The Queen of All Shortheads

In 2015 I caught a 4-pound Shorthead Redhorse (Moxosoma macrolepidotum) that would have been a new Illinois state record if I had stopped fishing, found a store with a certified scale, and got it weighed. I missed the record by just 1/100 of a pound. The state record, 3.74 pounds, was set in 2008 by Andrew Chione, whose brother John had set the Silver Redhorse (M. anisurum) record the day before. I wrote about them… Continue reading

Flying Gar Feeding Frenzy

500 miles. 24 hours. Infinite fish. On a Mission On the last day of the 2017 NANFA convention in Missouri, I drove several hours to fish some waters in the southeast corner of the state, led by Tyler Goodale, one of the fishiest people in MO. In the other car were a couple other NANFA members on a mission to capture (with dipnet and seine) some darter and sunfish species. My mission was to cast… Continue reading

Another Gar and Roughfish podcast to download (not me this time!)

Want to hear what it means to talk without ambiguity about something you really love? Doing his part in our ongoing effort to storm the halls of fishing power and supplant the trout and bass overlords, Garman appeared recently on the same public radio outdoors show I was on a couple weeks ago. He is much more entertaining than I was. I promise. Download it here: Thanks again to Dale Bowman for the coverage and… Continue reading

Catching gator gar, making history

In 1966, at the very southern tip of Illinois, a 7 foot, 150 pound alligator gar was caught on hook and line. There are no records of any being caught (by any method) in the state after that. 1966. Three  years before I was born. No one had been to  the moon yet. Computers that couldn’t even send offers of cheap Canadian pharmaceuticals or display low-resolution pornography were the size of Econoline vans and required… Continue reading

Two brothers, two days, two Illinois state record redhorses

This story is a few years old (the following is based on Dale Bowman’s report in the Chicago Sun-Times on May 14, 2008, linked below), but it’s a beauty: Brothers Andrew and John Chione were fishing the Fox River west of Chicago in 2008 for carp, catfish and anything else that would bite. On April 24th,13-year-old John caught a 25.5 inch, 6.71 pound silver redhorse, got it weighed on a certified scale and had the… Continue reading