Info on Santee Cooper II

So some of you very generously gave me some pretty good advice when we went to Santee with Kayaks back in June. We stayed a Poplar Creek Landing and targeted bluegill/shellcrackers. We had sort of light luck at Poplar creek but caught a fair amount in Stumphole, along with a few catfish on the side, not targeting them though.

We're going back the first weekend in October and would like to get into some more Bream but also want to find some catfish. This time we're taking my Gheenoe and staying at Stumphole landing. We hope to find bream back in Stumphole again, but figure unlike in early June, they'd be more scattered but I don't know. We'd also like to spend some time targeting catfish specifically.

So does poking around back in the Stumphole looking for bream with crickets & worms seem reasonable? Or would a different plan offer more chance at success? At what depth can we expect to find them?
Also, where's the best type area to look for to drop some cut bait on the bottom for catfish? Anywhere? Or is there something specific we should look for?
I'm just looking for any helpful general information and advice, certainly not your honey hole. Also not looking to fill the freezer but would like to bring home a few fillets.

I'd love to find some crappie but I suspect that would require finding some deeper brush piles and that's looking for a needle in a haystack without some local knowledge of brush piles. We won't be there but two full days and don't want to blow time blindly searching and can't catch everything anyway, lol.

Thanks for any info someone's willing to offer!

The bream fishing in the Woods aka (stump hole) you should be able to fine bream, the catfishing part, you should notice the channel markers that mark the river run, you can fish them but if you go up river past marker 164 you'll need to easy thru there until you notice the river run meaning banks on both sides of river, that might be where I'd start catfishing up against the bank.... that is the very back of stump hole woods. One tip if you can find or see the Muscles floating or up against the bank use them for bait, cutbait will only draw the gar fish but they pull too. ONE WARNING THOUGH, WE'VE GOTTEN A LOT OF RAIN, AND WILL GET MORE THIS WEEK, YOU MIGHT FIND A MUD HOLE TO FISH....

If you have a depth finder look for the deep holes in the stump hole area I call them guts almost like a ditch or creek bed fish those and the edges of those and you should have some luck, also if it's muddy in the stump hole area you might find clearer water over in the packs landing area it's not a bad run over to there, good luck.

Sent from my Pixel 3 XL using Crappie.com Fishing mobile app

All that is helpful, thanks to you both!

Jack's Creek is a good alternative from Stumphole if mud is too bad, otherwise I'd stick with Stumphole. Are you staying in one of the new cabins at Stumphole? They look really nice compared to most I've stayed in.

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Originally Posted by SeaRay

Jack's Creek is a good alternative from Stumphole if mud is too bad, otherwise I'd stick with Stumphole. Are you staying in one of the new cabins at Stumphole? They look really nice compared to most I've stayed in.

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Hello SeaRay! Thanks for the info on Jack's Creek. No, not a cabin. Booked one of their tent sites, didn't even know they had cabins. I'll check it all out when we're there though, for next time. Hoping they have a pancake breakfast like the place down the street! It won't be daylight quite so early this trip so maybe we can grab a bite before hitting the water.

Edit: Is Jack's Creek on the other side of the lake about 1/2 way to the 95 bridge? Thanks again.

Yes it's sort of straight across from Santee State park. They have the nicest cabins on the upper end. Owner can be a butt I'm told. Never had a problem personally. Good fishing area a lots of sheltered areas.

Thanks SeaRay!

Okay so we had a pretty good trip. Seeking further info as a follow up.
We fished in Stumphole, the water was in good shape. We went down there to target bream/shellcrackers and catfish for a few fillets. We wanted to try the river mouth where the channel enters the lake for cats but it was blowing and choppy enough to make it unpleasant in my little Gheenoe so back in the swamp: We right off the bat caught a couple keeper shellcrackers, maybe one good bluegill, otherwise little guys. We found those on 3’ of water. We fished 4,5, up to 7-8’ of water...nothing. So we never did find any decent sized panfish. But while in the shallows, using cut bream, we were very surprised to catch some larger than expected catfish; a 26, 22, 18,18,14,14 pound Blue cats, all which we released. We got broke off by a couple larger ones. Never before have I fished wanting to catch smaller fish! It was a great trip with those unexpected large fish (large for us anyway, admittedly average by Santee standards) Got one “keeper” 4.5 lb channel cat and one “keeper” 6.7 lb Blue. That was the only fillets we collected.
Anyway....
Couple of questions, 1. I fully expected to find some good bream back in the swamp, but ran into a couple locals searching as hard as we were and only picking up one or two here or there. What’d we miss?
2. We did on the last day fish the break on the river channel, caught one 14 pounder within 5 minutes but left after an hour of nothing. Tried slightly deeper water in the swamp with cut bait, nothing. What were those size catfish doing back in that shallow water?
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It can be fickle with pan fish in the swamp. Trick is to keep moving until you find them. We just ease along dropping worms until we find them(or not)
I'm not a cat fisher so you on your own there. We did catch some nice cats in 4 fow covered with lily pads. It was in the high 90s and I couldn't believe they were that shallow.