Zach's Pages

Monday, February 26, 2018

Fishing Report for Smith Lake 2/24/18

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The last two years, our club has moved from fishing Guntersville to Lewis Smith Lake in Cullman, Alabama. It's a bit of a departure from most clubs. Guntersville has historically been a hotspot and a must-fish lake early in the year, but not because of the number of bites, but the quality. Just take last weekend's tournament for me and Josh, which you can read about here. It's one of about four or five lakes in the country with that kind of number of double-digit fish, but while you can run across 9 pounders, like I did Saturday, you can also fail to get bit.

Now, factor in the recent downturn of the Big G, and that sometimes meant fishing weeks without a bite. That's changed this year, but the schedule was made already. 

Smith lake, on the other hand, has no double digit bass. But, it isn't the lake from the 80s or 90s that simply wasn't worth fishing. The introduction of blueback herring has turned Smith lake into a magnum spotted bass fishery. You can go to the Smith Lake Bass Tournament Facebook page and see how, week after week, you better have 16-20 pounds at the scales to expect a check, which is insane considering there are no fish over five pounds being caught. In other words, you better not be just catching numbers, but numbers of quality. 

That doesn't mean it's easy. Just take a look back at last year's event. You can read about our prefishing and how we turned in a 2nd place finish. In summation, prefishing was stupid tough with only about five bites a day, but those bites put us in the right locations. 


Still, we didn't find any magnum spots last year and had to cull up by ounces to get our limit.
Fishing for Smith this year started out the exact same way, though we did find one really good fish and thought we might have a pattern that involved hydrilla and sandy points for largemouth. You can read about it in the link below.

Fishing Report for Smith Lake 1/15/18


But as days and weeks went by, Brad and I continued to fish and struggle to put together a real game plan. We might catch five one day, two the next, ten the next, and not get a bite, which is essentially how we ended prefishing last Tuesday. One thing we learned from lasy year was those few bites tended to turn into good spots when the weather improved. 

So, that's how we started our tournament. We ran from the dam all the way to Rock Creek, which is a long way when you aren't really on fish. We began in a pocket that we used last year and while it produced two unders on crankbaits quickly, it didn't produce anything else for the next 30 minutes. We had hoped to get active fish on cranks early, but it wasn't meant to me. So, we went to the shakey head. 

Rounding a point to a cove we have typically caught fish, I picked up a spinnerbait and cast to buck bushes, which were now under water thanks to the rain. A fish slammed it and I boated a very, very solid spot. It wasn't a 4-pounder, but it was solid three. 

Brad began to get bit on a skakey head, adding an over and two unders. Meanwhile, I couldn't buy a bite on the stick bait I was throwing, so I went to a bigger worm. Then we both began to get bit. By 8, we had a limit of three overs and two unders. Not good enough.

We fished the pocket harder and did leave at 930 with a full limit of overs for around nine pounds. 

We made our way to a nearby rocky point that we had prefished, had caught a decent chunk, and had a history of producing fish for us. The main stretch didn't produce. That wasn't uncommon. We expected to find a fish, not multiple fish, which is what it did for us. But when we got to the rounded edge of the point, the rain clouds disappeared and the sun came out. 

The fish decided they wanted to play. 

First, it was a bite every five casts. But as we figured out where the bites were coming from and what angle the boat needed to be in, we began to boat over after over. At one point, we caught five consecutive overs. 

The rain came back, the bite died. We roamed around the point and still managed to get bit, but still couldn't find the big fish. At this point, we were sitting on 11 pounds or so with two decent spots and three clones. 

The sun came back out around noon and the bite began anew. This time, Brad caught our big fish of the day, which still wasn't very big, but was a solid 1.5 pound cull and boosted us to our final weight of 13.47. Along the way, we ended our day with around 30 fish that included two unders, two slots and around 25 overs. 

Thank goodness for culling beams! Word to the wise, every time you cull, know which fish is your smallest that is already in the livewell. It will prevent you from having to fish them out every time you catch another fish. If we had been smart, we would have known this. 

Come weigh in time, almost everyone had a limit of fish. We took home first place with the 13.47. Second and third were right on our heels. Big fish was a spot a little over 4 pounds, but we didn't catch it. 

