CLEVELAND, Ohio — Taking the family on a fishing adventure will be surprisingly easy, and conveniently close to home on Friday and Saturday, June 19-20. That is the annual Family Fishing Weekend hosted by the Ohio Division of Wildlife, and fishing licenses won’t be needed.
Good fishing waters will be waiting, as well. The wonderful summer fishing is in full swing all around northern Ohio, and the Cleveland Metroparks will be sweetening the experience with more than 3,000 farm-raised channel catfish.
The timing is excellent, and the catfish should be cooperative in the small waters where they will be released. There are also a lot of catfish and rainbow trout still swimming in Wallace Lake and the Ohio & Erie Canal ponds from recent stockings.
In the coming weeks, smaller waters will come into play. Receiving the feisty catfish will be Shadow, Ledge, Judge’s and Ranger lakes in the the Metroparks system, as well as the newly renovated Strawberry Pond in the North Chagrin Reservation.
“Catfish are family friendly,” said fisheries chief Mike Durkalec, with a laugh. “All it takes is some light spinning or spincast tackle, a small hook and some worms. Just fish the live bait along the bottom, or close to it.”
The catfish will be 1-3 pounds in size. Being farm-raised, they’re healthy fish to have for dinner.
Bring on the hush puppies and coleslaw.
Lake Erie settles down, walleye perking up: The recent nor’easter that pounded the Ohio shoreline and shut down the Lake Erie fishing — and the Walleye Festival in Port Clinton — has since been blunted by Port Clinton city crews, and the Ohio Department of Transportation.
The three to five feet of water in Port Clinton’s Waterworks Park was quickly pumped back into Lake Erie and the Portage River, and a flooded downtown was back on its feet two days later, hosting its unique outdoors Music on Madison summer series on Thursday through Sunday.
The Walleye Festival — Part 2 will be held Friday through Sunday, including the Skipper Bud’s Fishing Derby at Derby Pond in Waterworks Park at 12:30 p.m.
Lake Erie fishing reports good again: The muddy waters found around the Lake Erie Islands and all of the way to the Cleveland area have quickly cleared, but the walleye have changed their feeding activity.
The clearest waters have been high in the water column, with the top 10 to 15 feet attracting most of the baitfish and the walleye that are feeding on them. The near-shore areas have been good, but fishermen have had to release a lot of sheepshead in order to put a six-fish limit of walleye in the cooler.
While big walleye are lurking, large schools of walleye stretching just an inch or two less than the 15-inch size limit are hungry and biting.
The top tactic has been to troll spoons behind 40 Jet Divers, running the diving planers about 40 feet behind the boat. The small Stinger Scorpion and Junior Silver Streak spoons have been the top lures, with Bandit and Reef Runner minnow-style plugs also scoring.
Mosquito Reservoir bass still biting: The walleye fishing at Pymatuning Reservoir has been good in recent days, but the bass fishing is dominating the fishing at Mosquito Reservoir. The veteran bass anglers are casting topwater baits in shallow waters, with buzz baits and frogs working best early in the day.
The walleye being caught at Mosquito are generally being hooked while casting Shad Rap lures and various jerk baits once the sun goes down, and to keep casting until about 1 a.m. Some walleye are hanging around the weed beds, and will take a jig tipped with a nightcrawler worked slowly through the weeds.
Start planning the fishing trip: Dan Pribanic of Chagrin River Outfitters is offering a wide range of summer fly fishing trips from the American West to the Smoky Mountains and Alaska. He reminds anglers if they’re planning an adventure, plan early and get the needed gear as soon as possible.
Just about every industry is facing supply chain issues, he said, and fly fishing and other angling gear are no exception. If the specific gear is not in stock, it may take a while longer to get it than in the past.
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