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For the past 20 years I still do not understand why the largemouth bass has not done better in Cland. There is a ton of cover in the coves and the crappie seem to be doing well as of today as there are good reports of 15 inch plus fish being caught now?
I've caught some good one out of there, monster by no means but good fish in the 3-4lbs range. I caught one 2 weeks ago on a bandit crankbait that was in the 3+ range.
I heard once that there was not one single Black Bass Liscensed Guide on Lake Cumberland (Almost 100 liscensed Striper Guides). Sort of tells me something about the Black Bass Population in General at Cumberland. I never had much luck for Large heads but I never fished for them much either.
i personally believe the largemouth population on c land is slowly heading for "extinction." i think the biggest issues facing the largemouths are poor spawns (water fluctuations and lack of shoreline cover) and forage that lives offshore. the largemouths i catch in other lakes are generally heavier and more healthy appearing than what i catch from c land. does not help with the tourney pressure that c land has. just my 2 cents, any comments?
Just a Thought! On Cumberland in the spring when the fish are on the beds, that may be 10 to 20 ft. deeper or out of the water within a week. Depends on the weather and COE.
By the way they had a new meeting and are discussing holding the lake at a Max. of 705 year around while Dam repairs are in progress.
It's at 700 now to give you a gauge.
My new grandaughter may see it back to the tree line if that happens when she graduates High School.
They even call it "Post Katrina syndrome" not final yet but wait and see.
Here's my theory and I'll probably get blasted for it. The COE plays with the lake elevation waaaaaaay too much. A poor ole largemouth doesn't know where to set up shop for a bed in the spring. As soon as she gets something going a 5 inch rain will come or they drop it drastically in anticipation of one coming. I personally believe the smallmouth are heading down hill to, at least in numbers. Every time I'm at the docks in the middle of the day anymore I see somebody putting the knife to barely keeper smallmouth. Look at the guides websites, I've gotten to where I can't, everytime I do I see 14 people holding up half frozen brown bass for the camera, even though they paid to go catch STRIPERS. Couple that with tournament relentless pressure and you have the recipe for disaster. When you have 200 boat tourneys going out and 60 plus percent sometimes don't weigh any fish there is something wrong. But hey according to KDFW the lake is in great shape on numbers, bull$%^!. Sorry, you hit on a touchy subject for me right now. I guess I'll have to start going to Dale with Elnut and forget about Cumberland, it's just so far for me to go, Cland is already far enough. :-(
Mhall - I feel your pain. I absolutely love Cumberland, my love for the lake is probably for different reasons than many of the fisherman that frequent this website, but even still and none the less, I love that lake. After reading your response it makes me want to write a letter or make some phone calls to KDFWR, get them on the horn and address some of these issues and concerns. Of course if I did I'd probably get some bull crap like: "Well Mr. Minnow, we're in the process of making repairs to the dam and we're keeping water levels low, blah, blah, blah and so on..." I to have seen the pictures of the smallies, good sized smallies too, being held up when the people were fishing for and PAID to fish for stripers.
Dale has GOT to be my next venture...No, correction on that, Dale is DEFINITELY going to be my next venture. I am in the same boat as you Mhall (so to speak) for it is a long drive to Dale for me as well. Another lake I'd like to try for some spring time bassing is Green River Lake. And then too, there's always the Ohio River, which is in my own backyard. I know I can catch fish there down below the falls, but I don't get the same feeling out of fishing the Ohio as I do when I make a trip to one of our beautiful lakes in this region.
All in all it all comes down to the same ol' story for me, so many places I want to fish but so little time to fish them.
So true Chub, so true. I love the big C as well for many reasons other than fishing. I've got many memories there including video of me and my daughter playing and laughing in the water together when she was little. Now she's 16 and doesn't want to do that with ole dad anymore. Cumberland has always been a tough lake to fish and will humble the best. All that being said I've fished there long enough to usually always put something togethter but it's getting harder year after year. I am not the only one that thinks this either, lot's of long time good fisherman on that lake are singing this same sad song. Lakes go in cycles and maybe Cumberland will bounce back soon, I sure hope so. Take care Mark.
I think that maybe, just maybe we need to learn how to fish for largemouths off shore. I think they are still there we just need to adjust. They still have everything they need. So what if the lake has less water, there is still alot of it. I never thought they could hold a walleye tournament on the lake (below Burnside) and they would catch so many fish. I for one still think Cumberland is the best lake year round in this area. Trust me if weren't there wouldn't be so many tournaments on it.
geobass
Cumberland still has plenty of Largemouth, although i'm sure the water level changes haven't helped them..The fish have evolved because of the tremendous amount of both fishing and pleasure boating pressure and the new types of shad in the lake now.
Like Laurel River Lake deep clear water resivoirs are hard to fish anyway.
When you have bait fish that are suspended 30 feet deep in 100 ft of water it makes it tuff to catch the fish that eat them..
I can tell a diffence in all the game fish i fish for at Cumberland over the last 15 years.....INCLUDING the stripers...
I do think , however, that the smallmouth and stripers have done a beter job adjusting to the introduction of the alwife ( i prob spelled that wrong) shad.
We as fisherman are gonna have to do a better job of adjusting as well.
There is still good numbers of lm in Cumberland, yet I will say I've never had a tremendous lm day on Cumberland like I have other fish. People that supposedly know more about this kind of stuff say that the stripers don’t hurt other game fish populations I disagree. I'm sure muskies had something to do with Cave Run. If anything I would have to go with the water fluctuation theory. I think if they did keep the water level at 705 till the dam gets fixed it could help the spawn out tremendously. As for spots and smallmouths I think they have adjusted to the alewives and some stay relatively deep all year long where most fishermen don’t fish that deep and feed on them year round. I will say I caught a lm there a couple weeks ago that was about 22-23 inches long and weighed 4.1 lbs.
RC5 - Just curious to know where abouts you were at on the Lake when you caught that nice large mouth.