S L O W

Location: Browns Ferry - Wheeler Lake - Alabama

Time: 6:00 AM - 12:30 PM
Air Temperature: 89 Degrees
Water Temperature: 83-85 Degrees
Lake Level: 555.98'.
Weather Conditions: Calm.  Winds less than 6 mph SSE

I launched again from the house today with the intent of running jugs.  Today I launched them right in front of my house on the flat between the stump row and the channel in about 12 feet of water.  I had cut bait on all the hooks.  I only launched 12 today since they didn't do so good yesterday.

I went up to the nuclear plant to rod and reel fish.  Bite was very slow near the boils by the pipeline.  I only picked up two here today by bouncing bottom with shrimp.

I split my time between fishing the boils, the water intake gates, and running the jugs in between changing spots.  The jugs didn't produce a single fish on the first run.  The intake gates didn't produce any fish today at all.  I caught one nice blue about 8 lbs on my second jug run and also caught a small flathead. 

I picked Jessica up and we rotated through the normal spots again with no luck.  We even tried a bobber over the rocks on the bank to try to see if they were spawning on the rocks, but had no luck there either. 

We ran the jugs a final time and and caught one small blue.  Overall, a very slow day with only 5 fish.

Location: Browns Ferry - Wheeler Lake - Alabama

Time: 6:00 AM - 1:00 PM
Air Temperature: 94 Degrees Hot!!
Water Temperature: 83-85 Degrees
Lake Level: 555.99'.
Weather Conditions: Calm.  Winds less than 6 mph SSE

I had spend the previous week re-tying all my catfish jugs and added 8 more to the fleet, so I was anxious to get some jugs out.  I launched at the house and started off by dropping 20 jugs on the flat just west of Mallard Creek in about 14 feet of water.  I had cut bait on every hook.  I then headed to the nuclear plant to fish my normal spot along the pipeline.  

I was bouncing bottom with shrimp as bait.  Fishing was a bit slow.  I fished about 1.5 hours and pick up 3 catfish.  One was a very nice female blue cat full of eggs.  I'd say she weighted 10-12 lbs.  

I then headed over to run the jugs, but had absolutely ZERO fish or lost bait.  It begin to cross my mind that jug conditions may not be right.  We were on the tail end of a mayfly hatch and some of the catfish were releasing eggs.  They may not be on the flats like normal.  I pulled all the jugs and took them to the north side of the river and launched them in deeper water about 20 ft deep just as an experiment.  I figured the catfish may be moving shallow, but wanted to rule out deep water first.

I returned to rod and reel fishing over by the nuclear plant intake gates and pylons.  I picked up three more nice cats there with one big blue in the boat that probably weighed 10-12 lbs.  I released both of the large fish of the day.

Jessica joined me and we ran the jugs again.  ZERO luck again.  Headed back to the house having caught 6 cats total and kept the 4 that were of a good size to eat.

Jugging with Doug and Douglas

Location: Browns Ferry - Wheeler Lake - Alabama

Time: 8:30 AM - 1:00 PM
Air Temperature: 86 Degrees Hot!!
Water Temperature: 81-85 Degrees
Lake Level: 554.7' - A little more than a foot low.
Weather Conditions: Started calm, choppy by the early afternoon.

Fished with Doug and Douglas Ainsworth for catfish today.  Launched by my house this morning.  Immediately noticed water had dropped.  TVA was pulling water out in preparation of rising waters from all the recent rain from the tropical storm.  

We launched some jugs over on the flats off the point of Mallard creek in 13-14 feet of water.  The idea was to catch the cats on their journey leaving the shallows from their overnight feeding and heading to the channel. Then we headed over to the nuclear plant.  I had fears that we might be dealing with some strong current and that ended up being the case.  I've never seen current so strong in Wheeler Lake.  We had a really tough time keeping in the sweet spot and keeping our line vertical.  We gave it a shot of a couple hours, then decided it wasn't worth the struggle.  Doug did catch one blue cat while bouncing bottom.  We had several other good bites, but just could stay on them in the current.  We were using shrimp and cut shad as bait. We did notice the catfish guide boats appeared to be heading in early.  I think they were struggling, too.  

We decided to run the jugs and regroup with a new plan.  Jugs ended up producing well!  We caught 5 fish off the first float with one being a whopper.  I'd estimate it to weigh in around 20 lbs.  With the success on the first float, we reset the jugs and tied up a couple more and let them soak for another hour.  We ran them the 2nd time  around 1:00.  We only caught one on the 2nd float, so it appeared the fish had made their move, so we called it a day.

Ended up keeping 7 cats.  They dressed to almost 8 lbs of finished fillets.  Looking forward to doing it again!

 

Location: Browns Ferry - Wheeler Lake - Alabama

Time: 8:00 AM - 1:00 PM
Air Temperature: 92 Degrees Hot!!
Water Temperature: 80-82 Degrees near boils
Lake Level: 555.71’
Weather Conditions: Calm. Very Nice!

Fished the nuclear plant where the discharge water meets the channel like normal. I was bumping bottom with shrimp. Very calm, nice morning, but it turned out  to get very hot. Activity was better in the morning and slowed around lunch. Caught 5 catfish out of the boils. I fished around the pylons and the water gates and picked up one more nice blue cat. I also threw a jig around a log jam and pulled out a couple nice bluegill. Very nice morning.  Channel cat bellies looked to be full of eggs.  Catfishing should pick up and be good in the area for the next month. 

Location: Browns Ferry - Wheeler Lake - Alabama

Time: 7:00 AM - 9:00 AM
Air Temperature:
Water Temperature:
Lake Level: 554.93'
Weather Conditions: Fairly Windy

Catfishing with Amy McGovern.  Attempted to goo out night fishing last night, but winds were very bad!!  Still very windy today.  Fished with shrimp.  Tried to fish the boils and discharge at Browns Ferry with rod and reel, but didn't have any luck.  We had some jugs floating to the SW along the flats on the Decatur side.  Did OK on jugs.  Didn't fish long, but caught 3-4 good catfish. 

Location: Browns Ferry - Wheeler Lake - Alabama

Time: Afternoon
Air Temperature:
Water Temperature:
Lake Level: 555.24'
Weather Conditions: 

Didn't take good notes today, but Jessica and I fished Browns Ferry in the evening for catfish.  Looks like we had a pretty good afternoon.  Caught at least 3 catfish.  I imagine we were using shrimp.

 

Location: Browns Ferry - Wheeler Lake - Alabama

Time: 8:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Air Temperature: 75-85ish degrees
Water Temperature: 86 degrees in boils
Lake Level: 555.85'
Weather Conditions: South - South West 7 mph.  Hot, but good weather.

Catfishing with Kyle Macomber.  Had trouble catching good baitfish again today.  All shad were very small.  Caught 1 gizzard shad for bait in over 1 hour of trying.

Got to Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant at 9AM and fished the discharge water in 32'-37' of water.  Fished the drop off of the underwater gas line.  Depth changes from 24' to 32' fast.  Fished with shad and also raw shrimp.  Kyle caught one stripper.  We bounced bottom for about 2 hours and 40 minutes and caught 15 catfish.  Biting and striking upwards much of the time.  Mostly blues, but some channels.  Shrimp did just as good as shad.  Had trolling motor trouble, so left early because couldn't troll anymore.  Overall good day!