Read about all of my Fishing Adventures!
Follow my Fish of 2015
Though our last trip to Pickwick had turned out to be pretty awful, we wouldn't be dissuaded. It didn' t hurt that the near record highs for this time of year , in combination with the high current. After all, the trip before had been pretty solid. You can read about each of those trips by clicking the links below.
Fishing Report for Pickwick 12/17/15
Fishing Report for Pickwick 11/25/15
We were one of the only trailers in the parking lot, once again. Now, keep in mind that we weren't using McFarland as most anglers do. We used a ramp on the opposite side of the lake and closer to the damn.
We ran up to Jackson island, just as we have done each of the last few trips and began running the drifts. There was another boat fishing, which ended up being Ryan from Alabama Bass Guide. We struggled, only catching a few white bass. But, we stayed longer than we would have because we wanted to watch a guide and his two clients. Like us, all they caught was a few white bass while we were watching.
We scooted over to the rip rap, where we have consistently caught a solid 4 pounder. Nothing.
We talked about hitting the bluffs, which had been another pattern that produced fish. But, as we began our first drift, we noticed that the water was down about a foot from where it had been on our successful trip back in November. The last trip, the water had also been down and we had noted that the fish we caught back in November had been on areas with a secondary shelf under water. Today, as with the trip on the 17th, the secondary shelf was out of water. Indeed, we didn't have a single bite. It was starting to look like another tough day.
As we ran back up river, we noticed that the barge tie-ups at the exit of the barge canal had some very interesting looking eddy lines, created by the swift current (TVA reported over 100,000 CFS). We decided to fish it, as I had never fished it with current. We noticed that the eddy was between the first and second tie-ups, so we began fishing the eddy with A-rigs.
Quickly, we picked up a few white bass including a personal best.
This bad boy crushed the A-rig, which I had baited with Powerteam Lures grubs and a single custom swimbait in the center.
We noticed the fish really wanted the A-rig slow. With Brad on the front of the boat, he was fishing a little further outside of the eddy than I. But, turns out that was where the largemouth were. He boated two keepers on back to back casts and I followed that up with back to back largemouths including a solid 4-pounder.
TVA changed the current, which shifted the eddy line up one barge tie-up. That shift changed the largemouth's position and we never figured out how to catch them again. I tried a little bit of everything, from magnum shaky heads to jigs to cranks. I did have a terrific bite, which I am SURE was a solid smallie. It came just off of a rock pile that we had marked fish with the Lowerance structure scan. We did catch a boatload of white bass, though. That was JUST FINE by us!
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