Hey all. I going to be in sunny Florida in late February. While I'm down there I'de like to check fishing lake Okechobee of the bucket list. Can anyone recommend a guide you've had good experience with? I would be coming in from Orlando so north end of the lake is preferred but not mandatory. I did a quick search online but the number of guides was a bit overwhelming. Thanks Mark

I will be with a guide on O January 9 if you want to PM me afterwards for a scouting report and/or recommendation..

Thanks FryDog I'll do that. Good luck and leave some for me.

capt rob alfano

he is a member here as well. his name is gartracker

I fished a couple of days last year with Steve Daniels out of the Clewiston area.  Very nice guy with experience on the professional tour circuit in the 90s and early 2000s.  A Bassresource member (Dwight Hottle) recommended him to me and it was a good experience.  

 

An issue I ran into looking for an Okeechobee guide was that a ton of them are live shiner guides and take almost all of their clients out to fish live shiners under a float.  Not surprisingly they insist that this is the best way to catch a trophy largemouth, but it was far from the experience that I was looking for.  I had to be very specific with Steve and tell him that we wanted to fish artificial lures only, apparently that’s uncommon.  

 

We struggled pretty hard both days as it turned out, there had been a nasty cold front just before our arrival and it had certainly thrown the fish into a funk.  I’m sure someone was catching them good, but no one that we talked to was.  We fished the monkey box one day and South Bay the second day.  Regardless of the relatively disappointing fishing I still felt like I got my money’s worth by being able to sit on the trolling motor with Steve for two days straight and pick his brain.  He loves to fish reaction baits on Okeechobee which was a huge surprise to me.  We spent two days chucking spinnerbaits, chatterbaits, jerkbaits, squarebills and topwater.  We caught quite a few on jerkbaits, nothing but small males though.  

 

When I go back down to Okeechobee I want to flip and punch, that’s how I always pictured fishing on Okeechobee but apparently it’s much better some months than others and March isn’t a great time to be Flippin on Okeechobee.. or so I was told ?.  

Capt. Frank Carbone has been guiding since 1991; he is reputable and knowledgeable; and knows the water from Clewiston all the way to the Everglades. I recommend his guide service.

Thank for the recommendations guys. I'll be making calls this week.