Summer Fun with the Family

 

2021 Catfish Kickoff

Wheeler Lake - Browns Ferry

Time: 7:30 AM - 11:30 AM
Air Temperature: 53 - 67 degrees during trip
Water Temperature: 77 Degrees
Lake Level: 507.27
Weather Conditions: Mostly Cloudy.  Clearing mid-day. Winds N-NW 9-10 mph sustained.

I've put up my long crappie rods for the summer and converted the boat over to a catfish slayer.  Today was my first 2021 day targeting catfish.  I thawed out some gizzard shad for the poles and some old threadfin to float some jugs and launched this morning at Cowford.  We had a cold front push through yesterday and it was cold for a late May day.  The cloud cover and north wind didn't help the temperature.

I dropped 6 jugs in from on my neighborhood and went down past the nuclear plant boils where the secondary channel spits and dropped 7 more.  I moved down past the powerline island and dropped 7 more there and then returned to the nuclear plant to drop my pole.

I attempted the livesocope today targeting catfish, but I can't say it made a difference like it does with crappie.  I concentrated on the pipeline dropoff near the green buoy.  I caught 3 nice fish on my first 3 passes.  I hung around bouncing bottom with cut gizzard shad and picked up another one before heading back to check jugs.

I caught a couple fish on the first jug drop, but only caught one total out of the other 14 jugs.  I decided to pick up these jugs. I headed back to the nuclear plant and gave it another go.  I wasn't having much luck near the green buoy, so I move to the middle of the channel near the dropoff and hit a good honey hole.  I picked up 2-3 more here.  

Around 11, I decided to call it an early day and pick up the remaining jugs.  The wind never really let up and it was pretty difficult to hold position.  The weather was clearing, but I needed to get back to the house and clean fish.  I picked up another could on the first jug drop and headed home.

It was an excellent start to my catfish season.  I ended up catching 12 and keeping 10 for the freezer. 3 of the 4 channel cats were still holding eggs, so the spawn is still active. One fish was slightly over 10 lbs and I threw it back.  Most were good eating size.  Will hit it again in another week or two and start running trotlines soon.

2021 Spring Crappie Finale

 Cedar Creek Reservoir

Time: 7:30 AM - 2:30 PM
Air Temperature: 61 - 78 degrees during trip
Water Temperature: 
Lake Level: 580.24
Weather Conditions: Mostly Cloudy. Winds N-NW 6-12 mph

Doug and I took a day off today and hit the water for one last time for our spring crappie season.  It was a bit chilly and the cloud cover never lifted for long,

We started off fishing near the boat landing on the south shore.  The wind would soon get up and make the south shore tough, so we tried there in then shallows first with minnows and a bobber.  We struck out in our first 2-3 shallow stops, so we knew we needed to do something different.  

We decided to target deep water fully submerged structure like we had success with a couple weeks back.  We started on the east end of the lake on the big south bay in the bend of the river and quickly caught a few with the livescope and vertical jigging.  One we hit a couple locations here, we headed down to the far north west side of the lake and fished the narrow channel in the deep water we found fishing earlier in the year.  Once again, today we caught fish on ever single stop where we concentrated on submerged structure and jigging with the livescope.  The difference today was that we were pulling up good fish whereas a couple weeks earlier, only small, immature fish were in the deep structure.  

I don't believe we took any pictures today, but had a solid day.   Especially considering we had to completely change tactics.  We ended the day catching 20 crappie with 9 big enough to keep and one drum.  Once again, I was surprised to see 5-6 still hold eggs at the end of April.  Also surprised fish caught in 15-20 FOW over suspended structure hadn't moved up to lay.

Overall, I had a solid 2020/2021 crappie season averaging 24 crappie per trip and 12 large enough to keep each time.  Very solid improvement in progress over the past few years.  I'm changing over to catfish now and will pick up the long poles again in November.

Spring Crappie Winding Down

Cedar Creek Reservoir

Time: 7:30 AM - 3:00 PM
Air Temperature: 54 - 79 degrees during trip
Water Temperature: 
Lake Level: 580.22
Weather Conditions: Partly Cloudy. Winds S-SE 4-7 mph

Returned back to Cedar Creek today and fished solo.  Spent a lot of time fishing shallow again exclusively with minnows and a bobber.  Had my best luck over at the Lost Creek docks around mid-day.  I'm writing all this a few weeks late, so I don't remember all the details except it was a solid day.  Caught 25 crappie with 13 big enough to keep and 5 largemouth bass.  Caught a couple nice sized fish today.  Surprised to see 5-6 females still holding eggs when I cleaned them.  Seems spawn isn't quite over yet...

