Rainbow Trout
These colorful creatures thrive in cool, clear, oxygen-rich water. In winter, they are usually found in the open-water areas of lakes near the surface, and in deeper, cooler water in the summer.

Use night crawlers, red worms, salmon eggs, or power bait on a #8 hook about two feet off the bottom with a sliding sinker. Also, shiny lures less than one inch long may be cast or trolled. Try wet or dry flies in streams or along lake shorelines. Trout are most active in cooler air and water temperatures.

Largemouth Bass
The best time to fish for bass is during the spring. They prefer warm, shallow, shaded, weedy, or tree-covered areas.

Use natural bait (nightcrawlers and crayfish) or black or purple plastic worms rigged with #1 weedless hooks and crank baits or bass plugs. They must be at least 12 inches long to keep.

Smallmouth Bass
Smallmouth bass prefer cooler and deeper water than largemouth bass. They are more often found in moving water near inlets and steep, rocky areas.

Smallmouth bass prefer plastic lures, especially those combined with a spinner pulled through their habitat. Crickets and nightcrawlers are also good baits. Must be 12 inches long to keep.

Striped Bass
They patrol open water, 10-40 feet below the surface. They will move into the shallows to feed on small fish.

Use a strong rod and reel with at least 20 lb. test line, because a 20 year-old "striper" may weigh 40 lbs. Use trolling lures resembling small fish. Must be 18 inches long to keep.

Sunfish
These fish prefer shallow, muddy shoreline areas where submerged trees and weedbeds are found.

Use a bobber to hold a #12 hook three to four feet off the bottom. Use red worms, meal worms, or grasshoppers.

Crappie
Most of the year, crappie spend their time in close-knit schools in open and deeper water than sunfish. During the spring spawning season they feed along the surface on schooling minnows. After spawning they can be found around sunken brush piles.

Try streamer flies, jigs, grasshoppers, or grubs pulled along the surface or bobbed around brushy areas, or mid-water worm trolling.

Channel Catfish
Catfish comb shallow shoreline areas near vegetation and undercut banks.
These fish eat almost anything. Some of the best baits are chicken liver, crayfish tails, anchovies, mackerel, nightcrawlers, clams, or sardines, placed on a #2 hook with a 1- to 6-ounce sinker.