Hello and welcome to Kentucky Afield.

I'm your host, Chad Miles.

Join us as we journey the Commonwealth in search of outdoor adventure.

This week, we're headed to Bardstown, Kentucky to fish Simpson Lake for largemouth bass.

Then we're headed to Minor Clark Fish Hatchery to learn a little more about the muskie spawn.

But first, it's May and it's time to go to Reelfoot Lake for some bluegill fishing.

Jeremy, you and I have fished a couple times before.

Last time we were chasing crappie.

We're on Reelfoot Lake and there are a lot of crappie here but that's not what we're going after today, is it?

No today- This time of year, Reelfoot, the crappie fishing, although it is awesome, it gets outshined by these giant bluegill that Reelfoot has to offer.

It's just such a picturesque place.

It's a different lake than anywhere else you're going to fish in the state of Kentucky or Tennessee.

This lake, if you've never been here before, is one of the more picturesque locations and one of the best pan fisheries in the nation.

And today we're going to hopefully find some bedding bluegills is that the plan?

Yes.

We're going to be looking for bedding bluegill.

Now, we had that big storm come through a couple days ago.

It kind of pushed them off the bed.

Now, today, you're going to get a little bit of a treat.

You're going to find out how to catch them when that happens and they get pushed off the beds.

Okay.

We're going to be fishing timber for the most part.

Okay.

Instead of the bed we're looking for limbs or logs.

And they will start new beds on those when they get pushed off of the beds that are on the banks.

Okay.

So what type of technique are we going to use?

There's a million ways to catch a bluegill.

We're going back to granddaddy's way.

It's a bobber in a cricket.

I don't care how old you get when you see a bobber go down.

You are sitting under Eebly bridge in Breckenridge County, Kentucky with Papa, and you█re catching them bluegill.

Oh, man, It takes you back to your childhood, that's for sure.

Let's make this happen.

Let's go out here and catch some fish and get started.

I'm actually excited right now.

Let's get it going.

Let's do it.

A little light wire hook to save you from retying on all day.

Just has his, weight up here a little bit above it.

And then this is just a little slip that stops it from coming down.

And then you see this little this little piece right here allows you to set your depth.

I mean, this is a method that█s been around forever and ever and ever.

Ever.

This is going to be a cool trip.

If my bobber goes down and I'm looking at an osprey or bald eagle, just let me know.

All right, Come on, fish.

Caught one giant right here yesterday on this log.

It doesn't make any sense that bed you can see the holes right there.

Right there's a fish- Fish sitting right there.

Yeah, the fish are in them.

And it's literally right here beside me.

And I don't know why that we couldn't get bit.

And if they don't bite, we will move on.

This is what we're looking for right here.

This about to get fun guys.

Look, look how defined.

Bed, fish.

Bed, fish.

Look at them all.

Bed, fish.

Bed, fish.

Look at that.

Now that's ten to twelve feet, about where them bubbles are.

Right there.

It ain't very far out at all.

This is about to be fun right here.

Now we get them figured it out and get our depth set right.

We are to be able to blister these.

Free crickets.

Free crickets.

Free breakfast.

Oh, there we go.

There we go.

Now that is a nice big male bluegill.

Look at that big old beautiful fish.

Look at him pretty.

He's got his got his mating colors out.

He is covered up.

I like seeing the knot heads man.

When they got meat on top of their skull, they got some thick old back straps.

Man, that is a nice bluegill right there.

That is why you come to Reelfoot Lake when you can- When you can lip them?

Lip them like that.

Look at that.

What a beautiful fish.

That's why you come to Reelfoot Lake right here.

You get licked?

Yeah.

Oh, there you go, there you go.

You catch the giants, I'll just mess with these pumpkin seeds.

That right there is a female pumpkin seed.

She ain't colored up real hard because of being a female.

But you can see the turquoise stripes on her and that big old fat Bailey on her.

She's actually There's eggs coming out of her right now.

she sure is.

I'm going to get her back in there.

Yeah.

Real fast-like.

Here we go.

Oh, this is a good one.

Oh, boy.

Another good one.

Oh my gosh.

That is a tank.

I'll tell you what, that puts a smile on your face.

Look at that rod tip.

Bend.

Bent all the way over.

Puts a smile on your face.

I don't care how old you are or how many times you do it.

Yeah, you can do this every day your- people ask me all the time.

Do you get tired of fishing?

Nope, not for one second.

Look at that.

And there, right there is exactly why.

