Back from Watts Bar ...

[CrappiePappy]

and once again we managed to pick a date that was a couple of weeks too early for the Fall dock shooting for Black Crappie on Watts Bar Lake :D

Nonetheless ... we did manage to catch some "size", even though we didn't catch "numbers".

Water temp - 68deg
Water cond - Summer Pool .. clear to 2-4ft
Depth most fish caught - 18-20ft deep in 22-24ft of water
Bait - jighead tipped with minnow (deep water brush) ... yellow/char solid body jig (Vertical Casting docks)
Weather - Thur (sunny & cool) Fri (intermittant rain showers) Sat (overcast & windy)

We averaged around 10 fish per day (Thurs afternoon, Friday, Sat) but only had 3 keepers on Thur & Fri and 6 keepers on Sat. But, the size was much better than normal ... as we were getting into mostly White Crappie, whereas we would normally be catching Black Crappie. When going to Watts Bar, on our Fall trip, we expect to be catching 1lb Black Crappie, dock shooting. When the docks failed to produce much, we went to Plan B ... got some minners and went to some deep water trees.
Didn't take many pics, but these tell the tale :

Saturday's haul (top Crappie is 10" - Gill is about 8")



Me holding 4 of the "bigguns"



Sunday morning we were greeted with this



Special thanks to DonG - for getting those jig bodies for Paul. He put a whoopin on me with them (dock shooting). He caught a Blacknose that would go about 1.5lbs or better, and most all the keepers on Thurs & Fri. I salvaged my respect on Sat ... catching all 6 keeper Crappie, & the Catfish. He did manage the nice Gill, though :p
Special thanks to "Killer", of Watts Bar Crappie Tournament fame, for showing us the honeyhole known as "The Slide" (we even got to hear the McCaunahans "get out of my honeyhole alarm siren" ... for over an hour :rolleyes: ... but, we just kept on fishing :p )
And a special thanks to Arrowhead Resort Marina & Restaurant ... for the great accomodations & food. We'll be back

... cp

[lungbuster]

Great story and pix. Thanks for sharing.

[slimeyslab]

(we even got to hear the McCaunahans "get out of my honeyhole alarm siren" ... for over an hour ... but, we just kept on fishing ) Please fill us in on this....

[GRIZZ]

Your making me want to warm up the cruise ship and head to the Bar. 2 weeks from now huh?

[Fatman]

Thanks for sharing!!!!!!!! Nice pics

Fatman

[Cane Pole]

You even look like a fisherman.......Glad you got some fishies CP.

your pal,

Tom

[CrappiePappy]

(we even got to hear the McCaunahans "get out of my honeyhole alarm siren" ... for over an hour ... but, we just kept on fishing ) Please fill us in on this....

The situation is this : the submerged trees are right in front of their property, and are scattered from 5ft of water out to almost 30ft of water. It's a well known, and often productive spot. It would appear that they feel they have exclusive rights to the waters in front of their property. They have a siren/alarm device that they have been known to turn on, with the idea and intent to drive away anyone fishing that area. In our case, since we were catching quality fish, we chose to continue to fish, noise or no noise. :p

While we were perfectly within our rights to fish there, seeing that we were never even within 50ft of their dock/property, and even though we could have reported it as "harrassment of a sportsman conducting legal sport fishing" ... we chose to ignore it, in the hopes of sending a message to them that we were not going to be intimidated from our legal pursuit, and that their attempt to do so was useless. We hoped that, once they saw that it was a fruitless attempt, that they would just give up using it on anyone/everyone. I have my doubts, though

... cp

[CrappiePappy]

Your making me want to warm up the cruise ship and head to the Bar. 2 weeks from now huh?

Don't hold me to that :p ... but, I do believe that the Whites Creek fish would be more likely to be around the docks, with two more weeks of cooler weather. Of course, one would have to take into consideration the schedule of the water level drop to Winter pool. That, along with the continued decline in water temps, would be a better indicator ... than my guesstimate.

I've only been there (WB), Crappie fishing, in Nov ... a grand total of ONE time :p
That particular trip, we did not fish the Whites Creek area. We fished the deep submerged tree area, where we found the fish on this trip, and along the main lake cliff walls. We did catch a good number of fish, but I can only imagine what we would have caught, had we fished the Whites Creek area ... and the Black Crappie were still utilizing the deep water docks, then.

With the weather patterns being what they have been, over the past couple of years, we've been thrown out of our normal game plan ... almost every Spring & Fall. We've had to change our tactics, almost every time, to adapt to the Crappie specie that was within our reach. We thought that, given our experiences there, over the last 10yrs, that we could pattern their movements and predict their whereabouts ... given normal conditions. Problem has been that we've not encountered "normal" conditions, over the last few years :p But, that notwithstanding ... it has taught us to be diverse in our approach, and to be able to adapt our methods/tactics in accordance with the prevailing conditions/situation. It doesn't always result in a productive trip, but it usually has kept us from getting totally skunked

... cp