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 down to the Falls of Ohio in search of rough fish.

Then we're going to find out how to keep your hunting dog healthy from a veterinarian.

But first, we're going to jump in the boat with the 2025 high School Bass Fishing State champions.

2025 high school bass fishing championship wrapped up, and again, Muhlenberg County takes first place.

But this year was a little different, wasn't it?

Yeah, it was a little different this year.

You know, they decided to move lakes.

Usually it's hosted here on Kentucky lake.

Voted to move it to Lake Cumberland.

It's totally different.

It could not be more different lakes in the same state.

I mean here you've got big water and big.

You got a lot of shallow, you got channels, you got a lot of current.

You get out on Lake Cumberland, you get too far off the bank and it's 150ft deep.

You guys were able to locate some fish, but man, it really came down to the absolute last second, didn't it?

That's right.

And it's happened several times.

You know, in the past for us.

And I kept telling the boys, you know, that's that's part of our motto is we're going to give 110% to the last minute, you know, and it happened that way, you know.

So fish new waters, as you know, it's, it's a challenge.

But we took what we've all been taught and what I've been teaching and just use that similar, kind of technique down there on Lake Cumberland.

We had a 13 inch spot we caught first thing that morning and could not get rid of all day.

And we had a large mouth, literally right at 15in.

Dillon lost probably the biggest fish I've seen since I've been on Lake Cumberland.

About a 4 to 5 pound smallmouth.

And come up and jumped off about two hours left to go in the tournament.

No!

That would have won won us the tournament if we would have had that fish.

And so it was really quiet.

So there at the last little bit, I kept encouraging my guys, you know, don't give up.

Don't give up.

Keep going, keep going.

And, catched two 18 over 18 and smallmouth in the last, you know, ten minutes and, you talking about some excitement.

You got.

Let's go.

Wow.

It's small.

Yeah, it's number four.

Let's go.

Number four.

Yeah.

That's right, baby, let's go.

Oh, wow.

Oh.

Let's go.

Come on we go.

Yeah.

And what was your total weight?

We had, right at 26, I think two.

Literally.

You unhooked it buttoned up and off to the weigh station you went.

One cast can take you from maybe not last to first, but it could take you out of the top ten to the first.

Yep.

And, so to see you guys stick with it and see the energy was really cool.

See if we can't catch a couple fish.

There's one.

leaned into him.

Seems like a pretty good one.

No, drag█s just loose.

All right, that's it.

I've seen enough.. Got it good.

There you go.

On the minnow.

There we go.

Oh, boy, I don't.

Yeah.

It feels good.

Oh, this is a good one here.

Decent.

Felt good.

decent three point.

Yeah.

Choked it.

Kentucky Lake█s coming back.

He's saying throw left to the- right of the pointer.

Right.

Kind of up by that green pad.

That's right.

There's one.

Oh!

Oh, here we go.

We found ‘em now.

Yeah, we are fired up.

A pretty good, good fish.

Yeah.

You got me.

I got him off.

Oh, a brown good fish.

That's a good fish.

That█s a good one.

Oh, yeah.

Man, that is it.

Choked it.

That's a good fish.

Uh oh, two.

Gottem fired up.

Oh, here we go.

Here we go.

We got ‘em fired up now.

Get your crank bait out.

Yeah.

Smallmouth.

You got a smallmouth?

Yeah.

Oh.

Well, Dylan congratulations.

2025 state champion.

So you and your partner have been partners for several years now?

Yeah, we were partnered up last year.

Been friends before that since about sophomore year.

Was it you or Chase that caught the bass in the last second to the tournament?

That was me.

It was you.

Okay, so it was you also who accidentally missed one right beforehand, right.

So did you feel the pure redemption by throwing that fish?

Absolutely.

Did you think okay, this is going to be enough to do it?

Or did you think, man, we still might be shy?

What was your thoughts?

I still thought we were going to be a little shy, but I knew it was gonna be close.

What are your plans now?

This next fall, I plan on going to Murray State University.

Oh.

I thought I had a bite.

Plan on majoring in electro mechanical engineering.

Okay.

And then I'm gonna try to fish on the bass fishing team as well.

Okay, so you're going to continue fishing, and you're going to go for it to be an engineer.

Yeah.

Well, I'll tell you, congratulations on the state championship.

Thank you.