Just big old, fat, healthy, thick bluegill.

Look how thick they are across the back.

It's just a beautiful fish.

And there's a bunch of them down there.

We're seeing them right here on beds.

You can't see them through the water color.

It's rained and this water is normally stained up anyway.

Yeah, kind of a swamp-like.

Yeah, kind of swamp-like.

But, you, we can see where they're on the.

We can see we're on the bed.

Look at that.

Lookie there.

This is what it's all about right here.

Just come out here and throw it.

Keep it simple.

Keep it simple.

Keep it a little slip bobber.

Throw cricket on the end.

Give them what they want and then just start, catching them like that.

Yeah, you got me a little bit there, but I'm still real proud of that.

Oh, that's.

Those are two great bluegill.

And, I guess we█re going to put them back, huh?

Yeah, let's put them back, man.

Oh.

Tickling it, tickling it.

Got him.

heading out there too.

Now that looked like a fish that was maybe really small because the way he was biting.

And look.

Not really small.

Not small at all.

Wouldn't even take the bobber under the way it was hitting on it.

I thought that was a little bitty fish.

Thought about shaking him off.

Not really, but I thought, wow, that's a little bitty fish.

Can't even take that little bobber under.

And it's a beauty.

Nice big fat male bluegill.

Just one right after the next.

One after another.

Oh, where is that thing going to?

That thing is headed out.

Look at that.

Oh, my.

When I think they can't get any bigger.

And here comes something like that.

Look at that.

That's a nice bluegill right there.

There you go.

Oh yeah.

Oh yeah.

Come here, baby doll.

Oh!

Hahaha.

That might be the biggest one yet.

That is a stud.

I mean, a stud.

I got one.

Got one too?

I got a jumper.

This is a bluegill that you're not going to turn down anywhere.

Oh no.

No man look at, look at the size that.

What do you think that thing weighs?

It's close to a pound.

Three quarter to a pound.

Yeah.

It doesn't get any better.

We█re going to end up being done for breakfast.

Uh oh!

Oh, get off it!

Oh, look at that.

Oh my goodness.

Oh my goodness Chad miles, what did you do over there?

Look at that.

I tell you what.

We made a little move because the wind was so strong.

It was blowing the bobber and our bait.

About thirty seconds later reeled that bad boy and you know what?

We're seeing several down there on the graph.

So I got a feeling that could be some more in there.

Oh, that's a good one.

It looked like a good one.

Yes sir.

Oh, wow.

What a good fish.

I'm telling you.

That is just impressive right there.

Well, I tell you what.

First time you and I went out, you took me to your secret honey hole.

This place is no secret, but it is a honey hole.

That's it.

It's no secret, but it is absolutely a honey hole.

And still, being able to catch fish like this with the boats up and down the bank right here.

Just being, respectful.

Yeah.

And showing a little bit of etiquette.

Everybody can have a great day.

You want to get away and see some wildlife, see some nature and catch trophy sized panfish.

Let me tell you what.

Travel down here to extreme southwestern Kentucky or in part of Tennessee where Reelfoot Lake National Wildlife Refuge is and this is what you can expect.

Thank you so much.

It's been an absolute blast, and there's nothing like watching a bobber go down.

Nice.

Kentucky has a lot of municipal lakes, and most of them are open to fishing.

There's probably one close to you.

Good to see you, man.

Good to see you, man.

Today we're out here in Bardstown, Kentucky, on beautiful Sympson Lake.

I'm here with good friend Billy Parrish.

And, Billy, you live here in Bardstown, born and raised.

Right outside Bardstown and Bloomfield is where I grew up at.

Okay.

So this lake█s about probably 20 minutes from my house.

Yeah, I know you fished this lake some.

There are a lot of lakes, like Sympson lake, across the state of Kentucky, you know, municipal lakes or watershed lakes.

And most of them allow fishing.

And quite a few of them actually have boat ramps.

They're great opportunities to get out and spend a day on the water, aren't they?

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

This lake's over 130 acres big and it offers some good fishing.

Mm hmm.

A lot of good fish in here.

I've caught two hybrid stripes over 10 pounds.

Oh, wow.

You know what I love about these type of lakes is that, you know, gas prices are high.

Everybody's schedules are busy.

Yes.

You'd always like to hop in the boat and run to Cumberland or whatever.

But if you live in a part of the state that you have one of these lakes 15, 20 miles down the road and you just completely overlook it, that pass is probably- You'll save yourself extra days on the water and gas money by just running down there and spending the day.