2021 Cedar Creek Guys Trip

Cedar Creek Reservoir Guys Trip
April 15 - 18, 2021

Daniel McGovern
Ronny Watkins
Eric Watkins

We started what I hope is a new tradition this year.  Back around Christmas, I pitched an idea to have a spring crappie fishing trip to my dad and brother-in-law and they were all it.  We coordinated a few days vacation in mid-April centered around the spawn and made it a plan.

Dad came up on Wednesday afternoon and we did some grocery shopping a packing.  Daniel came up on Thursday morning and we hit the road for a 11:30 AM target time.

April 15 2021

We booked a cabin from BCDA Elliott Branch (http://www.bearcreeklakes.com/elliott-branch.html) and checked in right on time.  This was my first time dealing with the BCDA cabins and I was a little nervous about the location and amenities, but once we got there, we realized it was the perfect setup.  The cabins are very nice and had absolutely everything we needed.  We got everything unpacked and settled in and made some sandwiches and prepared to hit the water. 

We stopped by CJ's and got some tuffies and made it to Britton Bridge landing at 1:00 PM.  We set about to fish my normal places and techniques starting with the south side of the bank near the boat landing.  The temperature was in the mid 60's with a high of 67 and the winds were about 10 MPH from the N/NW.  It was sunny and beautiful and the water temperature was around 68 in the shallows.  We began floating tuffies under a bobber in the shallows and BOOM! crappie on the 1st cast! 

We fished heavy around the landing, levee, pumphouse, and on the blow down past the bridge all evening and had a solid day.  We finished with 29 crappie caught with 14 being keepers.  We also caught a bluegill, rock bass, and largemouth.  Very good day considering we launched a 1:00.

We headed back to the cabin and I cleaned fish while Daniel and Dad cooked dinner.  Daniel made some smash burgers and hot dogs that rocked.  After dinner, we were all exhausted and hit the sack early.

April 16 2021

We were all up around 6 AM and cooked sausage, biscuits, and eggs for breakfast.  We headed back out shortly after 7:00AM on Friday and started off with the same tactics as the day before.  However, the temperature had dropped substantially overnight and a cold front was blowing in.  The water temperature dropped about 5 degrees overnight with the lows getting down into the 40's and cloud cover set in for the entire day.  The high was only about 64 degrees.  This made our tactics from the day before much less effective.  We pulled a couple out of the shallows, but it started off very slow.  The fish we were catching were also much smaller.  We moved around a great deal and the fish were scattered.  We caught a few early, but went into a tremendous dry spell through the middle of the day.  

It was pretty obvious that the fish had pull back some from the shallows.  We couldn't find them in the deeper blowdowns on the bank either.  By middle afternoon, we decided to change our approach entirely and we found some submerged structure in the little bay where I normally fish with the blowdown past the bridge.  This structure was completely submerged in about 8-12 FOW.  We set up the Livescope and switched over to jigs.  The crappie started hitting immediately!  It seemed the key to the colder weather with the cold front moving in.  

We ended the day with 16 crappie caught and 10 keepers.  Daniel caught one bluegill big enough to keep.  We also caught 2 largemouth and one rock bass. While it was much slower, we still had a great time and had a good game plan ready for Saturday morning.

We went back to the cabin and I cleaned fish again while Dad and Daniel cooked.  We fried some of the fish we caught from the previously day and was absolutely stuffed! 

April 17 2021

We got up about 6:30AM and cooked another fabulous breakfast - deer tenderloin, sausage, biscuits, and eggs.  We hit the water shortly after 7:30AM and started the day with a plan to fish deeper water and fully submerged structure.  This day was much like the previous with heavy cloud cover and highs in the mid 60's.  The water temperature never recovered and stayed around 63 to 64 degrees.  

We started out were we finished the previous day past the bridge fishing structure in 8-12 FOW with jigs and we were immediately getting bites.  We pulled several out but overall, the size of the fish was very small.  We motored around the mouths of the bays and coves scanning and marking structure.  

We were all amazed that every single submerged structure spot we marked and fished held crappie.  We probably did this 10 different times and caught fish every time.  However, all fish coming out of deep structure were very small.  We realized later in the afternoon while fishing out towards the dam end of the lake that the small fish must be immature and would not move up to spawn.  Therefore, they had no need to leave the deeper structure.  

This would be our final afternoon of fishing, so we hit up the boat docks and some of the most promising shallow spots and managed to pull in a few keepers.  The bigger fish wanted to be shallow, but the wind got up to around 10 MPH NW and the combination of the cooler water and the muddy, windy wave action made shallows tough.  Still, we had a much more successful day that the previous since we had come into it with a better game plan.  We ended the day with 22 crappie, but only 4 keepers. Daniel also caught a nice channel catfish under the boat docks and we kept that one too.  

