[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON Apr-20-06 AT 03:53AM (EST)[/font][p]It's hard to find any shade up at Patoka. It's not like KY lake where you can find some shady trees overhanging the water in some spots.

Did you run into any submerged tree tops? I got an email from a friend that fishs Patoka Lake all the time and he went up river and said the tree tops were just under the water when the lake is at this level 538ft. We went up to Kings Bridge last spring when the water was only at 533ft and you could see the trees well enough to find the old river channel and stay in the channel. But without any trees to see it would be hard to figure out where the river channel is. That channel is only about 20ft wide in some spots. It's easy to get out of the channel and if the water or lake is down to 532ft you can run into some huge stumps or get stuck on a mud flat. DNR did their survey at Patoka and they posted the Map Coordinates of the fish traps. I took those map coordinates and plotted them on my FHS digital map of Patoka and most of them were upriver from Kings Bridge. But there are plenty of big crappie downstream from Kings and dumpling creek and even walls ramp. I'll bet that the crappie are spawning from Osborn ramp all the way up river to well above kings bridge. My buddie said they caught some nice fish up that way this last weekend. Saturday and Sunday. CrappieUSA had the Patoka Lake Tournament last Saturday and they weighed in some 2# plus fish Saturday.

I heard that it was really crowded Saturday too.

Regards,

Moose1am