ohio river madison

[bigcatkev]

Fished the ohio in madison saturday morning and caught 9 big drum "perch" on whole skipjack. They were all huge! Couldn't catch any blues but did catch one nice flathead. The skipps are hitting pretty good at the warm water discharge in madison. I'll get them blue's next week :D

[Eric-t]

How are you catching your skip jack? Only ones I can catch are about 4 inches long.

[Jroc777]

Sabiki rigs or small jigs usually work pretty well for skipjack.

[rodpod]

Caught 18 nice skipjack this evening on the ohio river in Evansville, next to a water discharge. Only fished about an hour right before dark. My friend and I also caught about 20 sauger/walleye, 10 largemouth and about 20 stripers. We were using (4) white 1/16oz jigs about 8-12 inches apart. Almost every cast we caught something and it was fun. The current seemed to be pretty strong today. But this is the second time i have fished this spot so i dont know if it is just the spot. It is where the river runs into a concrete building that is in the river for a water treatment plant, next to it is 2 waterfalls. Heres a pic of the skipjacks from tonight. Try to find a spot where there is alot of current from an obstruction and fish in the morning and right before dark. Good luck!

[holmesridge]

Went out yesterday afternoon(10/28). Caught some good fish. Flathead and blues. Used cut and whole shad. I caught them(shad) using a cast net.Good time,but a little cool.
Look at the bluecat pic. I have never seen anything like this before. I don't know if it is disease or what.Let me know what you think.

[rodpod]

LOL, Did ya step on him? poor thing, must swim in circles. Nice fish, we were out yesterday and we caught 6 fish on the boat during the day. Going out today too. The current is pretty good and the water temp is in the mid 60's.

[BassMassey]

thats crazy........i've never seen a fish like that.........did he put up a decent fight still??

[Brushy Bill Roberts]

I have heard several guys mention "skipjack" Just what the heck is a skipjack?
I have used what we called "creek chubs" which get pretty big. I would catch them on a hook about the size of a small panfish ice jig when I was a kid. Are the skipjack found in the smaller rivers in Indiana? Is it another name for shiners? Help me out here guys.
Thanks, Mike "Brushy Bill" Roberts

[tspergin]

skipjack are a herring, like shad they are a very oily fish and one of the best cat baits there is they hit sabiki rigs which catfish connection sells and they also hit jigs chk out the library there are some good posts there and pics,hope this helps

[holmesridge]

other than the apperance of the fish, I would have never known there was something wrong with it.
Bill, Skippjack look like minature tarpon. I am pretty sure they are a migratory fish that come up from the gulf of mexico. So they run only in the warm months in our area.They are very fast, so fast you you have to catch them a rod. I use sabaki rigs when I target them, but I have caught them on night crawlers,silver spoons, and white twisters as well.

[Brushy Bill Roberts]

I found this online. I guess they also call them "Tennesee Tarpon" Thanks for the info guys, I have fished for catfish my whole life, although it was for something to do during the night while we camped and fished flatrock river for small mouth during the day. I just started concintrating on cats this summer. http://www.geocities.com/Yosemite/Rapids/9007/skpjk.html

[river scum]

we dont have skippies up in the top of the state. i did get some from another member who fishes in the ohio a few times a year. man do the channel cats love cut skippies!!!!!! if you guys can get some they wont let you down for sure. thx again for the sack mike.

[holmesridge]

Went out on the Ohio Tuesday and Today. Had no problem catching shad.
The current has almost went away and fishing has slowed down for me.I am catching fish,but I cant seem to find the monsters.
My buddy Nate, proudly displays a channel he caught today.