We headed back to the cabin and I cleaned fish while Dad and Daniel cooked.  Daniel cooked some killer ribeye steaks on charcoal.  

April 18 2021

Week took Sunday as a day of rest and cooked a good sausage, egg, and toast breakfast and packed up and got ready for checkout.  Overall, I believe we caught 65 crappie with 28 of them keepers.  We also had a mixed bag of other fish (bluegill, largemouth, rock bass, catfish). We had an outstanding time and a much needed break.  I can't wait to hit it again next year.

2021 Cedar Creek Day 2 - Ridin' Solo

 Cedar Creek Reservoir

Time: 7:30 AM - 3:00 PM
Air Temperature: 51 - 70 degrees during trip
Water Temperature: 63 degrees
Lake Level: 581.58
Weather Conditions: Sunny. Clear. Heavy winds. 12 mph to 15 mph W.  Sustained.

Today was day 2 of my month on Cedar Creek.  I hit it solo today.  I started out on the south shore near the Britton Bridge boat ramp and picked up a couple quickly with minnows under a bobber up against the logs.  They had an extremely soft bite this morning and setting the hook was very difficult. The wind got up and made it tough to stay in position.  I tried moving out a little deeper and pick off suspend fish over deeper structure and managed to pull a couple out of about 8 FOW with jigs and the livescope.  

The wind forced me to move on so I went to the bay by the pump house and pulled out a couple shorts.  I then intended to go under the bridge over to the good south side blow down, but there was a boat in the spot, so I went up the the north blow down in the bend instead.  As I mentioned yesterday, it is in pretty poor shape this year, but I parked on the east side and tied off and was able to put 3-4 out of it with minnows.  I worked several more small areas on the north shore but struggled to stay out of the wind.  Fish were very scattered, but I picked up a few along the way in 3.5 FOW to 1.5 FOW.  Fish were about 50/50 keepers vs shorts.

I ran up to Lost Creek, and the wind was terrible.  I intended to fish around the docks on the west side to stay out of the wind, but there was a boat there too.  I instead fished the dogleg bay on the eastern shore.  I jigged a couple out of the deeper water with the livescope.  Once finished, the boat was still in my preferred spot, so I just headed back towards the bridge.  

I tried to fish my 1st spot of the day again but the wind made it impossible.  I took another pass near the pumphouse with now luck.  As a final effort to fish out of the wind, I crossed under the bridge and headed to the south shore up against the road to be sheltered from the wind. 

Bingo.  This was the ticket.  I began pulling crappie out of the log jams and bushes in the rear of this area.  Fishing was strong and steady and they were striking the minnows hard again.  I pulled in several here to finish the day with 11 keepers and 11 shorts and one yellow bass.

As I mentioned, the fish were scattered and the wind made it extremely tough, but overall, I was very satisfied with what I managed to catch.  I'll head back Thursday with my Dad and brother-in-law.

Kicking off Cedar Creek Spring Crappie Season

Cedar Creek Reservoir

Time: 7:45 AM - 5:00 PM
Air Temperature: 58 - 78 degrees during trip
Water Temperature: 63 degrees
Lake Level: 581.56
Weather Conditions: Sunny. Clear. Winds turning heavy. 6 mph to 15 mph SSE

Today kicked off our spring crappie season on Cedar Creek.  Doug and I cashed in a vacation day and hit the water.  We put in a Britton Bridge and fished the nearby south shore first.  Pretty much immediately, we got into the crappie while pitching slip bobbers and minnows into the stumps, bushes, and log jams.  They were hitting hard in about 3.5 FOW up to about 1.5 FOW.  Douglas and I pulled in several pretty rapidly.  Lots of short fish...

Afterwards, we went over on the north shore near the pump house and pulled out a couple, but is was slower, so we quickly moved on.  We headed under the bridge and looked for the structure I'd fished the past couple seasons on the other side of the road, but the water was too high to fish it by sight.

We rounded the corner upstream and fished the big blow down on the south shore and managed to pull several more out of there.  Again, many short fish.  I pulled 3-4 out of there on vertical jigs as well.

We tried the blow down on the north bank in the curve of the river, but had no luck.  The winter was not kind to the blow down and it is very rough in shape now.  

We headed all the way west towards the dam and went back into the cedar stands on the south shore to the area I did well last year.  We picked up about three largemouth there, but not much for crappie. We were well into a fish drought by this point of the day.

We headed back up to the north shore and tried all the typical areas, but struck out every time.  We did catch about 7 rock bass, but no crappie.

With our day getting short, we decided to head back to our first stop and re-fish that area.  Glad we did.  Doug pulled in two nice crappie and Douglas and I added several as well.  

Overall, it was a solid day.  Ended up with 15 keepers and threw about 20 back.  Caught a total of about 45 fish today.