And good luck at Murray State.

We'll be watching for you to see how you do.

But, you know what?

Fishing█s something you can do for the rest of your life.

That's right.

You can be 80 years old out here.

Bass fishing and catching fish with your Carolina rig.

That thing's been around that long, and it'll be around when you're that age.

So.

What do you got over there, Dylan?

Oh, yeah.

Aint too bad.

Two pounder?

There you go.

There you go.

Nice fish.

All right.

You gottem eating.

So, Chase, it's been about a month since you won your state championship here bass fishing.

What's next?

We gt, we're actually leaving in two days to go to the high school national championship in Oklahoma at Grand Lake.

Okay.

Now, do you have any experience at Grand Lake?

Zero?

Oh, hang on.

little one.

Little one.

Little bitty guy I think.

What do you got?

Nah, he aint very big.

Little bitty.

Small mouth.

Yeah.

Small mouth.

There you go.

There's no such thing as a bad smallmouth.

They're all beautiful.

There we go.

Oh, there you go.

Get him back in the water.

So, yeah, we got the national championship coming up.

It's, June 24th through 28th.

So I'm guessing that, you have a little better feel about fishing a new lake you've never fished befor.

After after the state tournament at Cumberland.

Tell me, when you found out that they were going to move the high school state tournament away from Kentucky Lake, where you spent a lot of time fishing, what was your thought about?

The whole thing was down about it, really, especially me and Dylan, because we knew it was our senior years up coming and, Cumberland is just, I mean, it's a Highland reservoir.

And here we're on the Tennessee River.

I mean, you can't get much more opposite than that.

And, we had never fished any lake like that before.

And so, it was definitely going to be a learning curve.

And, we were kind of nervous about it at first.

Of course, it worked out well for you because you guys ended up winning the state championship.

But what a lesson for life.

You know, sometimes you got to give whatever it takes to win.

You got, you know, whatever the cards you█re dealt.

You got to deal with that.

Even though it wasn't what you expected to come out and to compete and take it to the last second and, and to be able to win.

Congratulations.

Good luck to you at Grand Lakes and the nationals.

If you're the type of angler that just enjoys hard fighting fish.

And you really don't care what you catch, the Falls of the Ohio is the place for you.

Well, I'm right here.

Just steps away from the parking lot of the falls.

The Ohio and Indiana.

This is a place I like to come several times throughout the year, usually in the morning or in the afternoon.

And June is a great time of year to come down here.

One of the reasons I love it is it's so close.

There's always fish here.

And when the water conditions are right, like they look like they are today, you never know what you're going to catch.

I'll tell you what, when I come down here to the river, you're going to lose some tackle.

I like to use a wire that is a little more of a light wire hook, and I usually throw it on, braid it a lot of times.

Allows me to straighten this hook out and get it back now.

You catch or you hook into a 30 or 40 pound fish.

You might regret that decision because you're going to use a lot of drag and hopefully you can get it in.

But otherwise it seems like I'm retired all the time.

Here we go.

We got a fish on.

It's good to get a little practice.

When I get a fish, I really want to get it because this is probably the route they're going to take over the dam and back up.

All right.

Perfect.

Just such a high concentration to Gar right here comes another one, probably.

I'll tell you one thing.

These are rod benders.

Whatever they are, that's a drum That fish actually tried to hit and missed it.

And made him feel a lot bigger because he's foul hooked in the back.

Old drum.

And they are fun to catch.

But after a little bit, they kind of just give up on you.

That was going, he was trying to go up to up the river, getting out of here.

Here we go.

Oh, what do we got here another drum.

Hey, a lot easier to bring in when we're actually hooked in the mouth.

I'll tell you what.

This thing about fishing down here, in these fossil beds, is that every time you come, it's a new experience.

Even though the bottom really in changing.

I've got to figure out where they're seams that are in this fossil beds and Seems are where the water runs all the time.

We've got more water there.

So you might be catching over a seam or just shy of a seam and you got to figure out where that deeper water is because there's a lot of times the fish would be sitting pretty close to that.

Thing is it doesn't give you a real wide area to fish.

So I make long casts a lot of times to fish.

Five or six feet stretch of water and the rest of it's almost too shallow.

So every time you come, it's about figuring out where those spots are at.

And that's a lot of times going to hold the fish.

Man, how I'd love for this to be a sport fish, but just don't have that much confidence.

