Author: “Ocklawahaman” Paul Nosca with the assistance of Captain Erika Ritter….

A LONG FORGOTTEN FACT! In 1930 the Chipola and Suwannee rivers of Florida were stocked with “government bass” by our ancient “Department of Game and Fresh Water Fish”. These “government bass” were obtained from a Federal hatchery. In 1992 “Ocklawahaman” found an account of this long-ago fish stocking while examining the State of Florida library archives in Tallahassee for interesting outdoors stuff–and photocopied it. More about these “government bass” later on and you will be able to read the report published in 1931 by the then named “Florida Department of Game and Fresh Water Fish”. Read the full story

Author: “Ocklawahaman”  Paul Nosca with the assistance of Captain Erika Ritter….

OUR NATIVE RIVERINE STRIPED BASS…

Some of my fellow river “bassers” have experienced this type of adrenalin stimulus at least once and haven’t forgotten it yet. You are float-fishing a small river for your favorite black bass species from your canoe or kayak when all of a sudden your spinnerbait has been “intercepted” by an “F-4 Phantom II jet”–which is now attempting to drag you and your vessel into the depths by your own 12-pound monofilament line. Now, if this small river that you are “bassin” just happens to be no further south than northern Florida and is connected to a much larger river, big lake, or tidewater; then maybe you start thinking–WOW, it might be a “STRIPER”! Read the full story

Author: Jason Stutts (Lowhybred09)….

I have been fishing ever since I was old enough to hold rod and reel, or maybe just a cane pole.  I credit my father, James Stutts, for instilling this love of chasing that feeling we all love to feel, the excitement of a tug on our line.  Some of the earliest memories I have are being in a boat with my Dad.  I grew up a military brat so I was lucky enough to fish in many different locations.  But mostly I remember him taking me out on the Chattahoochee River on Ft. Benning, GA.  As a kid, we would usually fish for whatever was biting.  Sometimes that was crappie, sometimes bream, and other times it was my favorite of all fish species, the black bass.  I quickly fell in love with this hard fighting, finicky little fish that gives me that all so right feeling of joy. Read the full story

…..Is it the OCKLAWAHA RIVER or the “Oklawaha” River?
The “U.S. Board on Geographic Names” in 1992 changed the OFFICIAL spelling back to OCKLAWAHA, which WAS the ORIGINAL traditional spelling from 1824 until 1892. From 1892 until 1992 the official Federal spelling had been “Oklawaha”. OCKLAWAHA (Native American for “crooked” or “great” water) is the CORRECT way to spell its name.

CLICK ON PHOTOS TO READ CAPTIONS!!!
Read the full story

Author: Paul R. Nosca (Ocklawahaman)

Florida's Record Bass-sign in San-Antonio, FL honoring Fritz Friebel 20-2 lb largemouth bass caught in May 1923.

Most of us are river and creek bass anglers who fish from a small boat, canoe, kayak, stream bank or by wading. We are into the aesthetic nature of our preferred type of bass fishing and probably aren’t severely inflicted with “big bass fever”. Catching a new World Record 23-pound plus largemouth is likely NOT our usual motivation for going fishing or even anywhere near the top of our “bucket list”. But as serious riverine “bassers”, we sometimes might be a little curious about the dimensions of “monster” largemouth bass reportedly caught by those “other guys” and where they caught them. Read the full story

Author: “Ocklawahaman” Paul Nosca

It was the mid 1960’s. My older brother had already been called away a year or so before by President LBJ–Allen did come back home OK later. A politically inspired boondoggle project known as the Cross Florida Barge Canal, which planning studies calculated would make NO “cents”, was already decimating parts of Florida’s beautiful and historic Ocklawaha River Valley. I was a skinny kid saltwater fishing with natural baits on the Pinellas County coast, sometimes getting there by bicycle or city bus. Then I heard-tell that the man-made ponds scattered around my parents’ north St. Petersburg home had bass in them that could be caught from the bank on “rubber worms”. So after enough lawn mowing jobs for pay were completed, I bought a Mitchell 300 along with a medium spinning rod plus some 8-cent each plastic worms from an Eckerds drug store (10-pound mono, weed-less hooks and split-shot sinkers, too). This was the crude start of my bass fishing addiction. I learned to reel-in those worms moving VERY SLOWLY–“like molasses in wintertime”, ha! This was SLOW fishing but my trophy bass from that era was 23 inches long and reigned as my record “lunker” for a couple of decades. Read the full story

Author: Paul R. Nosca

Nature blessed the “Real Florida” with some 7000 natural lakes but only about 50 rivers.  And very few of those original streams were swift-flowing “spring rivers” such as the Silver-Ocklawaha.  Man in Florida with his bulldozers plus other heavy equipment has created many still-water artificial canals, lakes, Disney World, and the high rises of Miami Beach.  BUT I can’t seem to think of any man-made rivers that he has constructed ever–except, perhaps, for the Deepwater Horizon oily ugly fiasco!  Florida’s gushing springs and spring-fed rivers are REAL priceless gifts from God.  And they provide excellent habitat for several species of bass and other desirable fish along with their forage-base. Read the full story

Author: Rachael Stutts (Smiley)

As a child my poppy took me fishing at the paid catfish ponds. I would always catch the most fish,every time we went. One time I caught so many that my pop didn’t have enough money to pay for them all,so my uncle Michael had to help them clean fish for the whole weekend! This time spent with my family is treasured memories that will last me a life time.

I have always loved to fish but it wasn’t until this year that I became “hooked”. Its really Jason’s fault that I started fishing again. We got kayaks for a wedding gift 3 years ago and really didn’t start using them until this year. My husband (Jason) and myself started fishing this February in a lake near by. I was using a Zebco reel and Beetle Spins® as lures. Needless to say I caught mostly bream, if I caught anything at all. Then we started our river fishing adventures. Read the full story

Author: Blackwater (Bill Prince) ….

Amazingly, we needed only three pounds of bass on our virtual stringer to tie and few more ounces to win if no other team caught a fish that would add weight for them. Of course the other teams would be fishing too, and at the same time we were. The www.Georgiariverfishing.com (GRF) community has an almost year long fishing tourney for us people that are nuts about river fishing. The table below will give you the details on the rules. Read the full story

Blue Moon (Susanne) and I took our first vacation in four years. It was long overdue and much needed. We hit the road around 10 a.m. on Thursday, September 16th and headed to Atlanta to stay and visit with some special friends. Then we arrived Friday afternoon in Charlotte, NC to spend the weekend with our oldest son and his girlfriend’s family. After leaving Charlotte on Sunday evening we made the drive over the Appalachian Mountains to Pigeon Forge, TN. Of course, after doing the usual sight-seeing, attraction visits and eating, we began scouting out trout streams in the Smokey Mountains. We found several promising places to wade and fish for rainbow, brook and brown trout. That will be a trip in the future! Read the full story