Hello and welcome to Kentucky Afield.

I'm your host, Chad Miles.

Join us as we journey the Commonwealth in search of outdoor adventure.

This week we're walking the banks of the salt River looking for those white bass.

Then we're going to take a look back to our 2025 turkey hunt, where we had an incredible gobbler encounter.

But first, we're headed out the cave run lake to jump in the boat with Chris Mann in search of those giant cave run crappie.

Well I'm down here this beautiful morning, Cave Run Lake with my buddy Kris Mann.

How are you doing?

Doing well, good to see you Chad.

You know, we are just a few weeks away from this lake being somewhat partly frozen, right?

Yeah.

And now we've had a couple of warm rains.

It's bringing out the fishermen.

The reports have been good.

The parking lots got boats all over it.

This is a great time of year.

March is a great time to get out and really find some numbers of crappie.

What do you kind of look for this time of year when this water temperature is probably went from high 30s to 45 to 48 degrees?

This time of year just seems like these crappie are in pre-spawn phase.

So what they want to do, they just want to see sun.

They want sun and warmer temperatures.

We'll see these fish start really rising up in the water column.

And I actually expect to see it today.

It's just amazing in how fast those fish will transition from that winter to more of a spring type pattern.

It happens quick.

Let's go catch some fish.

Let█s go do it.

I'm super pumped.

Me too.

Kris, we were talking about coming down here fishing in the spring.

I tell you what, it seems like the fishing initially starts up the river, doesn't it?

Seems like these fish want to migrate up in the tributaries this time of year.

You'll find some of the most optimal spawning habitat in most of our fisheries, you know, up river, shallow water scenarios where you start getting into, you know, either standing timber or lay downs, you know, just a lot of good spawning habitat.

And the fish right now they won't be in that habitat, but they'll be staging around that habitat.

Okay.

Okay.

Yeah, it's always a good spot to start.

This morning I'm going to start out with a bait called the roux.

It's got a little split tail of a crappie magnet, but it's got the little, body like a minnow.

So it's got, fluttering tails and a little minnow type body.

And that's what we call an eye hole jig head.

So what's really cool about that eye hole jig head is I can take a slab bite or whatever my favorite bait enhancer is and just kind of stick it right down in the eyes.

And then what happens is that begins to, dissolve in the water.

It lets out a scent the fish can smell and they'll probably taste as well.

And it just helps with your bite sometimes.

Got him!

A white bass.

Is it a white bass?

Sure is.

Man those are nice.

Nothing wrong with that, is it?

No.

It's not exactly what you're chasing.

It's not tournament day, though.

So today we'll take whatever you can get.

They put up a heck of a fight.

Oh, man.

They do.

You know, these white bass are kind of doing the same thing as the crappie are doing, Chad.

They're wanting to move up, you know, and get up in these creeks and tributaries.

Won't be long before they'll be making their run to spawn.

Yep.

Won't be long at all.

You start hearing turkey gobbles.

You know it's time to chase white bass.

Here we go.

Got a crappie.

A little bit of, on the smaller side.

But you know what?

That's what we're here for.

Look how white they are this time of year in this cold, stained water.

Do you think about seven, eight inches probably eight inches?

Probably eight inch fish.

Yeah.

Here we go.

That's what we're here for.

Just find us a little bit bigger one.

It's a good start though.

You got him.

There you go!

A little better crappie.

I tell you one thing.

You get that lure near them today.

They're ready to bite aren█t they?

Yeah.

They've been, they've been frozen out for long enough now they're they're ready to eat.

There we go.

Man this feels like a better one.

Looky there.

It's a good frying pan fish.

That is right there if you wanted to load the skillet.

That's probably, what, ten inch fish?

Yeah, probably ten and a half.

You keeping fish today?

No.

Not today.

I'm going to pitch em back.

I've got plenty in the freezer right now.

Look at that.

Healthy fish.

Beautiful crappie.

We're going to turn it loose.

What a beautiful fish.

Man, that looks like a good one there Kris.

