April 6, 2023

***NOTE:  The Fishing Report Blog is back to regular weekly Thursday updates from September-May***   The Rocky and Chagrin rivers are elevated and muddy from rain, but will offer good steelhead opportunities as water levels drop and clear.  Anglers would be wise to monitor the trend in river level at the following links: <Rocky River flow gauge data><Chagrin River flow gauge data> <Rocky River NEORSD station with turbidity>.  Wallace Lake was stocked with 900 pounds of trout on Friday because the river was elevated and muddy.

The Rocky and Chagrin rivers are elevated and muddy from rain but will offer good steelhead fishing as the water begins to drop in level and clear.  Anglers should check the trend in flow at the links above before heading out on a trip to the river.  In stained water it is tough to beat a hot pink or chartreuse nickel to quarter size spawn bag (trout and salmon eggs both work well).  Additionally, as waters clear a variety of offerings will hook fish, including 1/32 and 1/64 oz marabou/hair/tube jigs tipped with a few waxworms or maggots, soft or hard salmon egg size beads, and live and salted emerald shiners- all drifted under a float.  Fly fishers are also catching steelhead as are anglers who prefer to cast spoons, spinners, crankbaits.  Steelhead are currently very well distributed throughout the watersheds.  When water in the main rivers is elevated anglers can check out smaller streams like Euclid Creek (at Wildwood Park), Porter Creek (at Huntington Reservation), and Tinker’s Creek (a Cuyahoga River tributary in Brecksville Reservation.  Additionally, the East Branch Rocky River downstream of Berea Falls and Chagrin River is South Chagrin Reservation since both are smaller and therefore drop in level quicker than the mainstem rivers downstream.  The steelhead run tends to begin slowly tapering off through April most years, dropping off sharply as May approaches.
 
Lake-run smallmouth bass are also beginning to migrate up the Rocky and Chagrin rivers on their spawning run.  Smallmouth bass will strike artificial lures similar to steelhead- such as medium size crankbaits, spinners, tube jigs (dark brown and olive are good) as well as marabou jigs under floats and streamer flies that imitate gobies, ,minnows and crayfish.  This time of year offers a great opportunity to score the "silver and bronze", which is catching a steelhead and lake-run smallmouth bass in the same day, often from the same pool on the same offering!  Lake-run "smallies" are typically available in the streams until early June.

Wallace Lake was stocked with 900 pounds of rainbow trout on Friday because river levels were elevated.  Additionally, the East Branch Rocky River was stocked on March 21 with 900 pounds of rainbow trout between Royalton Road and the ford (river crossing) about a mile south of Wallace Lake.  Several easy access locations were stocked and included the parking area on the north side of Royalton Road (Rt 82) along the river, off the low bridges to the Strongsville Wildlife Area and the Chalet, at the Whitney Road covered bridge, and off the ford south of Wallace Lake.  Elevated flows since the stocking will have distributed fish all throughout this zone with deeper holes typically producing well.  The trout average a little over a pound each. Stocked trout bite well on a variety of offerings, including dime size balls of colorful PowerBait dough, small jigs tipped with a few maggots or a waxworm, single salmon eggs or small spawn sacks, a few kernals of canned corn on hook, and small spinners.  Bait should be drifted close to the bottom or held down in place with a small sinker.  I hope to stock the river again late next week.
 
Throughout winter we stocked trout at Wallace, Shadow, Ledge, Ranger, and Judge's lakes and a fair number of these fish remain.  The majority of the fish were 1 lb rainbow trout, but a good  number of golden rainbow, brown, brook, and even some tiger trout were mixed in.  Note: the daily limit in the river is 2 trout/angler of minimum size 12”.  At Wallace, Ledge, Ranger and Judge's lakes daily limit is 3 trout/angler and the limit at Shadow Lake and the Ohio & Erie Canal is 5 trout/angler.  
 
