Late October Fishing at Rocky Fork

Date: <2024-10-26 Sat>

It was a fantastic Saturday for being late October, went out to Hillsboro Ohio to get some fishing before the weather gets too cold. Caught a nice catfish:

Because it's late October, the sun sets early and the water temperature varies greatly. The strategy is to hit the spots that have direct sun. There was a nice flat that was around 12ft, in the water rippled from all the shad feeding. This was a good sign the larger predators (catfish, bass) are lurking nearby.

The water temperature makes all the difference for fish, because they're cold blooded. At 4pm and out of direct sun the water was 50°F, on the flat with direct sunlight it was 52°F. The 2 degrees makes all the difference. It was visible just from seeing all the commotion from the shad.

After catching a few shad for bait, using a cast net, we prepared 3 lines to catch cats. Each line had 2 hooks, one being a shad's head, the other it's body (RIP).

First catch was a nice sized channel catfish, shown above. It was a great catch and took us by surprise. It's obvious that it's getting late in the season, for this cat was slow. At first we thought the line was snagged, but it in fact was a catch.

Caught a second catfish and a small bass afterwards. All in all a great fishing day for being late October. Once the sun set it was time to leave. Hillsboro is a small Ohio town with a quaint main street. Caught the Penn state game at 7pm at The Patriot Public House, which has fantastic bourbon smoked wings. Seriously some of the best wings out there.