Tell you what, well, when you come to the river, you got to be ready for anything.

You never know what you're going to catch.

Kind of hoping for hybrids today, but if you just want to get your line stretched, well, these will definitely do the trick.

Now, generally, as a fisherman, normally don't like to see those cormorants or such aggressive fish eaters.

But when you're trying to locate fish, one thing's for sure.

If those cormorants are diving, there's bait.

Here we go.

A cormorant may try to eat my fish right under it.

Another drum today.

It really is rough fish that are piled in here.

And there's not a whole lot of water.

It's kind of not very deep.

And these fish are in here and open and willing to bite.

Well, when that happens, I'm willing to come down here and stretch the line and try to have a day of catching.

Who knows what.

I'll tell you what.

The whole thing of hooking at fish that fight in that current.

Watching it go through the ripples over this Little Rock waterfall here and then it back up the other side.

Pretty fun.

Here we go.

Oh, my goodness.

Thank goodness he got off.

Oh, he didn't.

Not off, I thought he got off.

Oh, my goodness.

I think he got off and hit it again.

Gosh look how aerodynamic those fish are how they can just shoot straight up that rough water.

Actually hook soom bigger than this one today.

But I think it's the first one we got all the way in.

Now I got to find a spot to secure my feeding so that I can grab this fish.

Now, you never want to reach down and grab one of those.

It looks like you got a handle hanging out there.

That handle is covered in teeth.

You do not want to reach down there and try to grab that fish.

You would regret it.

Let me get better.

Oh, perfect.

There we go.

Look at there.

It's exactly what we wanted right there.

Got my lure back, turned him loose.

Hey, I must be living right.

What do we got here.

It looks like another Gar and they█ve been getting off quite a bit.

It's another drum.

I█ll tell you what.

Getting a perfect combination of a rod that will cast a long, long way but has enough backbone to pull a fish like this through.

Takes the right rod selection.

A good one.

It█s a good what?

I don't know.

But it's something big.

Another drum, hard fighting fish.

Man.

As many fish as I'm catching today, this is a perfect way to spend the morning come out and catch a lot of fish.

Here we go.

All right, here we go.

Another drum.

Say what?

These things are crazy.

You got a chance to come down here and catch.

Just tons of fish.

I don't know how many pounds of fish I've caught today, but tons and tons of fish.

It's kind of crazy coming down and being able to do this right outside the city limits of Louisville.

The great location to come for just a morning or an evening walk in and catch fish like this pretty much all day long.

If you're a fan of Kentucky Afield, you know that I love hunting dogs.

And a very important part of owning a hunting dog is understanding what to look for to keep them healthy.

Well, if you're a fan of Kentucky Afield, it will be no surprise to you that we love to hunt using dogs.

I personally own dogs and that makes the experience so much more exciting to be in the field with a dog.

So today I have a professional with me who is a semi-retired veterinarian, as well as a dog trainer, and you just have spent a lifetime around dogs.

Dr. Heye, how are you doing today?

I'm doing great.

So many people own dogs.

But if you're a hunter and you have a dog, there's certain things you need to know about your dog's health and conditioning and nutrition.

So let's talk a little bit about how you should manage that hunting dog, both in season and out of season.

Yeah, it's really important for them to be as healthy as possible, especially during the season.

So you want to keep them that way throughout the year.

About three things that you can really do to help is, feed them well and feed them a good plan of nutrition.

It's well worth the money to use dog food that's been researched and developed by companies that know about and work with sporting dogs.

Another important aspect is maintain their level of activity and keep them in good shape.

You can do that a number of different ways throughout the year, because when it gets to be hunting season, you want them in top flight shape to enjoy the hunt with them.

One way I do it is train them year round and also compete in field trials and hunt tests.

And there's a number of different activities for almost every breed of dog, a sporting dog.

It's fun for the dog and for the family to participate in.

I encourage people to do whatever they're interested in, including especially beagles.

Keep them in shape and if possible, compete with them.

Beagles can put on some weight, especially older beagles.

If you keep feeding them the exact same amount, they can put some weight on pretty fast.

Yeah, well, you have to be careful with that.

The food intake and you might have to reduce it during the off season.

And feed restricted amount and try to maintain their weight.

And there's other things you can take them for walks and swim.

I had a beagle and he swam all the time with my other dogs.