That's a good one if that is a crappie.

Oh, that's a nice fish there.

Nice fish Kris.

Yeah the kind we are after.

A beautiful crappie right there.

You know that's a pound 20 fish right there.

Nice job.

You got him.

So, Chad, just to get some perspective, I bet you if I lay that fish on on the golden rules it will go 10 inches.

And your█s is probably close to 11 inches.

Yeah.

Looky there.

I tell you what, if we were filling up a live well, it'd be... We'd be on a good start would█nt we.

Yeah.

Look at that.

Pretty fish.

Well, the crappie population here is alive and well, isn't it?

Yes, sir.

Another pretty keeper.

Yeah.

Beautiful fish.

We're hunting him.

Here he comes.

Get ready.

Want me to get the net?

Yes, sir.

Please.

That looks like a good fish.

Oh, wow.

That's a good one.

Look at that big old slab.

Yeah.

Big female.

Big ole nice crappie.

I tell you what, I know you travel across the South.

That that is not a turn your nose up at crappie.

I don't care what lake you█re fishing.

That is no slouch anywhere.

No where.

No, that's a good one.

Look how thick that fish is.

I mean, that fish is bigger than my hand.

Dandy.

That's a good one right there.

Kris.

Yeah, that's, that's when you're searching for tournament grade fish that's what you're searching for here.

That's probably over a pound and a half.

Yeah, that's probably about a pound 60 fish right there.

So that's a good one.

Beautiful.

Set that puppy back.

That█s a stud there.

Yeah man.

Big white bass.

Oh is it a white bass?

Don█t let him break you.

Oh.

Nice white bass.

Now, do you ever eat those?

You know we have before.

Yeah.

If you kind of get that little red streak of meat out.

They are really good.

If you get that red meat out.

So on some of these fish what we are doing, they're traveling.

And a lot of times when the fish are moving that fast I have to do a little something to let that fish know that that baits around him.

So I'll let the bait drop and get within a couple feet of that fish.

And then I will do a real violent jerk on the end of my rod to kind of alert that fish that something is in the water column around me.

And then once I see that I've got his attention, then I'll just start reeling that line normal.

Just a normal retrieve.

Smaller fish.

But that, I did exactly what you're saying.

Got it down there.

Was like, hey, hey, I'm over here.

Little bit of aggressive shake and you can actually see the bubbles on that screen come off of your bait.

And then just a slow retrieve away.

Whole pile of them in there that are 7 or 8in long.

There's just hundreds.

You got a bigger fish.

Yeah.

So Chad that fish right there's a hybrid crappie.

You see all the see the speckles like a speck black crappie.

It's also it's got that mouth that looks like a white crappie.

Dorsal fins is a white crappie and it just speckled.

And, that's what we know as a hybrid.

Now, you talk to a lot of different folks and they've got different opinions on those, but I've always heard that the hybrids get a lot of size to them really quick.

But that fish, a lot of times you'll see them and they're just really tall fish.

Real good fish there.

There he got it.

He got it.

Yep.

There we go.

Looky there.

Beautiful fish.

I'll tell you what that never gets old.

Kris, you keep your fair share.

And always have some.

Even though you're coming out here and not keeping fish, it still never gets old catching them.

No I just enjoy the search for them.

And I think that's one of the most important things to tell people that are fishing you know, and it's like hunting or anything.

If you're going to be outdoors, you kind of get to fall in love with the process of figuring it out, you know, because you're always going to have days it's not going to be as good as others.

And if you just learn how to really enjoy yourself while you're in the outdoors, you can't beat it.

That's a stud.

That's a dandy.

That█s a fighting fish there.

There you go.

Perfect.

Got him.

Well, I'll tell you what.

It doesn't get much better than today.

We caught a ton of fish.

The weather's been great.

Man we've caught fish from the get go.

We have caught white bass and crappie the entire time.

Spring is in the air and more of these days are in our future.

You're in short sleeves.

And it was literally frozen two weeks ago.

Yeah, but the fish know it too.

They're moving up.

