Everything That Swims: Fishing At WVU

During my time at WVU so far as a freshman, I have spent a great deal of time on the Monongahela river that runs through campus. Tough would be an understatement to describe the fishing on the river, but when you don't have a car, you make due with what you've got! The redeeming quality of the Mon river is that it's like a zoo, I have caught largemouth, smallmouth, and spotted bass, white bass, hybrid stripers, musky, walleye, sauger, freshwater drum, channel catfish, rock bass, crappie, and several types of sunfish. The downside is that while all of those fish exist in the river, you have to put in about an hour or two of fishing for each fish you catch, and one fish days are common. I can't explain it, but no matter what species you target, you will probably end up catching others while doing so, and it's rare to catch 2 or 3 fish of one species in a day. For example, if I go out and bass fish, and I catch 5 fish, there's a good chance that only one or two of them would be bass, and there is never a pattern to it. On my best day bass fishing at the Mon, I landed 7 bass, it was a mix of all three species, and three fish were over 12". That should say something, considering I typically fish the river at least three times a week.
The best bait by far has been a 4" Keitech Swing Impact on a 1/16 or 1/8oz jighead, white when the water is stained, and some sort of minnow color if the water is clear. The baitfish in the river seem to be almost exclusively silver shiners (look and act a lot like saltwater glass minnows) so the swimbait is a great match.

Another good technique is simply trolling rapala shad raps, #5, #6, and #7. They will catch just about anything in the river.

Here are some fish from the river!