Lake Talquin - looking for input

I have been out of the crappie fishing business for a few years, but an old buddy and I used to fish Talquin several times a year. We are looking at giving it a shot again and Talquin is our go to place. Looking through the forum I'm not seeing must on Talquin so would appreciate any encouragement, input on current conditions, etc. that would help get the juices flowing again.
My home water is primarily the Choctawhatchee River here in the Florida Panhandle and it holds some very fine crappie that need my attention this winter.

I have lived on and fished talquin for over 20 years. our place is in the back of hammock creek one of the spawning areas historically. the season really starts at the east end of the lake where the ochlockanee river flows in. the prime spawning areas are rocky comfort creek, harvey mill creek, and ocklawaha (boy scout to many) creek. the lake is not the caliber of the great mississsippi crappie lakes, but has been very good for many years. it has been primarily a trolling lake for a long time. but now, live scope fishing has gained great popularity. this last year was the worst for crappie fishing i ever experienced. numbers way down.. i believe the large influx of out of state fishermen (primarily from georgia) keeping a great deal of attempting to spawn crappies has been a major factor in what i believe is a major decrease in overall population in talquin. we also have a sustained period of very high flow out of the lake and out the dam into the river below which i believe may drawn many fish out. hopefully this season will be better. you need lite wire hooks on your jigs here due to all the wood throughout the lake. the best guide on the lake for many years has been Jared at lake talquin lodge, (850) 6273822. a good guide always a fine way to start at a new lake. ------------Attachment 473031jim grazis

Most fishermen’s aren’t telling what lakes they are fishing anymore. When fishing is good on a certain lake then everyone seems to want to go check it out and with computers news travels real fast. I have fished Talquin for about 7 years now and Catfish45 was right about last year it was extremely bad. Even for the ones that was fishing everyday sometimes one or two fish a day. We keep our camper there from Feb 1st till the end of April. We don’t get to stay there all of the time due to still working and it is a 225 mile drive. The way it looks now we will only get to fish for about two weeks this year due to work. But we have to make our reservations a year ahead of time and we don’t want to loose our lot. Because full retirement is June 2024 then we will spend more time fishing. We don’t ever keep a lot of fish. I just love being on the lake and my wife looks seeing the eagles and other wildlife. Catfiish45 this year maybe we can meet up and have a cup of coffee.

Thanks a million guys for your input. Not very encouraging, but as fishermen do we keep looking for the fish holy grail out there. LOL

I did get a report about night fishing catfish on Talquin and the bite was reported to be good. this was about a week go. That's a possibility as a backup.

Thanks again for your help. Any other comments from others are welcome as well.

Their is quite a few that catfish at night and according to them they catch a bunch. The last couple of years we have single pole jigged at night for crappie. If we could fish more we would be able to learn the lake better which would help. We enjoy the time we are able to go over and have meet some nice people.

Check out HOOK LEGENDS on YouTube. He fishes Talquin a lot.

Sounds good.