Hunting
Opening weekend of Oklahoma's primitive (muzzleloader) season is this weekend, the biggest opener so far this year. Jeff has a couple of bucks he'd like to catch up with, and if not, he'll take a mature doe for summer sausage, snack sticks, backstraps, tenderloins and jerky. Mornings should be cool with warmer afternoons, which gets big deer out hitting scrapes. Fun note: someone told Jeff that in their area a deer rub is called a "hook bush."
Lake-wide
Same old broken record. It's late fall heading into early winter, water is cooling off, and fish are starting to transition deeper, though there will be a lot of activity up on the banks at certain times of day.
Backs of coves
Fish are feeding on gizzard and threadfin shad halfway back or toward the backs of coves, especially where a creek or drainage runs in. Bass, White Bass, Catfish and Crappie will all follow the shad back there.
Catfish
Depth depends on light penetration, water depth, clarity and where the shad are. Follow your GPS, keep drifts under 1 mph, and the fish will tell you what depth they're feeding at; then go back over the same spot until you maybe get a limit. Reminder on Grand Lake Blue Cat limits: 15 a day, and only one over 30 inches. From the Catfish research study Jeff did with the Oklahoma wildlife department years ago: as long as plenty of fish over 30 inches stay in the lake, recreational anglers can't over-harvest the under-30 fish. Let the big 20- and 30-pound breeders go and there will always be plenty of 3- to 8-pounders to eat. His favorite eating size is 5–6 pounds; that's about as big as his electric knife likes, and two or three 6-pounders give a lot of meat, belly meat included.
Crappie
On main-lake brush piles now, migrating toward the backs of coves as the water cools, following shad. In docks, look in deep, dark areas, but don't fish too deep: this time of year Crappie can be right up under the encapsulated foam. If they're not where you usually catch them, bring your jig or minnow up to within a foot or two of the foam. They go through this shallow transition every spring and fall; people even see them swimming around inside their wells.
Dealers
fishlucke.com and Amazon at Fish Lucke; Littlefield Sporting Goods and Grove Walmart.