Well, let's go get started and see if we can't catch something.

Okay, sounds good.

Let's catch a fish.

We got something here?

Oh, a little one.

Yeah.

Well, we'll take him.

I'll tell you what, that thing thumped it, and then my lines started moving, which a lot of times indicates it could be a big fish.

This time I got fooled.

We'll take it.

There he is.

There he is.

Got him?

Yeah.

Good fish here, Chad.

Let me get the net.

Oh, yeah.

Good fish.

Where's your net?

Oh, I got it.

Right there.

We don't want to lose this one.

Oh, my gosh.

There goes my poles.

Did you get my poles?

One went, one went down.

I got them all.

You got them all?

I got them all.

I got the fish and all my poles.

Man, that's a heck of a bass.

You caught that on spinner bait?

Yeah.

You and I just said that we didn't think we had enough wind and It was too bright to be throwing spinner bait.

Well, that's a good one there.

That is a really good fish, Billy.

How many times have you driven long ways to go to a big lake and not caught a fish of this caliber?

A lot of times.

A lot of times.

A lot of times.

So, you know, like I said, sometimes you don't overlook these little spots.

You know, this just happens to be one in Bardstown.

There's a lot of little towns that have watershed lakes like this.

Mm hmm.

That's good fish, man.

You got a fish.

You got a fish.

Oh, man.

He was running with it like he was going to be somebody.

You know what?

That's the third, like the third or fourth bite I've had on this little- this little senko.

And two of them have been this little.

Here you go.

Oh, my gosh.

Yeah, I got a giant here.

Swim bait?

Oh, yeah.

Chatter bait.

I've got a- That's a good one.

Oh, don't come off.

Oh, that is a good fish.

Oh, yeah.

That's a really good fish.

Yes, sir.

Oh, well, he.

I think they're out here suspended a little bit.

Might have already spawned out.

You know that- He's healthy, isn█t he?

That█s a good fish right there.

That's a that's another solid four pounder.

Yeah, I'm going to guess three twelve.

What do you think?

Three pounds, six ounces.

Yeah.

Still good solid fish, isn█t it?

That is a good fish.

Got him?

Yeah, he's not very big, but I got him.

Decent fish.

Another fish right off the wood right there on the old senko.

I've got those little fish dialed in.

You got those big ones dialed in.

Hey, I'll sit out here and do this all day, though.

This is a lot of fun.

My fish need some food to eat, you know?

There's one.

There█s a good fish.

Yeah.

Oh my- it's a good fish.

That's a real good fish.

Yeah.

Get the net on this one.

This is a six pounder here.

Oh, my Gosh.

Look at that one.

That's a great fish.

And he hit it like it was a blue gill peck.

You said you just got pecked.

I barely got pecked.

What do you think that one weighs.

I say four pounds again.

Yeah.

Yeah, a little more.

I mean, that ones a little more than the last one.

Probably right at four pounds, last one was three pounds and what?

You want to weigh this?

Yeah.

We'll see what he weighs.

I do have my scale trained so it knows if it's my fish or your fish, it weighs in two totally different.

I wouldn't doubt that.

4.0.

Pretty good.

Yeah, pretty good.

Pretty good guess wasn█t it?

Pretty good fish right there.

That█s a nice one, man.

On a lizard.

On a lizard.

You got a fish?

I got a fish on a crank bait.

What do you know about that?

Ah, you got a good one.

Yeah, you got a good one.

Probably a three pounder or so.

That's a good, healthy fish.

You know what?

Sun is up.

Day is about to come to an end.

I understand why you come here so much.

Right.

It's an opportunity to go out and have a chance to catch a big fish and take advantage of what█s close by.

Right.

This has been great, man.

I appreciate it.

I've had a great time, like always.

Let's get this one back.

For every muskie that's caught here in the state of Kentucky.

There is a team of fisheries biologists that worked hard to put it there.

I'm here today with Mike Hardin.

Mike, I know you've been with the Fisheries Division for a long time and you're currently program manager and assistant director.

But Lifetime Muskie Fishermen.

Lifetime.

I grew up- first place I ever swam was at a riffle at the mouth of Warix Run Creek.

Oh, yeah.

And of course, that's impounded by Cave Run Now.

And it's also a good muskie place.

We recently just spent some time at Minor Clark Fish Hatchery, which is pretty important for the Muskie population here in Kentucky.

Clark Hatchery is the only hatchery.

We've got two hatcheries and that's the only one that grows Muskie.

