Inland stripers are often referred to as fresh water tarpon due to their sheer strength and enormous size. These brutes can grow up over 60 pounds; in fact, the state record in Arkansas weighed 64-8 pounds and was 51-inches long with a girth of 31½-inchesThat’s a monster striper in any reservoir or ocean. It’s truly rewarding to catch one of these silver sided, but not every reservoir in Arkansas has striped bass. The list of premier striper lakes would include Norfork Lake, Beaver Lake, Lake Ouachita, and Lake Greeson right now; Lake Ouachita seems to be the hot spot with anglers regularly hooking in to big stripers. Fishing guides and weekend anglers often use live shad or big shiners, but Lake Ouachita fishing guide Chris Darby chases after stripers using only artificial lures. It’s more challenging, but more rewarding as clients hook into a monster striper.

Darby (Phone (870)867-7822) guides year round out of Mountain Harbor Resort and Spa (www.mountainharborresort.com) chases stripers year round. “I use a variety of lures including hair jigs, jerkbaits, paddle tail swimbaits, Heddon Super Spooks, Cotton Cordell Red Fins, and Cotton Cordell Spoons. My clients sometimes bring their own rods, reels, or lures, but I normally supply them,” said Darby. Which lure Darby fishes with depends on the time of year, water temperature, depth the stripers are holding at and where the bait fish are located? “In the winter the stripers will migrate up the river channels or mouth of the river arms. That’s a great time to be casting a topwater lure like a Super Spook or Red Fin. November is the prime time for fishing them.  In April, stripers will begin moving towards long points on the main river arms and can still be caught on topwater lures, but other subsurface lure begin catching most of the stripers. During the summer months, stripers will migrate towards the dam area around the Brady Mountain Recreational area then begin migrating back towards the river arms again in the fall,” said Darby. Darby noted that stripers maybe still located deep during the fall months, “It all depends on water temperatures. Cooler water temperatures will bring them up, but years when the water is warmer we will still be spooning them in November.” Besides water temperature, Darby always keeps an eye out for gulls when striper fishing. “Any place you find the gulls diving, you will find stripers pushing shad to the top on Lake Ouachita,” said Darby. Stripers in Lake Ouachita in Arkansas are commonly caught in the 12- to 15-pound range, but it’s not uncommon for anglers to catch those over 25 pounds.  

Darby’s striper tackle boxes for stripers consist of white hair jigs, paddle tail swimbaits, Smithwick Rogues, Heddon Super Spooks, Cotton Cordell Red Fins, and Cotton Cordell Spoons. “The white hair jig only weighs 1/8-ounce, but they match the smaller shad that stripers commonly feed on during the winter months. We will cast them on spinning rods to get longer distances out or drop them quickly to stripers showing up on the graph.  Unlike other lures, the white hair jig has a really subtle swimming motion just like shad in the winter,” said Darby. Similar to other professional anglers, Darby will back reel on big stripers once he has hooked up allowing him more control of the striper. “I use 7 foot medium heavy action rods with Power Pro Braid down to Seaguar 12-pound fluorocarbon line as a leader on my spinning rods,” said Darby.  Besides a white hair jig, Darby will fish with a 3-inch Mister Twister Sassy Shad on a 1/8-inch or 3/8-inch jig head anytime the stripers are holding deep. “I will fish with the 1/8-inch when the bait and stripers are in less than 20 feet of water and the 3/8-ounce jig head anytime the bait and stripers are deeper than 20 feet,” said Darby. For actively feeding stripers in pockets, points, and banks, Darby fishes with a Smithwick Pro Rogue. His favorite color on Lake Ouachita is black/chrome/white belly, or black/chrome/orange belly. When fishing deep, Darby likes to use a 3/4-ounce Cotton Cordell Spoon. “I will fish the heavy spoon on 20-pound Seaguar Fluorocarbon; it’s just too heavy a lure to bounce around without having a strong line that lets you get a solid hook set,” said Darby. The last two lures are topwater that Darby uses to catch stripers. “It doesn’t matter what color Super Spook you fish with if a striper wants it,” Darby continued, “as for Red Fins, I prefer the bigger C10 model in either smoky Joe or rainbow trout.”

Lake Ouachita presents anglers with a number of navigational hazards including standing timber, submerged humps and rocky islands. Any boater venturing out should have a good quality map and GPS/sonar unit that marks hazards, underwater features, parks, and marinas. Most of the submerged rocky humps are marked with buoy markers.  In general, anglers should stay in the main lake area or follow the old river channel when up on plane especially when up the North Fork, South Fork, or Ouachita River arms.  

Anglers will find cover and structure abundant in Lake Ouachita. Aquatic vegetation which was once plentiful on the reservoir has been depleting due to high water levels vegetation can still be found in some areas of the lake. Brush piles put in by the Army Corp of Engineers and by anglers can be found sunken around points, humps, or break lines. The Army Corp of Engineers brush piles are marked with blue signs that indicate a brush pile is located out in front of it. Anglers will find most banks consist of lime stone, slate rock, and clay. A limited number of pea gravel banks are located throughout the reservoir.      

Lake Ouachita is Arkansas’s largest lake with over 66,000 total numbers of acres. The lake doesn’t have a closed season on stripers which bite all year round. It’s a unique Corp of Engineer lake with no homes allowed close to the shoreline. The 600 plus miles of shoreline and over 200 islands offers lots of places to fish.  That equal 40,000 acres of surface water with an average depth of 40 feet. The lake is deep with some of the depths around 200 feet deep, but most of Lake Ouachita averages around 50 feet. Lake Ouachita is located in the Ouachita National Forest with over 1.6 million acres and located near the resort town of Hot Springs, Arkansas.