NOrfork Lake Arkansas near Mountain Home in the Ozarks Mountains Region Fishing report and lake condition by Scuba Steve from Blackburns Resort and Boat Rental.

The lake level is 552.57 and has risen just a bit in the last 24-hours with a couple of hours of generation in the morning and again in the afternoon.The White River at Newport is 9-feet and they could be letting out much more water if they wanted to. Hold and hope. We need to be at least 548 but they seem determined to keep it high for the spring rains. A five feet drop now would give us a better chance of staying normal, what ever that is. The surface water temperature had dropped a little yesterday and I had just under 46-degrees yesterday afternoon. The water seemed a little more clear and I could see my lure down about 6-feet. The creek visibility is about the same as the main lake.  The wind died down some but is coming back soon. We are on the borderline for some storms on wednesday with another cold front coming through after more warm weather starting tomorrow. This has been happening for several weeks now. It got down to 19-degrees last night in town and colder here near the lake. Blackburns had several fishermen out yesterday but I did not talk to them about the results. I am not doing that well but am catching some fish but no picture fish. I do not take selfies with a fish held up under my face over and over. I am catching just a couple of keeper bass and a few crappie and not much of anything else. The big fish are eluding me except for a large crappie now and again but not like it was. I am catching no bluegill or walleye and the catfish stopped a coule of weeks ago. The next event is just before the full moon in March which is the 19th when the stripers go to their spawning banks at dark and caught slow rolling the stick bait.This is a good time to catch and release them in shallow water. This is also getting to be a lost art with few doing it. The next time is the middle of April when the top-water bite for both bass and stripers gets going good and the male crappie move to the backs of the creeks on shallow wood. There can be some dead time in March with the cold fronts coming through about twice a week. It is my least favorite fishing time except for the lake turnover in October. May is the best month for overall fishing and weather if they do not let the lake get too high too fast. Scuba diving season starts June 15th for spearfishing but there are less and less of divers out there every year due to low visibility in recent years. In a normal level year it can be excellent. We will see what happens this year. It is hard to believe we are 1/2 through february already and about ready for another season when I can stop being concerned about ice and start worrying about storms blowing my dock away. I have taken many measures to keep that from happening. We seem to get a big strom the first part of July every year but the resort is in a well protected valley and has missed any severe weather in the past. People used to come to Blackburns from town to get away from storms in the old days before weather sirens and there has never been any damage for 70-years. I hope it stays that way. I have a lot of work to get done by March 15th but have been working on it all winter. I think you will like what you see when you get here and there are no price increases.