# Please help! Troy Ohio Fishing area



## prhodes2 (Jul 3, 2009)

I live about 3 min from the great miami river here in troy ohio and would love to learn how to catch fish here. I have tried, but never seem to get anything except a small rock bass here and there. Could someone please email me at patrhodes @ gmail . com or call cell 937-416-1555 or answer this thread with the more details the better. at this time I am planinng on going out tomorrow Saturday July 4th from 4:00 till 8:00 pm and fishing the dam area and south to the bridge at st rt 41. I was going to use waders and casting tube 3-4 inch tube jigs and bouncing them along bottom and #2 mepps style spinners both around the structure at sides (wood,weeds,etc...) unless otherwise advised that is. Any help with recommendations on locations,lures or bait,rigging,presentation, and so on are greatly appreciated. I just would love to learn how to fish this river since I live so close. I am also open to the option if someone is wanting to meet me and fish with me and show me the ropes. I am a 24 year old male and newer to the area and just cannot seem to find a way to fish anywhere within 45min and be successfull. I do not have a boat at this time. Any other lakes or streams and so on are also a plus for recommendations. I love to fish for bass, walleye, saugeye, pike, and crappie if in numbers. sometimes catfish. Thanks and God Bless. Patrick K. Rhodes


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## Mr. Smallie (Mar 25, 2005)

Welcome to the site! I'd recommend finding a new spot. Lately, the dam area reminds me a lot of the walleye run on the maumee - too many people! There are a lot of places north and south of Troy that are wading-friendly with a lot less people.

Find a bridge and start walking up stream. I really haven't heard of any problem with land owners, as long as you are carrying a pole and respecting their property. You may want to consider old tennis shoes rather than waders. The water is in the upper 70's this time of year.

You are on the money with a 3.5 - 4 inch tube. Black with blue fleck has been real good lately. I would also consider a 1/4 oz. buzzbait if the water is not too cloudy (10" or better visibility). Those are my go to big fish baits. If you want to catch quantities, a small crankbait like a rebel craw, wee-R, Big O, or 100 series Bandit will work well. Craw patterns and shad colors work for me. 1/4 oz. spinnerbaits in white/chartreuse with a white twistertail trailer and a single silver willow blade work at times.

I'm sure you'll be getting a lot of sound advice on here. Good luck and let us know how you do!


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## prhodes2 (Jul 3, 2009)

Thanks a lot Mr. Smallie. I look forawrd to hearing evrybody elses advice too. Any particular area to park and wade that you recommend. And how do you fish those lures. Cast and retireve? Jerk around the bottom? I will be leaving to Gander Mtn ot walmart in about an hour to buy some lures for tomorrow and hope to get as much advice as possible from everyone before then. Thanks again....


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## Mr. Smallie (Mar 25, 2005)

You'll be hard-pressed to get any real specific spots to fish. They'll end up looking like the Troy dam!! You can catch fish anywhere on the Miami, just look for deeper ripples and pools. They're going to be in one of those places.

As far as fishing the tubes go, I like an 1/8 oz. bullet weight with a 4/0 or 5/0 hook (I fish for big ones!) texas rigged. For tubing, I use a 6'6" rod and a baitcaster filled with 50# PowerPro braid. You'll hear a lot of different opinions on this, but it works for me.

Work the wood, rocks, and weed edges, especially near deeper water. You can vary your presentation. I usually switch between a steady pull and gentle "hopping". If you notice anything "different" (a "tick", a tug, slack, unusual weight, etc.), reel down and set the hook.

Throw the buzzer in 3' or 4' of water (or anywhere else for that matter) and real just fast enough to keep the blade churning. Of course, you can always vary the speed. If you don't get a hit after a half hour or so, switch to something else but keep checking back with the buzzbait.

Hope this helps and good luck!


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## smallmouthjunky (Aug 11, 2006)

That river loves a crawdad-like crankbait. I usually run it parallel with the bank in deeper holes. When nothing else will work these always do.


