Dale Bowman

Wrapping up some youth fishing notes in a back-to-school special; plus a note on monarch butterflies.

Piled-up warm water is keeping them at bay.

Mike Matuk caught an odd northern pike at the end of July that led to questions on silver pike and possibly Furunculosis, all adding up to an odd Fish of the Week.

Delving into a mystery at the Chicago Maritime Museum of the Black house painter James Bolivar Needham, who did years of distinctive Impressionist paintings of the Chicago River, and the question of what the change of scientific name and split of largemouth bass and Florida bass mean (if anything) for the largemouth bass record in Illinois.

An artistic water lily photograph and a note of golf course great blue heron eating something unusual are among the notes from around Chicago outdoors and beyond.

Kyle Hammond now owns two Indiana state records for gar and provides some perspective on fishing outside the box.

Along with some summer kings on Lake Michigan and the usual summer regulars of catfish, bass and panfish lead this sprawling raw-file Midwest Fishing Report.

Kayla Summins wrangled a big largemouth bass out of the weeds while crappie fishing with an ultralight on Delavan Lake to earn Fish of the Week honors.

Jason DeBoer, who took an interesting path to documenting Illinois’ two main rivers—the Illinois and the Mississippi—for the Illinois Natural History Survey, shares his path and insights.