Water temp was 61 degrees in most places. We fished moderately stained water on the main river channel, specifically points in Rock Creek. By far, the most damage was done on a shakey head with a seven inch worm in green pumpkin. I fished a 3/8ths ounce while Brad used a 1/2 ounce. He fished braid and I fished 10 pound Segaur. It didn't make a different. 

The fish were definitely feeding up, as we had most of the fish spitting crawfish and shad everywhere. I caught one spot that had so much shad and crawfish in its mouth that I don't know how it managed to get the worm in there! 

Get out there and fish Smith. The next month or so is going to be a riot. I sure wish I knew how to catch them big spots, but 30-plus days are A-OK with me!
 

Wednesday, February 21, 2018

Guntersville 2/17/18

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I haven't been on Guntersville since October of last year. Yes, this is the beginning of an excuse. Just hang with me, please.

So, the ABT on Pickwick didn't happen. I'm still not sure how I feel about it. We weren't catching any fish, but we were on fish, if that makes sense. No, I didn't' really talk about it in my fishing report I wrote, which you can read here. But, after trip upon trip failed to turn up any fish (and I mean that literally) we had scanned enough to know where there were. While we didn't catch any, we really didn't try too hard. Anyway, it doesn't matter now aside to say that I had planned to fish Saturday and suddenly found myself free. 

Then I remembered our NASA club had a tournament on Guntersville and I thought, hey, next ABT is on Guntersville in a few weeks. Might as well fish, right? But, like I said, I hadn't been on the G since October and I didn't have legitimate hope we could win a tournament. I mean, there's a billion boats out there and the fishing has been tough. 

But I did think it was setting up for a fantastic day where we could catch some monster fish. We had a few warming days and a lot of rain. Saturday was going to be warm and overcast, perhaps some rain. I talked Josh in to it and boasted that we were gonna catch 20 pounds. He said he had better odds on not getting a bite. A quick look on social media showed that the G was heating up. 

Now, recall that my last trip on the G wasn't terrible. It was our other club's Classic and Brad had caught a 7 pounder in practice. I backed that up with one of my own the day of the tournament and we cashed a good check. The fish ended up being the biggest of the year for the club. Not a bad way to end the season, I'd say. And, like I have told people, while I detest fishing Guntersville, it is the only lake where I feel I have a legitimate chance of catching a 7 or bigger at any point. You can read about that tournament by clicking the link below.


Anyways, we put in at Scottsboro city park and since we didn't have any clue to where we were going to fish, we pretty much but the trolling motor in the water and began casting. 

I had four baits tied on and I was determined that I would only throw those. I had a lipless crank XR50 tied on in Rayburn red, a white chatterbait, a green pumpkin swim jig, and the Bull shad. All of these are standard February fare. 

Where we were, the water temp was 55, the clarity less than two feet but not as stained as other areas. I started out throwing the XR50 mostly as Josh was throwing variations of the other baits. After an hour of not getting any bites, I began to modify my retrieve. Yo-Yoing is common. So is a straight retrieve. I slowed it down. And I got bit.

The first fish was a four pounder. When it got to the boat, it made a hard shake and threw the bait. Minutes later, I boated a three pounder. Then another keeper. Along this five foot contour line we followed, there was definite areas with males and definite areas with females. And, there was a lot of space in between with nothing. The males were on a secondary point and the females further into the cove we were fishing. In this area, there was grass but there was no rhyme or reason to dead grass versus emerging grass nor areas with no grass. It was simply the fish were here and there and no where in between.

Around 9:30, I was throwing the bull shad and the rod loaded up. I did my best to keep the fish from getting in the grass, but she wasn't coming up. For awhile, I thought I had lost here because of the amount of weight on the other end, combined with no real action or movement. But, two minutes later, we boated the beast. I had done my best to shield the action from the three boats fishing behind us, but moments later, two boats were close enough to ask us about the fish I just caught. I knew it was a nine-pounder, but played it down and said it was a six. 

We did learn that lots of fish were getting caught, just no quality.

We hammered the area for another few hours, catching several more on lipless cranks and occasionally a chatterbait, but nothing that measured outside of one more 15 inch fish. 

At weigh in, we had a little over 13 pounds, which included the 8.95 hog. It was fairly depressing not to have a few more fish with that kind of monster and I think I was more upset about the illusion that we lucked into her than we found her. 

