lake fishing 2011

[OO7:BASSINASSASSIN]

How was the fishing last year? For me, it was poor. The fishing for tucs seems to be in a downward trend. On the other hand, I think the bass fishing was best its been since the early 90s. Unfortunately for me I do not have a boat so I do not fish for bass much. I wonder if the tucs are leaving the lake when they lower the water level. Hopefully, 2012 will be better.

[roadwarriorsvt]

I agree that the Tuc fishing has declined, at least as far as numbers. I remember hearing about 2008, where catching over 100 was not a huge feat. I started fishing the lake in 2009 and caught 20-40 Tucs during the summer months. Morgan's Point was a mad hot spot. 2010 declined more, them 2011 it declined even more. I remember seeing some of the massive busts where the water looked like it was boiling! You just don't see that instense busting anymore. Maybe more and more of the shad/bait fish is slowly getting depleted.

[Ca_Bass]

Every ecosystem will have its swings. My theory is the sustained low lake levels a few years back helped the bass out(my guess is it helped them have a good spawn) and for some reason negatively affected the tucs. I'm sure sometime in the future something will happen to swing things the other way.

I do remember when everybody was catching more tucs than they could have imagined many fisherman having thoughts that there were TOO many tucs and that was negatively affecting the bass fishing!

I only fished the lake until I think may of last year so my vote is valid to then. But I had a BUNCH of 15+ bass days.

[Basshead]

Ca-Bass is correct. Every lake goes through phases. To evaluate a fisheries by bank fishing with live bait or fishing every so often is not an accurate assesment of the population of peacocks. There are so many variables involved. Yes, you dont have the abundants of big peacocks like a few years ago, nor do you see them wagon training around the boat as before. Fishing pressure plays a big part of it. But there's plenty of 2-3 lb fish now. Peacocks school up on shad during the fall months here. Fall is usually prime time. But from time to time, you can still whack em pretty good nowadays. So I would say "fishing was good-excellent this past year".

[BASSTRACKER]

id have to agree with the natural swing of a lake. tuc were dominant for awhile now they seem to be less so. there are a lot of factors I'm sure at play. shad may have had bad spawns,weather may contribute. bass are affected the same way. i have even seen a decline in the red devils, don't see as many along the banks and not catching as many either. a lot of damn good fisherman pounding nests during the spawn too, look at it like this. the tucs feed before the spawn to fatten up for a long session on the nest. they go several weeks without eating. every time you catch one it burns that stored energy up and even if the eggs and fry are unmolested and it goes back to the nest. the next day another fisherman goes down that bank and does the same. sooner or later that fish is gonna either abandon the nest or stress will make it sick. more than likely it will eat the nearest thing to replenish itself, and that would be the fry. something to think about. after all it may not matter much on a 78000 acre impoundment but at 350acres we don't have the breeding stock to replenish after a bad spawn. water going up and down so bad last year might have killed a lot of nests too, man it was up and down so much I'm sure nests either got swamped or left high and dry. all in all the year was decent not the best but a lot of bass and some good sized tucs as well. lets hope its just a downward swing and not a trend!

[OO7:BASSINASSASSIN]

I know fish populations go in cycles and by downward trend I meant downward side of the cycle. It was up for a long time, maybe longer then when they kept the water high. When they used the water for irrigation, the fishing stayed pretty good. The bass are doing better now but still not like the 80s.