Fishing Report Archives

Hard to believe its August already - time can fly. There has been significant improvement in the fishing in 2023. A lot of people have reported better fishing for all species this year to include crappie, bluegill, red ear, white bass, largemouth bass, tons of small sauger, and smallmouth.

I do more bass fishing than anything else so that will be the nuts and bolts of this report. Ledge fishing for largemouth is still working. Traditionally fishing offshore starts to slow down as we get into July.

Something that has been different this year is there hasn’t been any really big tournaments this summer so the typical offshore ledge fishing has had little pressure. No pressure leads to good fishing. I can think of one honey hole that had a lot of bass on it during the month of June. That hole was fished every day in June by many boats and it took a beating but produced a lot of fish.

As I always say you can catch a heavy bunch of bass on Kentucky Lake any day while fishing offshore. During the month of August there will still be some good ledge fishing. I have done well fishing ledges that are 20 feet or deeper during the late summer and early fall.

The other type of offshore ledges that I have done well on during the late summer are drop offs inside of big creek mouths. These locations can hold a lot of transitional fish that are moving toward the shallows. There are many ledges in the bays and creeks that never get fished so you might just find some big ones.

When you do find a ledge that has some good fish on it most likely they are there because that spot is a good spot that holds fish during a certain time of year and not because some random school of fish landed there. I rarely use the word schools as it relates to largemouth bass because they aren’t a true schooling fish. I prefer the term groups of bass and yes, on Kentucky and Barkley lakes, bass will group up, especially in the summer.

During the last couple weeks I had some good days fishing the shallow flats out on the main lake, at creek mouths, and back in the creeks and bays. I like to use the whopper plopper, the Strike King Sexy Dawg 4.5 inches, and a buzzbait.

Many other top water baits will work. One of the main reasons the top water fishing is good now is due to the shad that have moved shallow. This top water fishing started a little early this year probably due to the abundance of shad. Some days I had to switch from top water to finesse baits.

I remember anglers saying in 2022 that they have never seen more shad in Kentucky Lake. Well there are twice as many shad in the lake this year. The largemouth bass are fighting harder this year than I have ever seen - probably due to the surplus of shad.

Basically they are building muscle by working hard to catch bait fish and because they are successful at getting the bait fish they get plenty of nutrients they need. I’ve had more than one break my line this year which is operator error - LOL!

If you enjoy catching white bass now is a good time as I’ve seen many big schools busting shad out on the main lake and in the creek arms and bays.

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