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## prhodes2 (Jul 3, 2009)

Well I stopped by Gander Mtn and had a couple guys assist me who really knew what they were talking about. Or at least it sounded like it. One guy was more of a river smallmouth fisherman and got me a pack of Coffee tubes 4.5 inch coffee/salted black with blue flecks tubes and some 1/8 oz and 1/4 oz pro tube jig hooks.He also had me get a small crawdad type shallow 3 ft running crankbait and a couple mepps #2 and #3 Aglia spinners and I got a Beetle Spin 1/4 oz spinner white with black stripe and silver spinner blade. The other guy was more of a walleye and saugeye and muskie and pike fisherman and recommended a Reef Runner Deep little ripper in fire tiger color to be universal to go for the pike and saugye. I only got one for that type fish because of how expensive it was. They explianed how to use all of these. They really seemed to favor using the tubes for most the time and slow retrieval or bouning off bottom/jerking motion. Unless I wanted to more go for pike/saugeye and then use the reef runner like a jerkbait. I think I will start with the tube. I still think I might start around the dam and wade down south past the rt 41 bridge and down to the railroad bridge about 1/2 mile south of the st rt 41 bridge. I figure casting into/around the bank by the weeds/wood/rocks. I know someone said that this are can be over fished and I will agree, but I am more familiar with this stretch ofthe river. I really do not know where any other place to park are which would be at a spot of the river that would be shallow enough to wade down stream in. Any more comments are appreciated. Thanks.Are there certail spots I should use the tubes at and certain spots to look for to tie on the reef runner and try for some pike and saugeye, or is it just a guessinggame and I just hve to decide what I am after? The reefrunner is about 4 inches with lip and will run from 5-10 ft depth depending on how fished? will bass also go after this or should I mainly stick with the tubes or spinners?


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## SConner (Mar 3, 2007)

These replies are right on the money. Get away from the dam and you should do better. Sounds like the guy at Gander did you right with his suggestions also. Rebel wee craw is a killer in this river.

Good Luck!


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## prhodes2 (Jul 3, 2009)

Do you just cast and retrieve with the rebel wee craw? and where would you recommend parking and wading? I am only familiar with three areas. 1.) treasure island troy boat ramp area and wading up stream. 2.) the dam and wading down stream 3.) St Rt 41 bridge and wading downstream to the railroad bridge.... WHERE SHOULD I GO??? HELP????????


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## fshnteachr (Jun 9, 2007)

Map of the river with parking locations

http://newserver.miamiconservancy.org/recreation/documents/GMRRiverMap_1A.pdf


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## prhodes2 (Jul 3, 2009)

Thanks maybe I will go up to farrington rd??????


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## prhodes2 (Jul 3, 2009)

looks like it might rain night tomorrow now when I will be going, but I think I will still go as long as it is not a down pour...


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## SConner (Mar 3, 2007)

prhodes2 said:


> Do you just cast and retrieve with the rebel wee craw? and where would you recommend parking and wading? I am only familiar with three areas. 1.) treasure island troy boat ramp area and wading up stream. 2.) the dam and wading down stream 3.) St Rt 41 bridge and wading downstream to the railroad bridge.... WHERE SHOULD I GO??? HELP????????


There is no wrong way to work rebel craw. I like to twitch it a little while reeling and most people retrieve too fast. There are too many spots to mention here, just get away from all the people and you will do fine.


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## prhodes2 (Jul 3, 2009)

Well here are the results.I went to the gmr saturday 3:30 to 8:30 pm with one buddy. It was sprinkling most the time, but kinda refreshing. We started wading at farrington rd and waded south approx. 2.5 miles I am guessing and then waded back. WHOO! what a hard time wading back upstream that far when you don't have enough tim left to take casting breaks. We caught a total of 6 fish between the two of us. 3 saugeye and 3 smallmouth. all around the 8-12 inch mark so nothing huge. It did not seem like a lot of fish to me for the amount of time we were out and the amount of river we covered, but we were happy since it was our first time fishing the great miami and even more happy that we were only 5 min from home here in troy. We tried casting everywhere from the banks to the center of the river and every fish was caught on a #3 Aglia Mepps rooster tail spinner. We tried 4.5 inch black with blue spec tubes both weedless texas rigged and regular with the jig unseen in the tube, also tried small shallow running crank baits like a rebel craw and tried beetle spin and tried a reef runner but I could never get it to cast right without the hooks catching my line and tangling when it would hit the water? I take it back 1 smallmouth too the bettle spin, 1 smallmouth took the crankboait, and everything else was on mepps spinners. tried lots of lures, but no bites on anything else but they were jumping everywhere. Seemed like all the bites were in deeper holes by the bank with good current running through them. We had gun for a first time and look forward to going for a shorter amount of time maybe next weekend. Also- I do have a couple pictures in my gallery


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## Mr. Smallie (Mar 25, 2005)

Glad you caught some fish. Don't give up on the tube and crank baits - they will pay off.


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## fishking12 (Dec 18, 2008)

the dam is a really good spot for catfish and saugeye we catch them on a lead head with a green worm it works great we have been catching alot of fish down there this year


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