Thread: A bad day at Abel Reservoir

I hit the road for Fredericksburg this morning & spent the day checking out Abel Res. A couple of regulars rolled in as I was preparing to launch.

When asked about the crappie population at Abel, they said they didn't know if there were any crappies in the lake (but admitted that they only bottom-fish worms for bream.) Not an encouraging start.

The water was fairly clear (18" to 24" vis.), somewhat dark, and not as cool as I hoped: 67.4 at launch time and as high as 76 by mid-afternoon. Lake level is down at least a foot

One small bridge crosses the lake - right next to the launch area. I figured that would be a good place to start & if there really were specks in this long skinny lake, some of them were bound to be there. Within minutes, wham!

Looks like the lake does have crappies.

Page 2 in the "How to Catch Crappies" book says "look for brushpiles and fish them." Sometimes it's hard to know a BP is there, but this one was a snap.


Page 3 says "look for wood"--no problem! Abel has wood everywhere you look.


Did I mention beaver huts? Everywhere you look--I even saw the beaver scurrying away from one!


One section of Abel looks like a mountain stream--complete with shear rock dropoffs.

Nothing in the book explained how to fish this kind of water & being a flatlander, I decided to dial up Wasabi the mountain man & get some OJT. After his phone rang and rang and rang it became obvious that I was going to have to figure this out on my own. Fortunately, the specks helped out.


Other sections of this exciting lake are quiet coves & creeks

and beautiful vistas.


DGIF lists this lake as 185 acres, but it seems many times that big due to the extensive shoreline.

Every fisherman I saw on the lake grumbled about how bad a day today was. If this was a bad day, I can't wait to fish Abel on a GOOD day!!!!

For the day:
30+ specks (13 keepers, largest = 11.5")
3 white perch (2 eating size)
3 green carp
1 catfish

Minnows were the ticket, but occasionally one would hit a jig. If there was a color of the day, I didn't find it.