So actually trying to reintroduce Muskie into our waters and in greater numbers kind of started very close to Cave Run Lake how many years ago?

That's a little interesting.

It's 1973, so that puts it at about 50 years this year.

Okay.

So, you know, we ought to commemorate that and go muskie fishing.

I couldn't agree more.

I think I caught my first muskie with you in the boat at Cave Run Lake.

Yes.

That is awesome.

That time of year is not that far away, it█d be time to go try it again.

Here at the end of summer, when we start seeing some cool nights, it'll be time to get out the buck tails and go give them a shot.

So tell me a little bit about what the department does in the process of raising Muskie to be released back into our Kentucky streams and lakes.

We get fish from the local waters, usually out of the tail waters or the lake, and we bring them to the hatchery.

And of course, then we go through the the hatchery protocol to induce spawning.

We're located just below Cave Run Lake here, so we have easy access to the brood fish and we're able to maintain brood stock on site as well.

The females are spawned into a dish pan.

Once we collect the eggs from the females, we'll have a separate crew that are collecting the milt from the males.

Milt is added a a couple different stages during the fertilization process.

Once egg collection is complete for that female we█ll add water that's stirred in for about 2 minutes to ensure that the eggs are fertilized.

Once it's been 2 minutes, we█ll rinse the eggs off with water three times and then we'll add diatomaceous earth stirred into the eggs that is allowed to sit on the eggs for about a minute.

And then where we█ll rinse three times.

Then the eggs are set aside to allow to water harden for about 3 hours after they water harden for 3 hours, we will take the eggs.

We will actually use a disinfectant called ova dine.

The eggs are disinfected and in a disinfectant bath for about 10 minutes and then the eggs are split into different hatching jars and placed onto the hatching battery.

They'll stay on the hatching battery for about 11 to 14 days until they're ready to be pan hatched.

After we pan hatch the eggs, they're placed into trays inside our tanks here.

They will swim out of those trays in 5 to 7 days and they'll go down into the spawn text material in the tanks.

After about 11 to 14 days, they'll swim out of that material and go through what's called swim up, and they'll swim up to the surface.

At that point, we█ll take those fry and we'll stock them into 7 to 9 one acre ponds down here on the hatchery.

After we put them in the ponds, we don't stock fry or like we do some of the other fish.

We grow these out and so we feed them, give them a lot of great care because we're, you know, we want to make sure that we have the most success when we put them in the water so we grow them out with feeding them minnows or goldfish.

And then at the end of the summer, we have two different stocking categories.

We'll stock our streams with nine inch fish, but for our four lakes, Cave Run, Green River, Buckhorn and Dewey like we grow them out to a little bit longer.

You see those in around the 12 inch range and that gives them a good chance of success.

Each year You know, we try to raise 11, 12,000 fish there at that hatchery.

And then, of course, those get distributed across the state.

So it's very important and it's critical to the Muskie.

Interestingly, one of the best streams in those early surveys for Muskie, you know, back in the late sixties and seventies, one of the best streams was the North Fork and Licking River, which now, of course, is the headwaters of Cave Run.

Yeah, well, I say what I know you love.

I know you love the Muskie.

Every time we start talking Muskie, you get that grin and that giggle and you're like, I know you love fishing for them and you know what?

If you've ever had success catching a muskie, how could you not?

I mean, it is literally the apex predator or the wolf of the water.

And I'm very proud of the work that's being done right there at Minor Clark.

Yeah, the work that's being done now and really the foundational work that some of our early biologists here at the Kentucky Department Fish and Wildlife did.

You'll see their work cited in many of the other states Muskie programs as well.

Well, thank you so much for spending your time with us today.

And next time it'll be instead of standing by water, we'll be on the water.

In six weeks.

In six weeks, let█s hit it.

Now let's check in and see who else has been out having fun in this week's ones that didn't get away.

Here we have our old buddy, Eric Taylor, who caught this nice common carp at Salem Lake.

Check out this beautiful white crappie that was caught by John Carter at Kentucky Lake.

Nice fish.

Father and son, Ricky and Kaden Young were able to double up this spring in Hart County, Kentucky.

What a hunt.

For this Memorial Day weekend.

Here at Kentucky Afield, we'd like to remember and honor all of the men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice for our freedoms.

And remember, hunting and fishing on private property is a privilege.

Always ask permission and thank the landowner.

Until next week, I'm your host, Chad Miles, and I hope to see you in the woods or on the water.