We hope you and your family have enjoyed a fun summer. We believe our clients have. Since June 1 the six Scenic City Fishing Guides have taken hundreds of clients out on a total of 94 fishing trips. And the fishing has been great.

The highlight of the summer for Capt. Richard Simms (so far) came on July 1. That's when Matt Schulte landed the second largest catfish to ever grace the bottom of Capt. Simms's boat. They caught the majority of the epic battle on video that was posted on a story on NewsChannel9.com/Outdoors. The impressive photo and associated video went viral.

Huge Catfish = Huge Battle!

 

"I think we almost broke the Internet for a couple of days," said Capt. Simms. "People love 'Big Fish" stories, especially when you've got the pictures and video to back them up. NewsChannel 9's corporate owner picked up the story and posted it on about 120 other news websites across the country."

But there have been plenty of other epic catches as well. Capt. Ben Hayes and Capt. Chris Peters have been on an awesome bass bite. Although they dropped it slightly in the rankings, Chickamauga Lake is still considered the sixth best bass fishing lake in the entire United States by Bassmaster Magazine. According to FishDayton.com and their #GiantAlert, there have been about 100 bass caught on Chickamauga Lake this year that weighed ten pounds or more.

Of course sometimes the best part of fishing is all the other interesting stuff you see out on the water. Capt. Simms saw a "first" one day recently.

"In my life I've seen virtually every non-aquatic animal you can imagine swim across a lake or river - bears, deer, squirrels and a host of other normally terrestrial critters. But until this day, I had NEVER, EVER seen a swimming groundhog. And this one swam a loooong ways!"

Groundhogs Can Swim - Who Knew???

On yet another day Capt. Simms and his client, Henry Lehman, spotted a large crappie floating. As they got closer they realized the crappie was still alive. It was only floating because it had a large bluegill stuck in its throat.

This was one case that he really did bite off more than he could chew. FYI, the bluegill became catfish bait. The crappie went home with Henry, along with about 100 pounds of catfish for the freezer.

By the way, if you happen to be like our regular client Eric Kaulfuss, and want to take advantage of some Scenic City Fishing Bling, check out our online store. We would also appreciate support of B'n'M rods. Whether it is crappie or catfish, B'n'M provides the stuff dreams are made of. That is true especially if you're fishing with Team Catfish or Daiichi hooks.

Enjoy the rest of your summer. We hope you'll call on us soon. FYI, July is pretty much booked up but we're booking now for August AND those popular Fall fishing trips. E-Mail Capt. Simms at [email protected]

Finally, our traditional laundry list of happy client photos. Thanks for reading.