Advertise with us and see YOUR banner here
Reach more customers with the largest outdoor website group in the region
Hunting Fishing Discussions
subscribe
feed
get widget
Red River Fishing Reports
Regions Covered: Click on the region name for region report, weather, maps, and more...
Red River (North) - Friday, September 16, 2011
By:
Bri-Guy2
on 09/16/2011 08:13 AM
|
Add Comment
|
Post New Report
| 
| |
 |
Fished the North dam in Fargo last night. Had one rod for cats and one for eyes. Had several bites on the eye rod (lindy and minnow) but only landed one nice 15" sauger. At sunset I had something enormous literally pull my cat rod (big frog) off the holder and right into the river! When it was in the river, the foam handle was still up and it took off like a barrel attached to the back of Jaws. I threw a heavy spoon around for a while hoping to catch it, but no luck. Really wish I could've seen that fish. Was fishing in the slack water, so it was all fish pulling that rod in.
|
Red River (North) - Thursday, September 15, 2011 | |
 |
Catfishing on the Red has remained steady over the past week with numerous big fish being caught all up and down the river. They were being caught in faster water near deep water during the daylight hours and shallower fast water as nightfall set in. Frogs and suckers have been the bait but the fish are showing signs of preferring sucker. This recent cold snap has dropped the water temperature 8-10 degrees over the past couple days. It is yet to been seen what affect this will have on the catfish pattern. Places to try are deeper holes, snags, and of course keep working the fast water for the feeding cats. As the water temps level off over the next few days the bite will become more normal and predictable. All signs point to a continued great bite.
|
Red River (North) - Thursday, September 15, 2011 | |
just wondering if there is gonna be a sauger or walleye bite this fall by the dam,or is it still to high,is there a certain height the river needs to be and when do the cats stop biting in the fall.maybe i can make a trip this year yet.
|
|
Red River (North) - Saturday, September 10, 2011 | |
 |
Went to Drayton Saturday afternoon and started fishing a couple miles north of Hasting landing. Fished for about 2 hours and the fishing was slow, caught three fish. Came back in and set up the tent and had dinner before going back out at 8:30. Fished many area north from the dam all the way back to the landing till 3:30 am and the fishing became really hot. We only put four in the boat over 20 pounds, and I do not know how many fish we caught total. Most fish were in the 12 to 16 pound range, but we went through 40 frogs, 6 water dogs, and 6 small suckers (4"-6"). If I had to guess we probably caught at least forty fish total. As of Saturday night a person still could not put a boat in below the dam due to large amounts of sediment on the parking area (probably 12"-18"). It sounds like it will be cleaned off soon though, hastings landing is all clean though and looking good. I was pretty excited to get back on the river, with the water levels being so high in Fargo all summer it really put a damper on my catfishing this year.
|
Red River (North) - Saturday, September 10, 2011 | |
The cats are biting at Drayton, no doubt about that. Shore conditions much improved also.
|
|
Red River (North) - Saturday, September 10, 2011 | |
 |
went to the fargo dam at dike east, used frogs and goldeye, skunked, was there for 3 hours, but I did catch a one eyed frog!
|
Red River (North) - Saturday, September 10, 2011 | |
 |
Birthday Bash on the Red!
Started the evening off at about 7pm and got off the water around 10pm. It didn't take long to find the pattern and we were catching fish left and right! The first couple fish were smaller, in the 10-12 pound range, but after adjusting a few things the 20-24 pounders followed quickly. Redhorse sucker outproduced frog, goldeye, and white sucker EASILY. We camped out in front of a 20 foot hole, and had the best luck in slack water. 2 oz. and 3oz. weights, 8/0 Gamakatsu Octopus Circle hooks, and large steaks of Redhorse proved to be deadly. Just make sure to bring the CLEAR glasses, as the Mayflies are out in full force! Get out and enjoy the bite while it lasts, which should be the better part of 2 weeks I'm thinking. |
Red River (North) - Thursday, September 8, 2011 | |
|
The cold snap of last weekend slowed the catfish bite but the warm temperatures of this week are bringing them on strong. Lower more normal water levels are also making getting around much easier for more anglers.
Fish are coming in most traditional areas with the bigger fish coming in the fast water. Fronts of holes and along channel breaks seem to be the best areas. Sucker and frog are the baits again this week. The preference seems to change from day to day so mix it up until you learn what the fish want that day. Stay on the move and great things will happen. |
Red River (North) - Tuesday, September 6, 2011 | |
 |
Fished one evening from the boat 6-8. Fished snags which produced one 10lbs and three smaller fish between 5-8lbs. All on Frogs... nothing biting on a cut goldeye. Moved about 3 times then went to my favorite hole. Fish were packed in there. I hooked into another 11lb fish and he got in the current and had a good fight. I almost had him off the bottom and the other rod went nuts. I grabbed it and the fight was on. He was in the main current I he ripped line out. So I took turns fighting the fish until I landed the smaller one... did not use the net... and then landed the other fish about 5 minutes later. He as a little over 18 Lbs. Hooked another big one a few minutes later but pulled me into a tree and could not get him out. Oh well.
