January Fish

[Allday]

The wife and I went out Fri. to test out the 798 SI we got for Christmas and loved it. We met Riverman at a little honey hole off the Tombigbee River and had a good afternoon of fishing. The wind was blowing a little but not really bad. The water was 44 degs. and the air temp. was 64 deg. fishing minnows about 4ft deep. We put 10 crappie and 2 bass in the boat and Riverman had 14 crappie not bad. The date is wrong on the camera we did catch fish on the day on the pics.http://i362.photobucket.com/albums/o...9/102_0027.jpg
Nice sunset!!
http://i362.photobucket.com/albums/o...9/102_0031.jpg
Our little catch.
http://i362.photobucket.com/albums/o...9/102_0023.jpg
Riverman and his stringer.

[Gansett]

Congrats on a great day of fishing. I'm wondering if you omitted a zero following the 4? Something happened to your pics, hope you can repost--sure would like to see them.

[gone_fishing]

Your making me jealous sitting here with snow on the ground rotten ice on the lakes more cold weather and snow on the way.

[Riverman]

There is something about this particular location that these fish start moving shallow very early.Not sure exactly what it is.May be that there is some warm water springs located in the cove.There may be some bait hanging out nearby.Relatively new at fishing in this lake but it has proven to be a good'un.We started fishing the banks last year in Feb.Fish were everywhere.We decided that we would start here in Jan. this year.Fish were ganged up around a submerged top.Tried the banks early that morning with no luck.Stumbled onto these fish after the wind got up around lunchtime.The bite was during a window of a couple three hrs.This lake also covers with grass during late spring and is very limited access due to mobility.Water was up a couple of times during winter and blew most grass beds out.Allday posted pictures on the AL state forum that will open.

[tritonman]

Where are you guys fishing out of on the Tom. I do a good bit of fishing out of Longs Landing just outside of Gainesville.

[Riverman]

Mostly fishing in creeks and river located above Coffeeville L&D.Not a whole lot of options in this locale.Most of these will grass over in early spring.We will focus mostly in the main river then.We also will fish in the Alabama river above Claiborne L&D.Pretty much use same pattern on this body of water.Creeks and coves early and main river after spawn.All the fisherman in this area probaly do the same thing.We also will venture up to Millers Ferry ocaisionally.Thats the next L&D above Claiborne.We got pretty aggressive last year and put over 600 keepers in the boat.We set a goal to try and catch fish in every month last year.We were somewhat successful.November and December we came up short.Mostly because we didn't go much.I didn't go after Bama started playing ball because I went to all the home games!! RTR

[Allday]

Edited the pictures today sorry about that. Like Riverman said this is a early hole for some unknown reason. I am just glad we found it, a nice honey hole. Yes 4 foot is correct the fish were that shallow. I have fished two other lakes in our area and have not found crappie that shallow in those lakes, strange is'nt it.

[Ken Jones]

How Did you find fish that shallow? Out here in the West there still pretty deep. 50 to 60 feet. I think most people who fish a lot would like to know also. Water temperature is still 39degrees here in Idaho.

[catman]

great pics.

[Riverman]

Not my thread but I will explain as best I can.We located fish in this cove (creek) real early last spring in Feb.We decided that we could probaly catch fish earlier if we could get in because of grass covering cove.The high water this year blew most of the grass out so we had no problem getting in.Not sure but the average depth of this cove is probaly around 6' deep.We just started fishing around cover such as stick ups and tops in the general area of were we last caught last year.There is something different about this particuliar place.Just haven't figured it out yet.It is also my opinion that all these places in Lower Alabama are not like the places that I read about on the internet.Due to mild weather I believe that some fish stay in these coves and creeks yearound.We have been at flood stage about 2 weeks prior to this trip.Also believe that some fish stay in the main river year round.The reason I believe this is that we keep detailed logs and catch them in all places year round.We will troll in these same coves later and will do pretty good also.Hope this explains some of how we do it down here.