I was out Wednesday morning chasing cats upstream of Stillwater. The weather was beautiful, winds calm and water flat as glass, river is stable at 675.4′ and the water temp was 76 degrees.
There were shad pods everywhere on the river. They are still small but it won’t take them long to turn into those nice 3″ to 4″ shad all the fish love. You could see fish popping those shad schools all over the river on that flat water. I watched gar, white bass, and smallmouth all chasing that bait as the sun came up on a beautiful morning. I couldn’t find any channel cats though – I know that they are following the shad too. I ended the night with about a 16# flathead caught on a bullhead. With the shad back, the channel cat bite is going to turn on now.
All this bait is going to turn the fishing on. Time to watch the gulls and follow the shad. This is usually my signal to start drifting for channel cats. Sturgeon season is only 16 days away too. So many fish … So little time.