Went back out the next morning and nothing over 5lbs. Caught about 16 fish and then all the frogs were gone. Now onto bow hunting. |
Red River (North) - Monday, September 5, 2011 | |
 |
Well, Saturday found me on the Red again around North dam, using a floating lindy rig, with fatheads and 3 bites no fish. The water is down and its very fishable, but I only saw a couple bullheads caught and everyone knows I can't catch those. It was windy as all crap but still nice to be out. Sunday found em chasing frogs in the morning, then decided going to need some suckers as well. went to a spot we almost fished exclusivley for a couple years and nothing, a couple of tick tick tick, grilled some burgers and went home. Overall I have had 2 days on the River without bringing one in. Now completely baffled I will venture out again today after work and give it a go again, couple weeks of this weather the water temp should be dropping and fish will put on the feed bag and it will be a slaughter house.
|
Red River (North) - Thursday, September 1, 2011 | |
Spent the last 3 days (mon-wed) shore fishing the red as hard as humanly possible. Made the trek across the state and decided to give Drayton a shot. Got in about 6 pm on monday evening and the place is an absolute mudhole. We found that there are 2 spots that were fishable, and one was already occupied, so we made our way through 5 inches of mud for about 40 yards to get up to the spot. Started out with cut sucker on one line and frog on the either...caught a 4 lber within the first hour, and then my old man lost a decent fish around 10 lbs i suppose. Then about an hr into the night i landed a 25 lber on sucker which ended up being the highlight of the weekend. We fished until around 12:30 and landed 2 more smaller fish in the 7-8 lb range. We were pretty excited about the next day, so we tried our "mudhole" again...what a miserable day it turned out to be. We resorted to throwing some nightcrawlers out just to get some 8 inch whoppers to show our rods any action. Tuesday night as I'm sure most every one knows, turned out to be a windy, rainy night. We braved it until around 8 pm and headed back to the hotel. We decided to stay one more day and hit GF yesterday...We fished from 10 am until11 last night and caught maybe 7 fish total. I caught a 7 and 10 lber within the first 2 hours of setting up and then we hit the mid day lull and went around 5 hours without even a slight nibble. We had our hopes up for the nighttime feediing frenzy but was sad to say that it consisted of 2 smaller cats around 4lbs a piece and then my old man had a very nice fish on that was fighting like a 15+ lber, but she dove under some structure and ended up losing it. A nice finish to a not so stellar few days. I'm thinking that maybe we were a little early in our trip planning, or maybe weather played a factor. All in all we had a good time though...shared some memories...didn't kill eachother..and I caught the trips biggest fish!:)
|
|
Red River (North) - Thursday, September 1, 2011 | |
|
Fished last night maybe for the last time since Bow season is starting. It was nice to see the river in its banks. I fished out of Aber. Boat Ramp. Using Frogs only. In two hours I caught 8 fish. Nothing smaller than five lbs and one over 12lbs and one over 18lbs. For only two hours of fishing I was really happy. The 12 and 18 were caught at the same time. I had teh 12er half way in and my other rod started jumping. It took me 20 minutes to get them in the boat. I was by myself so it was quite the show. I fished snags with ok luck but then just went to one of my holes in 15 feet of water coming off of 9 and that is where I had most of the luck. |
Red River (North) - Wednesday, August 31, 2011 | |
 |
Sorry this is a bit late, but I went out this past Sunday night for some night fishing. I was scouting the river systems to see what the water levels were at different spots. Ran into a very nice young guy named Jason at one spot who gave me 10-15 frogs that he had and wasn't going to use so I gladly took them off his hands.
I went out about 10pm and right from the get go it was non-stop action on the frogs. I usually fish with two rods, but Sunday night I had to switch to one because I kept getting two at a time and that was getting to be more trouble than it was worth. Almost all fish were in the 5-10 pound range with a couple 2 pound cats mixed in. About the last 15 minutes I was there I threw my second line back out with sucker on it and it got a couple taps but definitely didn't take it like they did the frogs. Didn't end up catching one on the sucker. |
Red River (North) - Monday, August 29, 2011 | |
|
I said it on Friday and others have said it too, the fishing around Grand Forks is really good right now. The bite has changed some since last week. Last week they wanted deeper faster water, then they moved to snags then out to shallow fast water. Great numbers of bigger cats are coming in. It seems that the best bite right now is about two hours before sunset into darkness. There really is not bait of choice. I saw frogs shine one day, sucker then next and heard guys saying goldeye was the ticket and I could not buy a fish on goldeye so bring it all and see what they want that day. I think right now stay on the move mix up the bait until you find active fish and then let the madness begin.
The river is really manageable now and looking like a great fall in store for the catfish guys. |
Red River (North) - Monday, August 29, 2011 | |
 |
Well if you want to try catfishing , now is the time. Fish the Red in GF friday with my boy from shore 830 pm to 1030pm. We caught 8 cats from 3lbs to 20lbs. Took a bunch of kids out Saturday night about same time frame, caught 9 cats lost 3 cats at shore.. Used Frogs and Suckers, both worked well. It was so much fun to watch kids catch their first cat.. Even the small ones were giving them all they could handle.....
|