8^th Annual Barbie Rod Steelhead Derby Fundraiser Recap.  Thank you to the 122 brave souls who ignored the weather forecast and attended another fun Barbie Rod Steelhead Derby fundraiser this past Saturday.  Attendees endured all four seasons in a single day but we still made lemons from lemonade!  We had a couple steelhead caught by anglers who persevered under terrible conditions as well as quite a few rainbow trout at Wallace Lake. Robert Wilmink took first place with a 25.75 inch steelhead.  A close second was his fishing partner Shaun Campbell with a 25.5 inch chromer.  A real highlight was the 3rd place finisher with a 20 7/8  inch steelhead caught by Jason Lawson.  The "coveted" biggest sucker award went to Eric Feckner who edged out his closed competitor by a quarter inch with his 20.75" white sucker catch.  Hopefully everyone enjoyed the cookout and went home warm with a full belly and some of you enjoy the great raffle packages you won.  And we netted a whopping $10,247 for our Metroparks Fishing Fund in the process (we've raised just shy of $50K for public fishing over 7 of these events!). A huge thank you to all our volunteers who helped pull this off, our awesome sponsors, and Ohio Central Basin Steelheaders for hosting the raffle portion.  

Photo Release Waivers for Fishing Blog Photos (fast and easy to complete online).  Photo release waivers for photos sent in for the fishing report can easily be completed online through Smart Waiver (takes only about 30 seconds to complete) at the following link: <Smart Waiver link>. You only need to do this one time and any future additional photos submitted are already covered.

If you have a photo that you would like to contribute to the fishing report, or if you have any further questions regarding fishing in the Cleveland Metroparks, you may contact Aquatic Biologist Mike Durkalec at (440) 331-8017 or [email protected] .

Tight Lines,
Mike
 

A huge congratulations goes out to Jason Lawson who caught his FIRST STEELHEAD EVER on a kid fishing rod and under far from ideal river conditions!  He took third place out of 122 competitors in the 8^th annual Barbie Rod Steelhead Derby fundraiser held on Saturday, to boot! (photo courtesy of Jason Lawson).




Vinny gives a thumbs and smile in approval of this white sucker from the Rocky River.  Then he followed up the next day by upsizing to a steelhead.  Great job, Vinny! (photo courtesy of Brian DiGioia).



Brent shared “I’m just astounded by how large these fish have been this year!” (photo courtesy of Brent ONeill).



Adam caught the biggest non-steelhead trout in the Barbie Rod Steelhead Derby with this beautiful 17.25” golden rainbow trout from Wallace Lake (photo courtesy of Adam Martin).



Josh and friend made the most of an elevated and muddy river on Saturday’s event and still had a great time.  He also won the biggest raffle package of the event! (photo courtesy of Josh Sommers).







Matt shared “Made it back to the river finally. The size of the fish this year is unbelievable.” (photos courtesy of Matt Ohly).





Thank you to the 122 brave souls who ignored the weather forecast and attended another fun Barbie Rod Steelhead Derby fundraiser on Saturday.  Attendees endured all four seasons in a single day but we still made lemons from lemonade!  We had a couple steelhead caught by anglers who persevered under terrible conditions as well as quite a few rainbow trout at Wallace Lake. Robert Wilmink took first place with a 25.75 inch steelhead.  A close second was his fishing partner Shaun Campbell with a 25.5 inch chromer.  A real highlight was the 3rd place finisher with a 20 7/8  inch steelhead caught by Jason Lawson.  The "coveted" biggest sucker award went to Eric Feckner who edged out his closed competitor by a quarter inch with his 20.75" white sucker catch.  Hopefully everyone enjoyed the cookout and went home warm with a full belly and some of you enjoy the great raffle packages you won.  And we netted a whopping $10,247 for our Metroparks Fishing Fund in the process (we've raised just shy of $50K for public fishing over 7 of these events!). A huge thank you to all our volunteers who helped pull this off, our awesome sponsors, and Ohio Central Basin Steelheaders for hosting the raffle portion.