Bowfin

streamerguy

streamerguy

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May 9, 2011
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Well I decided to head over to a place called Geneva Swamp today in search of my first bowfin. Well I did end up catching around 5 of them baitfishing but also tried fly fishing and didn't even get a bite. I was fishing streamers. Most of the fish I caught were right on the bottom so I probably wasn't getting deep enough fly fishin. But on a happier note we did get into a ton of crappies on the fly, for a while it was a fish on every other cast :-D .

Any tips on the bowfin?

Here's a pic of one of the fish.
 

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Most of the bowfin I have caught were from the lagoons in Presque Isle Bay wile bass fishing. They were all shallow as the lagoons don't get very deep. Never tried to catch one on a fly rod, sorry. Did you fish Geneva from a boat or from shore? I've always wanted to fish that marsh for bass but have never made it.
 
Cool.
We don't see bowfin pics everyday here on PAFF. We used to call 'em "dogfish" when I was a kid fishing in Michigan.
 
Thats really cool. I've still have never seen a Bowfin. I know people catch them up in the Bay (Erie). Whats the deal with the Geneva Swamp? The rumor that I always hear is that the bottom is so soft, the bridge over it actually "floats". I knew some guy from back home that would hunt huge bullfrogs from a jonboat back in the day. I drive over it all of the time...I've always wondered about fishing it.
 
"Did you fish Geneva from a boat or from shore?"

Fished it from shore

I tried out 2 spots, one of them the bottom was soft, but the other actually had a rockier(but still soft) bottom. The only fish we caught were bowfin and crappie. No bass or even bluegills, but I did see a small pike around 12in.
 
I know nothing about bowfin other than to note that if they are in the Geneva Marsh, they either already are or will be in Conneaut Lake and French Creek soon. The marsh is the outlet of Conneaut Lake and drains to French Creek.

I did my undergrad years not far from there (University of Thiel, Greenville Campus, as we called it) and we used to fish up there quite a bit from shore. Mind you, this was a long time ago, but the best bass/panfish angling in the entire complex (its a huge piece of swamp/water) was in the Hartstown Swamp and Crystal Lake, which was right across 322/18 from the Hartstown Swamp. Access to both was easy then. I don't know what its like now. Like I say, long time ago..
 
I have often wondered how many people kill bowfin mistaking them for snakeheads
 
Starting back when I first made this thread in 2011 it has been a goal of mine to catch a bowfin on the fly, and it finally happened on Saturday, as well as yesterday!

Saturday afternoon my brother and I decided to just do some lazy fishing with bait, and since we were having great success and the fish were obviously active, I decided to go back to the vehicle and get out a fly rod. It didn't take long before I hooked up! They are great fighters on spinning tackle, and even more so on a 5wt fly rod! A bunch of them even jumped out of the water like a steelhead! Most of the fish were in the 12-18in range but they still pulled very hard and tried to bury themselves in the weeds. I honestly think a 7wt wouldn't be too heavy, especially if I would have hooked into a much bigger fish. Big heavy streamers in brown or black bounced along the bottom near the weed lines were productive.

Yesterday we went at it again and they were still active! Same tactics worked: just worked streamers slowly along the weeds.

Pound for pound, bowfin are one of the best fighting fish out there imo. I have been really sick lately with fall trout/steelhead fever, but I might just have to try for bowfin one or two more times before fall! Great fun

IMG_0177_zpsf01933e5.jpg
 
Nice... always fun to catch a new species on the fly.
 
Thanks boychick. That's two new species on the fly for me this year(gar is the other one). I wonder what's next?!?!
 
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