They're getting into more shallow water.

They're starting to look for structure, for spawning habitat.

It's on.

It is on.

It's mid-March, and the temperatures are starting to warm up.

And you know what that means.

It's time to start walking the banks in search of white bass.

Well, today I'm doing one of my favorite springtime activities here in the state of Kentucky.

That's chasing white bass.

The white bass that are in the lakes will run up the rivers, and they will do their spawning in the flowing water.

Well I'm here at salt River today, here at the Palmer Road access area.

I've got a backpack, some waterproof boots.

I'm going to grab some gear and we're going to hoof it to the water until I see the right kind of water conditions I want.

and hopefully locate some white bass.

So my goal was to walk toward the lake.

But due to the fact that the further I go, I'm still not catching fish.

And I'm not seeing people.

And there's cars up there.

We're going to go the other direction.

You make six, seven, eight cast in an area you feel like you fan cast it pretty good.

Doesn't happen.

It's time to move 60, 70 yards and try it again.

Sometimes you got to have some patience and you got to find out where the fish are at, what they want to eat that day, and how fast do they want it.

I mean, sometimes they want to super slow, sometimes they want it sped up a little bit.

So once you get those pieces of the puzzle put together, you can go from can't catch a fish to catch and ten, 15, 20 in a matter of 20 minutes.

Here we go.

Not a real big one, but it's a nice, nice male white bass, most likely.

You know this typical size for a male fish the females can get up to, you know, here at 13, 14in are pretty common.

And sometimes you'll even see them 17 18in.

But this is a pretty common white bass right here for salt River.

And man, these are hard fighting little fish.

There you go.

I█m going to flick this one back.

See if we can't catch a couple more out there.

Here we go.

Another one of these males.

Look, he hit that one there.

I mean, he hit it dead on.

Choked it.

Now, I've tried a couple different techniques today, throwing a couple other things.

But as you've seen so far, they're wanting to hit this little bait in the shallows, moving relatively quickly.

So hey, I'm going to give them what they want.

Look at that.

See that white milky substance that's coming down from this fish?

This is obviously a male.

So this fish is actively spawning.

Here we go.

These are all males and they're all about exactly the same size.

That one might be a little bit bigger, but they're definitely wanting this thing fast which tells me they're in the riffles.

They're right up in there dropping their milt in these really, really fast moving pockets.

All right.

We're going to turn this fellow loose.

You know, if we catch a really, really big one, a couple of those, I might keep them for now.

We're going to turn these loose.

Oh, here we go.

Look at him running.

And this might be a little better fish.

See what we got here.

This here's a little better white bass.

Right where that goes from the riffles.

Hit this deeper pool.

It was sitting in there.

There he is.

Look there.

One cast came back down to this little spot where I'd seen a fish earlier.

I was talking about casting the same spot over and over and over.

Sometimes, you know, if you leave, come back and make a couple casts down there because, like I said, there's certain areas they want to be and they'll come in waves, you'll catch a couple and then bam, they may be gone, but come back and try that spot again.

You might very well get on them.

Here we go.

All right.

This is either really in the current or this is a really good fish.

I don't know what's going on here.

Look at there.

A little better fish this time.

I'm going to grab him for a pick him up.

A little bit longer.

Just strong.

Just a really super, super, super strong fish.

I'll tell you what.

Catching these on light tackle.

And like I said, I'm throwing a seven foot medium weight rod on a little jig head here is a one eighth of an ounce jig head.

But cast these things out and just pull them up.

Pick them up.

Change your retrieve.

Sometimes they want it fast.

Sometimes they want it right on the bottom.

Sometimes they want it up and down.

They█re right in these little scenes where there's a lot of current and hey, catching them on the current makes for a much better fight.

Spring turkey season is right around the corner, and I'm getting super excited to get out and start working some gobblers.

What a way to start the 2025 turkey season.

I just got dive bombed by an owl.

That thing got within a foot of my head.

I was listening to him call thinking, man, this may be a great locator.

Then he got closer and then he dove right at my head.

Well I'm awake.

That's better than coffee.

Well it█s the opening morning of spring turkey season.

Got set in plenty early.

Got my decoy out.

Beautiful morning.

I still have not heard the first gobble, but I feel very confident about my set up.

It's a spot I have hunting in the past.

Last year I hunted this spot.

We had some birds roosted directly across this field, probably 200 yards.

They flew down, but they made theirselves way on the other side of the pond.

And were sitting down here about 80 yards 90 yards strutting and never could close the distance.

So this area I'm sitting got a river.

I have a feeling this year, due to the high water, it's going to press those birds just a little bit closer to me, putting them right in range.

Sounds like I've got two birds.

Both about 300 yards away.

That way.

I was hoping to have them up on the ridge.

That doesn't mean they're not there.

I just haven't heard them yet.

Man, we need those birds to come this way off the roost.

Hopefully, they'll come off that hillside and fly into this field.

If not, it could be one of those situations where it's 10, 11, 12, 1:00 before they get here.

But that's okay.

It's going to be a beautiful morning.

Little crisp, start off around 32 degrees, but it's going to reach the 50s and full sun.

These birds have had a lot of rain.

They're going to want to get out, shake the dew off, do a little strutting in the sunshine.

That's when I should have my best chance.

Well, have a bird gobble that doesn't sound like it's more than about 120 yards away.

This is definitely the closest gobbler I've had all morning.

I think he's getting closer.

There he is.

Right there.

Oh, here he comes.

Here he comes.

He's about 80 yards.

Exactly where I saw a turkey last year and never got a shot.

He's looking right at the decoy right now.

60 yards, almost in range.

Oh, man.

He's locked up.

Now he is turning away.

He's walking away.

Hit that mouth call one more time.

You stopped him.

Here we go.

He's turning.

He's turning.

Come on, come on.

Here he comes.

Here he comes.

Lets see if he commits all the way this time.

Get ready.

Now.

Wow!

I tell you what, I about gave up on that bird.

Came all the way up, turned to walk away.

A couple of yelps later, he turned and committed.

Let's go up there and make sure he doesn█t fly away.

What a beautiful bird.

This morning's hunt was super exciting.

But I'll tell you this.

It was a roller coaster.

After getting set up in the thick, thick, heavy fog and listening and doing some calling.

Finally started hearing some gobbles.

But they were way off.

It sounded like they were on the other side of the river, which I thought was going to pretty much end my hunt for today.

But as the sun came up and started burning the fog off, I could tell that the water has receded quite a bit.

And now I thought, I have got a chance a bird may cross that river.

It may just fly over.

Well, after calling and calling and calling, all of a sudden I was like, oh my gosh, that gobble sounded a lot closer.

I finally laid eyes on the bird and it was 90 to 100 yards away down below me.

Here comes the bird.

He starts to commit.

It sees the decoy.

It's gobbling to the decoy.

It's strutting around and then starts walking up.

Right before the bird gets into range, he turns and is moving away.

I look over at my camera guy who I know had a mouth call in and I said give me some light yelps.

Yelp, yelp, yelp, yelp.

And that bird full strut gobbles, turns, and you can tell he's committing.

It went from thinking this hunt was over to that bird turning, walking, coming right into range.

And wow, I could not be more happy and more grateful to be able to take this beautiful eastern wild turkey.

What a fantastic opening morning to the spring turkey season.

Now let's check in and see who else has been out having fun, in this week's ones that didn't get away.

Here we have nine year old Luke Mattingly, who headed out to Taylorsville lake and caught this nice crappie.

Check out the excitement on Maggie's face as she shows us her very first fish.

Nice job.

Check out Randall Howell with this beautiful largemouth bass that he caught while fishing at Dale Hollow Lake.

Hey, make sure you tune in next week for our live question and answer show all about turkey hunting.

And remember, hunting and fishing on private property is a privilege.

Always ask permission and thank the landowner.

Until next week, I'm your host, Chad Miles, and I hope to see you in the woods or on the water.