Is the baitfish in short number at Woods?

**GoneCrappieFishing** · 05-25-2013, 06:59 AM

I have been really paying close attention to how many balls of baitfish I would notice at Woods Res the last few months and at the same time, noticing them at Normandy as well. I'm no fish or wildlife trained biologist or conservationist, but I will say this. You can go to Normandy and fish and you will see visible bait balls at the surface at times and several balls of baitfish in the water all the time. Point is, after many months of fishing there and Woods Res both, I have come to the conclusion, that I just cant hardly find the bait balls at Woods Res in anywhere near the abundance I can find them at Normandy. I'm sure that most of you who fish Woods would immediately think the stripe in the lake have just decimated the bait fish there. That too is my guess after seeing just how poor the crappie are there now. Another thing I have noticed is I haven't been noticing the stripe in as abundance as they were before either. Not complaining about that at all though.

Just thought I would post something that was of interest to me, and somebody else out there may have some knowledge on the subject. I have lots of theories, and guesses, but that's all they are. I wish I had taken college classes on wildlife conservation when I was a young man. I've done got too old now to soak up very much book learnins.

**bfish** · 05-25-2013, 01:11 PM

Not discounting your observation, but adding some thoughts that might help explain your observation.

1) Normandy is more productive, ie more nutrients. So more fish per acre should be there (including bait).
2) Woods tends to be colder and bait balls on the surface don't occur as soon. Also Woods is more clear (see above for reason), which then the bait stays deeper.

**The Shootist** · 05-25-2013, 03:55 PM

we were on woods this morning and only saw one bait ball and it was surrounded by fish....we were looking for blu gill beds and they arent bedding yet......everything is late this year.

**Dave and Lynn** · 05-25-2013, 09:49 PM

Normandy is covered with bait as we saw last tournament. I think the fish were so full that they didnt need any thing to eat so we all caught less. That is a a theory.

Toby I think you have hit it right on the head. Sometimes you dont need a college education to figure out what is going on. You need time on the water.
Now what is the problem at Tim's.

**The Shootist** · 05-26-2013, 11:35 AM

Tims is full of bait fish........the crappie on tims are hard to find but they are there.......Its hard to keep up with the movement of crappie when the water goes from nothing to eighty feet ten feet from the bank....

**BigOrangeSlab** · 05-28-2013, 07:18 AM

i agree with david,the rise and drop in the water levels at both normandy and tims can't help the fishing.the baits balls are something i haven't seen much of at woods but have seen at normandy.i guess i need to hit tims the next few trips(oh boy)to get geared up for the tx.

**Dave and Lynn** · 05-28-2013, 08:46 AM

While on Tim's this past Sunday I don't remember seeing any bait balls at all. We were there for 8 hours.

**skeetbum** · 05-30-2013, 04:55 PM

I trolled Rawlins creek in Woods last year and saw balls of bait and would connect with fish as the cranks went thru them. Randy and I trolled some jigs in the same area a few weeks back and I saw very few baitfish sign, and what I saw was smaller in size and held less fish than last year. I also didn't see any when I was swimmin yesterday.

**rubicon3680** · 06-05-2013, 10:49 AM

My wife and i went night fishing 2 weeks ago. Fished 2 spots one near the pumping station and under the bridge. We were anchored or tied up at both locations for at 3 hours. Hardly got any bait to come up at all. What little bait did manage to come to the lights was quickly eaten by 4"-6" stripe and gizzard shad. Did have one nice 14" fish and one other keeper, lots of short crappie though. Never could get any kind of bait ball around the lights though so you may be on to something with the lack of baitfish.

**c1bigocarp** · 06-05-2013, 01:00 PM

I went to Woods yesterday afternoon and saw plenty of bait and stripes tearing up the surface in large numbers. Caught serveral crappie (small) 1 at 13" and 5 others that would make the 10" mark and 1 carp that I will post a photo of on another thread. I saw baitfish in large numbers on the screen about 8' deep and the stripe were tearing them up but I did not catch one of them all afternoon.

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Is the baitfish in short number at Woods?

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