Fishing Report Archives

From the September fishing scene on Kentucky Lake comes pretty good reports from crappie fishermen who have landed some nice stringers of the area’s most popular panfish.

Each year crappie sort of transition toward shallow to midrange depths once the late summer begins to lose its grip and fall’s presence is imminent.

Once cooler nights enter the picture and surface temperatures fall it stimulates movement of baitfish, namely schools of threadfin shad, toward shallow flats and big bays as well. That seems to be what’s happening at the present time.

Crappie fishermen this week have found a few more fish entering the 9 to 12 foot depth zones. Structure in the midrange area is attracting a few nice crappie that are showing interest in both live minnows and jigs tipped with minnows. Tipping jig with Berkley power nibbles in the white, chartreuse and various metalflake colors has produced too.

Fall officially arrives on September 22nd this year but it’s not unusual for fish to begin taking on a fall pattern mode before the seasons officially change on the calendar.

Meanwhile, there are always a few fishermen working the deep ledges or secondary sloughs and creek channels that locate deep fish. Some reports this week indicated scattered crappie were taken in 20 to 23 feet!

Surface temperatures this week reflect some cool mornings as readings are starting the day off in the 78 degree range and warming to 81 or so by midday. That’s beats the upper 80’s from last month so the slow cooling trend has already started.

The long range forecast shows a slow cooling trend going into next week but until then warm days remain, although highs are not expected to return to the low 90’s as was the case earlier this week.

Water color remains clear across the reservoir. Lake levels are projected to be in the 355.7 range---which is down a few inches from last week--- by this weekend in the Kentucky Dam area. Similar readings are expected upstream in the New Johnsonville area so the reservoir is expected to be relatively stable in the days ahead.

Catfishing has been fair with boats still relating to the edge of the main Tennessee River channel banks and beneath the New McWherter bridge here in the Paris Landing sector. Productive depths have been in the 30 to 35 foot range. Nightcrawlers and chicken livers are still producing.

Bass fishing continues to be somewhat challenging for even experienced anglers who are struggling at times to put together a consistent pattern. While a few fish have been taken it hasn’t been easy to locate decent numbers of medium to larger size fish.

Some anglers are staying with a summer pattern and still banging away at ledges and humps out on the main lake area. Big Texas rigged worms plus shad variations of huge crankbaits have worked at times as have swim baits and even some Carolina rigged craws and worms.

Back in the big bays some boats are still searching for roaming schools of baitfish and bass. Tossing Strike King’s Red-eye shad and Bill Lewis Rattle Traps in chrome/blue color combinations have accounted for several small fish at times.

Fan casting the upper end of big bays where acres of aquatic weeds once attracted late summer bass will still put anglers in touch with a few fish even though not much cover is present.

Gravel banks haven’t offered much in the way of a topwater bite lately. Normally, bass begin to move up and chase those early morning and late afternoon gravel bank shad sprees but that pattern has been slow to emerge. Perhaps cooler surface temps will stimulate that bite in the weeks ahead.