So that's important even in the off season to maintain their weight and throughout their life, that's going to help them live a better life and be able to enjoy the hunt.

The third aspect of maintaining would be the health, and prevention of disease processes, including ticks and fleas, heartworms, internal parasites, and vaccinations are all extremely important to help the dog throughout its life.

I think it's a good idea to visit your veterinarian on a yearly basis and make sure they have a heartworm check and their own heartworm prevention and flea and tick control.

And most of the heartworm medications take care of internal parasites also.

Some of the disease processes when I first started practicing have almost been completely eliminated because people are vaccinated.

But it's also important to check the dog and make sure there's no other problems.

When you get them vaccinated.

Check the heart, check the skin.

You know, check the ears and eyes, and teeth.

That's important.

As well as getting the vaccine.

There's a lot of ways to handle fleas and ticks.

What do you kind of recommend is one of the best ways for a sporting dog?

There's a number of different products on the market, including injectable medications that last six months or a year for heartworms, and flea and tick medications that are both topical and oral.

So it's the owner's choice, and many of them are excellent.

Rarely, if ever, find a live tick embedded in the skin of my dog.

Now, I might occasionally see one crawling on them, but the medicines that are available are extremely good.

One of the other things, if you take a dog out and you work that dog in the field and say it's a 3 or 4 hour hard day of work for the dog and you bring them in.

What should be your level of inspection of that dog before you put them up?

A cool-down period after the exercise is important, and let them relax and walk.

And then you look for potential problems, lameness, any cuts or abrasions, and then watch their temperament and their breathing, their food intake, their urination, defecation, all those things are important to watch for after you train them.

Pretty common that after a dog works that hard, you may get something in there paw.

A briar in their paw or they have a little cut or scratch on their ears because, man, they're all out.

I mean, you think about how I look like sometimes coming back through the woods I'm cut up too, you know, you're so focused on what you're doing and you█re enjoying what you're doing, that a little cut becomes just part of the game.

Kind of the same way for the dogs as well, but they may need your help to help tend to those wounds.

They may need some help.

And if you ever have any question, of course, whether they need additional help more than you can give them, then contact your local veterinarian and maybe even describe the problem and see if they recommend coming into the clinic.

Many of the little scratches can be cleaned up just with soap and water at home by yourself.

And, removing any of the burrs.

Or there's some weeds during the summer that produce some thistle type growths that can be dangerous to the dog too, inhaling them.

And, so that's something to be aware of also.

Any other tips for us dog hunters out there?

Things that we should consider when it comes to training our dogs, both off season and in season?

My philosophy is don't train for tomorrow.

Train for the dog.

If you have a 13 month old dog you want to train for two, three, five, seven year old.

So they learn over time.

Just like going to school, kindergarten, grade school, high school.

And, don't expect them to be perfect the first time you take them out.

It's good to take them out in a controlled situation when they're first experiencing the hunt, and you can control the situation.

So there's not ten dogs running and people shooting everywhere.

For the beagles you can control the situation and have them have good experiences.

As far as working and training a female dog during her heat cycle, is there any precautions you should take there?

Well of course, keep an eye on them.

Most of the people that I work with continue to train their dogs during the heat cycle.

Sometimes train them after training the male dogs so that there's no interference with that.

The question everybody wants to know... male or female dog?

Which one makes a better hunting dog?

Statistically, in competition, and hunt test and field trial, the males are slightly more popular than the females, but it may be just because of the heat cycle twice a year that they're not able to compete during that time period.

So you've had great both males and females?

Males and females.

Me too.

I tend to like the females, but I've had both.

Well, as a dog owner and a hunter myself, it's really great to get out here with a veterinarian and a passionate dog lover and trainer, to kind of get your take on overall dog health and what we should be looking for.

Thank you so much.

You're welcome.

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

Check out this beautiful sunfish and this proud angler, Andrew Ryan.

He shows us what he caught while fishing at Williamstown Lake.

Nice job.

Wayland Goodwin went bass fishing on the Kentucky River and caught this nice largemouth bass.

Congratulations.

Check out this giant largemouth bass that was caught by Jason Piercey while fishing at Kentucky Lake.

This fish was caught photoed and released.

Nice job.

Summer is here and the fishing is heating up.

Head to FW.KY.GOV to research your next fishing location.

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.