trying them out on your shallow water pets when I come down in April. oke: