Stan and I went on a scouting mission to a lake for an upcoming crappie guide trip. We were disappointed to find that the bait shop was out of minnows. Luckily, we brought some worms and started the morning off fishing a pile of fish with slip floats. The bite was pretty slow and we only caught two crappie out of the school so we started to move through a creek. We were long lining crappie jigs behind the boat and started to get on fish right away. The further we went back in

Chandlar, Dwayne, Morris, and Robert joined us on the river for Chandlar’s birthday party. The goal was to catch a bunch of eaters. Being a half day trip we got right to work and started catching fish from our first spot. We started the day off with a double up and that got everybody fired up. In this first spot everybody had a chance to catch at least one fish, and after about an hour, it was time to move on. At our next spot, we picked up a couple fish, but it wasn’t nearly

The James River has fully come to life for the Spring. Robert and Mark came out for a half day trip in the morning with their sights set on catching a trophy fish. We had bait in the cooler and got straight to fishing once we picked the gentleman up. We started our morning with cut Hickory shad, drifting channel ledges down the river. We had a couple small taps that didn’t hook up but we promised our guest those were just little fish and not the ones they were looking for. Sh

Kara reached out to us and purchased a half day fishing trip for her dad‘s birthday present. The group was interested in trophy size catfish. We had plenty of bait left over from our morning trip so we picked the group up and took off to start fishing. It was a gorgeous 70° day, but the wind was howling. With steady winds around 15 to 20 miles an hour we had to choose our fishing locations carefully. In our first spot, we targeted structure and the fish weren’t super interest

We had Raymonz and Aiken out for their first trip on the James River. We launched early and had bait ready when our guest showed up. We swung back to the ramp and grabbed them and it was on to fishing time. The guys were looking for a cooler full of eater fish on their trip. We had a chilly morning and worked some channel ledges down river. We started the morning off with a nice eater size blue cat. Another spot and we caught another blue cat. As the tide rose, the bite slowe

Michael and Brady came out for a return trip on the James River. We started the night looking for Hickory shad. We spotted a lot on the livescope but didn’t hook into any so we moved spots. We scanned the river as we drifted and found a pocket of Hickory shad. Within a half hour we caught 4 and a bonus striper. With some prime bait in the cooler, we turned our sights to catfish and ran a little bit down river to start drifting. We put six rods suspended about a foot off the b

Xavier recently won a hellcat rod on his first trip with Goober Time Guide Service. He was quick to book another trip and brought his buddy Tristan along this time. We threw the cast net and caught a dozen giant gizzard shad for bait and then moved on to our first anchor of the day. While scanning some shallow water flats, we noticed some bait balls and some large fish schooled up around them. We turned the boat around, tossed out the anchor and it wasn’t long before the rods

We had Tyler, Amy, Esmarie, Joe, and Luke out for a half day of fishing. With temperatures hovering around 30° we were happy to see that there was no wind which made for a very comfortable morning. Our crew was interested in catching any kind of fish with a trophy fish being a bonus so we got to work, trying to put some eaters in the boat. We anchored up on a mud flat that was holding a lot of bait where we knew catfish had been scattered. The rods were getting hit right from

We had Tori, Austin, Kayden, and Bentley out for a full day of fishing. With a recent cold snap bait was very challenging. We started our morning anchored up in a small pit after marking a ton of bait and giant fish. Unfortunately, we found zero bait in our gill net and we found out the sonar marks were giant carp. We moved to our next location and started dragging baits in about 10 foot of water. Our gill net was very productive pulling in all kinds of species, including gar

We had Norris and Nathan on the boat for a return trip with the goal of catching a bunch of eaters and some trophy fish. We started off with a very cold and windy morning with temperatures below 30. We made quick work of catching fresh bait and set on our way to anchor up. We tried anchoring on a channel ledge holding a lot of bait and fish but it was so windy the boat wouldn’t stay put. We moved locations so we could hide from the wind. We found a bunch of bait fish stacked

Phillip and David joined us on the water for a full day of fishing. The guys had big plans for the day taking advantage of our hellcat giveaway. They wanted to catch some eater fish to take home and also a trophy fish so they could win a rod. We showed the guys how we use livescope to catch bait with the cast net while we set the gill net out and let that work its magic. We had a couple pieces of bait to start fishing with and decide to move onto our first fishing location. W

Trevor and Joey took advantage of a last-minute cancellation to jump on the boat Friday night. We had fresh gizzard shad ready to go when they stepped on the boat and we got right to fishing for a six hour trip. The guys were looking for some trophy fish so we started anchoring on spots that were holding good fish and plenty of bait. The first anchor had a couple takedowns and some really finicky bites, but no fish came in the boat. We went through a series of about five more

Xavier reached out and told us he was looking to put some meat in the freezer and break his personal best of 6 lbs for a blue catfish. We invited him to the James river and got to work. We started the morning off catching bait with the cast net and had a large variety to feed the fish. We caught gizzard shad, threadfin shad, and mullet. We started off with chunks of gizzard shad and small threadfin shad. Rods started getting hit immediately and the fish keyed in on the thread

Ernie the Hog Snatcher came down for a trip and had never done any dragging for catfish. We decided to show him how much fun it can be. We collected a bunch of gizzard shad for bait and headed off to some calmer waters to drag baits. This was our first trip with our new AlphaBoardz . The new design updates were a very nice touch and everything worked flawlessly. I can’t wait to test them out in the dark with the led light pods.  The plan was to set up 6-8 planer boards and dr

Stan and I ran a guide trip  Sunday morning and wanted to check in on some high water locations. We had leftover bait from the guide trip and the weather was unseasonably high for a February afternoon so we pulled the boat out of the river and launched ina new location. The water was so high we had to get creative launching the boat as the ramp was completely underwater.  We We launched safely and slowly made our way up river, careful to watch out for any debris floating down

Lisa booked a half day trip to celebrate her Dad’s 80th birthday and brought her Mom and Daughter along for the celebration. We had some bait in the cooler when the group arrived and had the gill net soaking to collect a little bit more. We loaded the crew on the boat and showed them how we use the gill net to catch fresh bait. The gill net is a great tool and we had all the bait we needed for the trip and got to fishing.  The recent weather patterns had the fish scattered bu

After spending the first few days of 2025 working on some projects, it was time to hit the review for my first fishing trip of the year. I did not have a trip planned so I decided to take the jon boat out and let the motor run some. I did a quick workout and did not rush to the river. I knew bait would be easy to find and I’ve been on a good pattern of fish so I let the sun rise and start warming the world up. We hit the river, marked shad immediately and sunk the gill net in

We had Austin, Tori, Mason, and Kayden on the boat to celebrate Kayden’s birthday. The goals for the trip were simply to catch some fish and if we came across some good ones, that would be a bonus. We had the gill net in the water when our guests arrived. We let it soak as we loaded them on the boat and got organized. We collected the net, showing our guests how it works, and only had a few pieces of bait. We moved to a different stretch of river and set the net on a giant sc

66 lb Troph Blue Catfish Chris, Sam, and Dieter joined us on the James River with the goal of taking some fish home to eat while chasing monster catfish. Leading up to the trip, we noticed a large wind front moving in before a cold snap. We decided to move the trip up to a 6am launch so we could enjoy a bit more fishing before the wind kicked up toward 20 mph. It was a cold morning but we showed the guys how to catch gizzard shad while they were deep in the water column. Our

Max and Patrick joined us for a joint birthday party. These youngsters are eager to learn more about the James River and we packed as much info as we could into a half day trip. We launched the boat and took off to catch some fresh bait, explaining the importance of having the freshest bait possible on the James River. It took a couple tosses of the cast net and one set of the gill net and we had all the bait we needed for the next few hours of fishing. We also caught a coupl