Northwest Fishing Reports

Had a chance to hit Okeechobee a couple days after the hurricane passed through. It was windy and a little tough to fish but ended up with 8 bass all 2-3 lbs & this thing. It is a mudfish, which I've never heard of before.

with a tail like that i bed it had some power behind it!

Hah! I fished there before, about 14 years ago. We stayed at Roland Martins Lodging. That's about all we caught, dog fish and 2-3lb bass.
The mud fish or dog fish is a bowfin. They're hardy fish and they kind of look like snake heads, wonder if they're related, they can survive in very muddy water with little oxygen. I remember wasting a lot of shiners on them and gar down there.Was a little weird fishing with the alligators. I heard the place rebounded recently.

It fought pretty good. Kinda thrashed around like a bulldog for awhile. My guide caught some bigger fish maybe 5lbs or so. He was using swimbaits. I opted for a plastic worm which might have been why I got the smaller fish. Definitely a great experience though. Saw one alligator briefly rustling around in the weeds.

Yeah, they hit really hard and like you said thrash. Almost like a death roll at the end. We had them in Michigan as well, but they really thrive in Florida.

Did you fish anywhere else down there?

Nope, just at Okeechobee, kind of a last minute thing as I was vacationing in Lauderdale. Definitely interested in heading back down someday and trying the everglades around springtime.

I fished the Everglades as well, unfortunately there was a cold snap a that time. I really wanted to catch oscars, we ended up catching small bass.

If your down at the Everglades, you should try some saltwater fishing. I always wanted to try snook and redfishing, not sure how good it is in the spring.

I used to catch huge bowfish over 20 pounds fishing for channel cats in the rivers in north and south carolina.