Truth is, this spot we've fished has produced that kind of quality before, but never more than three. You can check out one of those reports from 2014 here. In fact, this spot is the number one reason we had to buy a bigger net for Josh's boat. In all, we caught around 10 fish, but it was the loss of the four pounder that cost us first place. First was a decent bag of 14 pounds, none of which over three pounds. Only two limits were caught out of 10 boats. 

Anyways, still a great day. Likely the last time I will catch one that big. But, hope springs eternal. 


Tuesday, February 6, 2018

Fishing Report for Pickwick (Year to Date)

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I know, most of you must be thinking "Dang, Zach must not be fishing or at least catching cause he sure ain't posted in awhile." 

If you guessed the latter, you would be right. Hey, it's tough to make a fishing report when you haven't caught a measuring bass in THREE WEEKS. That's right, folks. I've fished Pickwick at least once a week since essentially January first. 

My first trips on Pickwick resulted in some big numbers or big bags. On one trip, we caught thirty fish like it wasn't any issue. Next trip was tough, but we had a solid 17 pound bag without any big ones. 


But, starting January 1st, the fish stopped biting. Like, at all. But, if you have been on Pickwick, you likely know that.

Ok, so as days went by, I starting talking to more and more fishermen. Now, it's widely known that fishermen are liars, but I find that only the case when they are catching them. Frustration is easy to see. This included locals and non-locals alike. And, after Josh's motor tossed a blade and I was rescued by several locals, I was able to really get in depth with the local flavor and they had some interesting things to say,.

First, if the water temps are under 50 degrees, they say don't bother. Second, there was a shad kill and that killed everyone's change to get bit. Literally. 

Everyone else reported what I've experienced: Days without a bite. After an unsuccessful trip Saturday, I watched a large club weigh in. The winner won with 14 pounds of spots out of his wrapped boat that proudly displayed his so-and-so fishing.com website. The rest of the field? I saw three fish weighed. Total. 

In talking with fishermen I know, most everyone is skunked. The ones who catch anything get only a few bites, but they are the right kind, and they are coming within minutes of one another. So, if you DO get one to bite, you can get more, but it may only be a for a minute or two. 

I know this has to do with the weather, so I started looking at some trends over this year and previous years.

First things first: TVA keeps water level records for five years. The lake is at 409.5 elevation. That is the lowest in the five year period. 

Here's a comparison of previous years on February 5th and then on the 15th:
2018-409.5
2017-410.8 / 410.65
2016-412 / 410.5
2015-409.7 / 409.6
2014-410.4 / 411.2
2013-414 / 411.5

Ok, so that's all just subject to rain, right? Here's a look at precipitation for those years.
2017-2"
2016-2.97"
2015-2.24"
2014-2.67"

Thus far in 2018, we have had 2.5", year to date, and that includes .79" in the last five days with an estimated 3-4" on the way this week. So, we should exceed those totals for the last few years and likely all previous years, which is why TVA has kept the lake low, I suppose. In the meantime, flow has been non-existant. You need at least 60,000-70,000 CFS to really get smallies biting. We've been seeing 30s most days. That's going to do a few things: bring the water level of the lake up and create flow, all good things. 

While that's likely great for the smallies, the smallie bite alone won't support 220 boats. That means largemouth, and that means dependency on weather. Obviously, the weather has been a huge factor that resulted in a shad kill. How does it compare to past years? Let's take a look at average temp, average high and average low.

Year            AVG Temp            AVG High          AVG Low
2014                 44                          65                       30
2015                 36                          57                       19
2016                 47                          63                       29
2017                 53                          69                       38
2018(to date)   40                          49                        33

In summation, this year isn't even the coldest average, but we haven't had the amount of "heating days." That is, while the average is slightly higher than, say, 2015 and the low isn't as low as 2014, the average high is 8 degrees lower than the nearest year. Since water has an exponentially higher thermal coefficient than air, it takes a lot more energy to warm it. That means days and days of much warmer air is needed, which we haven't had. And, brutal cold snaps, of which we've had several, undo any warming there could be. As it stands now, water temps are still in the mid-40s. 

Anyway, it should be of no surprise that times are tough. The water is low, the flow is low, the temps are low. The question is, will there be enough heating days in the next 10 days to warm the water up at least five degrees?

Hope this puts things in perspective.