August 2021

In late-summer, highlight species targeted around Cleveland Metroparks include walleye, smallmouth bass, largemouth bass, panfish, channel catfish, and common carp. To monitor the most recent river water level and temperature you can check the following link: <Rocky River flow gage data> <Chagrin River flow gage data> <Rocky River NEORSD station with turbidity>.  Please note: the Fishing Blog is updated once a month in June, July, and August and back to weekly in September.  

Anglers willing to head north of Cleveland on Lake Erie in 55-70 feet of water are catching limits of walleye trolling crankbaits, spoons, and crawler harnesses.  Also effective once a good school of fish is located is casting and slowly retrieving a weight forward spinner like an Erie Dearie tipped with a whole or half nightcrawler.  More smaller walleye are being caught shallower and anglers are sorting through many sub-legal fish, at times, to find larger walleye.  On any given outing in summer the Cleveland Harbor behind the breakwall can produce a mixed bag of largemouth bass, rock bass, smallmouth bass, white bass, catfish, freshwater drum and sunfish species, as well as walleye.  Offerings such as tube jigs and live minnows appeal to the widest variety of species. 

Smallmouth bass are typically found in the deeper, rocky pools of the river during the day in summer, and often move to the heads of such pools in the early morning and evening hours to feed actively.  A dark olive or brown tube jig of 3-4" length is one of the best producers of bass in the river.  "Smallies" also bite well on live bait (ie: minnow, crayfish, and leeches), lures (ie: spinners and minnow plugs), and flies (ie: crayfish patterns, Clouser minnows, dark brown or olive sculpin or muddler minnow patterns).  Rock bass are also present in the same river areas as smallmouth, and can be caught using the same offerings listed above.

Throughout June, a total of 3,000 lbs of farm raised channel catfish were stocked between Acacia Reservation (1,000 lbs between three ponds onsite), Shadow Lake (600 lbs), Ranger Lake (400lbs), Ledge Lake (300 lbs), Strawberry Pond (400 lbs), Oxbow Lagoon (200 lbs) and Judge's Lake (100 lbs).  Channel catfish stocked in late May also remain to be caught at Wallace Lake and the Ohio & Erie Canal fishing area.  Catfishing is usually best during lower light conditions using baits such as nightcrawlers, minnows, chicken liver, and processed dough baits.  Resident channel catfish are available in the Rocky, Cuyahoga and Chagrin rivers all summer.

Common carp are found in all of our rivers and are among the most willing biters during the heat of summer.  Carp can be caught on canned corn, carp dough baits, worms or crayfish tails.  The key to fishing for either carp or catfish is fishing on (or very near) the river/lake bottom.  In addition, freshwater drum (sheepshead), white perch, and bullhead catfish are also common catches in the northern river reaches (north of Morley Ford) in summer.  For the angling generalist, any of the species thus far can be effectively targeted by fishing a nightcrawler worm right on the river bottom with a sinker.

Summer is a great time for family fishing, and panfish are perfect for a leisurely picnic and fishing outing.  Buegill, crappie and various other other sunfish species can be taken with a number of offerings, with a waxworm or redworm on a small hook (or tiny jig) suspended under a stick float and fished around a weedbed or shoreline brush always a top choice.  Wallace Lake, Shadow Lake, Strawberry Pond and Lakefront Reservation marinas/harbors are just a few of many places in the Park to wet a line for various panfish species.  Largemouth bass fishing is often best in Wallace and Hinckley lakes, although bass can be found in most park waters.

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  md@clevelandmetroparks.com .

Tight Lines,

Mike

Brayden reports " Went down to the Cuyahoga River and pulled in a nice 31" Pike on a silver Mepps 3 spinner" (photo courtesy of Brayden Palus).



Lots of kids have had their first taste of fishing ever through Metroparks summer camps- in this case at Camp Forbes in partnership with city of Cleveland.



Steve has an AMAZING fish fry in his near future featuring this huge catch of sunfish and a few bonus perch from along the CLE shoreline of Lake Erie (photo courtesy of Steve Farley).



Robert made a nice catch of walleye and bonus steelhead off Cleveland (photo courtesy of Robert Eggleston).



Ed caught this slab crappie at Wallace Lake on a live shiner on July 30th (photo courtesy of Ed Schmitt).


 
Popular local rapper Matthew "Reddy Redd" caught this fine largemouth bass fishing along the Cleveland shore of Lake Erie (photo courtesy of Matthew Reddy Redd).




Alan and his wife rounded up a fish fry or two from the Lake Erie shoreline (photos courtesy of Alan Tomko).



Carl caught this fine walleye just west of Cleveland on Lake Erie (photo courtesy of Carl Schweisthal).





Shaun rounded up a limit of walleye fishing crawler harnesses and Bandit crankbaits from his kayak (photos courtesy of Sean Cassidy).



This beautiful largemouth bass came from Beyers Pond (photo courtesy of Sean Johnson).



Denise shows off a fine channel catfish taken from E55trh breakwall (photo courtesy of Denise Persinger).




Sierra introduced her pup Mara to her first sunfish at ledge Lake and the meeting went well! (photos courtesy of Sierra Wick).




Ted and his family have been ejoying the summer fishing- from walleye on Lake Erie to largemouth bass on local ponds (photos courtesy of Ted Choukalas).



Luther displays a nice largemouth bass caught from the pier by the Edgewater Park boat ramps (photo courtesy of Luther Williams).



Dave and friends made a limit catch of walleye out of E72nd boat launch recently (photo courtesy of Dave Pfahl).



Nick caught this juvenile flathead catfish at the pier at the old Coast Guard station at Wendy Park (photo courtesy of Nick Zarlinga).






Victor has been sampling the summer diversity of fish in the Rocky River (photos courtesy of Victor).



We sampled fish at Wallace Lake with a Bay Village school STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) summer camp.  Here this kids pose with a huge crappie.



I recently had a friend in town and we got a three man limit of walleye (and released several) casting weight forward spinners and crawler harnesses with Capt Gary Norman of Dog Pound Charters.



The fish cleaning station has been very popular at E72nd boat ramps.  Ee appreciate folks keeping the area clean!




Largemouth bass and bowfin are among a long list of species that can be found along the Cleveland shoreline all summer.



This lad seems quite happy having caught a rock during a summer camp fishing outing at Ohio & Erie Canal.  Can we say he caught a "rock bass"? (photo courtesy of Jake Kudrna).



Humans aren't the only anglers that frequent the our various waters in summer.  Some are mammalian (mink, otters), reptilian (northern water snake) and avian (kingfisher, osprey, heron).  A local photographer got this great shot of a Great Blue Heron with its white sucker catch from the Rocky River 9photo courtesy of Andrea Nagy).