Patoka Crappie

[mperry]

Wife and I are camping at Patoka this weekend. Any tips on what and where the crappie are biting at. Going to try and be over there Friday afternoon if I can get off work in time. We usually fish under the 446 causeway back in the stickups but the last few times there only caught small crappie. Any help will be appreciated.

[Moose1am]

I fished Patoka yesterday and caught some small crappie but saw another guy catching them good up right next to the shoreline. He was fishing a minnow only about 2ft below a bobber and he was using a long pole to get away from his Bass Tracker Boat. He fished this one stretch of shoreline for about three hours.

I was told were a good spot was but I missread the email and fished in the wrong area. I may head back up there today if it don't rain and storm. If I do any good I'll write up a report when I get home.

Water surface temps in 10ft deep water were running right at 70 deg F. Creeks are stained with some floating debris in the back of the creek bays.

Water level was 539 last I looked. It's going to rain for the next few days until Sat and clear up Sunday. But that's the forcast today. I'll be it changes by Saturday!

Another Idea is to go to the CrappieUSA web site and look at where they caught fish on Patoke the last few tournaments there.

Last few years I fished Patoka in Sept and Oct we caught them in about 10ft to 15ft of water along a intersection of a couple of ditched in a cove right on the main lake. Anytime you can find shallow water areas right next too deep water you have a potentially good crappie shot. Throw in a brush pile along the ledge or edge and it's got great potential.

You will find that most crappie fishing guides put out brush piles to attract the fish. If you put these on drops, long points or the inside curves of a looping underwater stream cut you have a good chance of attracting and holding some crappie.

If you are camping at the Newtwon Stewart area ask them how long they will remain open this year. I wonder if they are going to have to shut the water off to prevent the pipes from freezing up?

[mperry]

Thanks for the post Moose. I'll be sure to ask them how long they stay open. I live real close to Hardy Lake and you can camp there all year long. I would think Patoka would be the same. If you do go back before the weekend let me know how you did. Might now a little of what to expect. There is supposed to be a cold front coming through so this may shut the crappie down for a few days.

[psprowler]

isn't the 446 causeway on another big lake in Indiana?

[mperry]

Yes, wrong lake. Patoka is the 145 causeway I believe. 446 is Monroe.

[Moose1am]

Went back to Patoka Lake to do some more fishing Today. Wed Sep 27. Left around noon. Not bad since I stayed up to 3 am this morning.

I have setup the boat to troll crank baits. Actually to be more specific they are Bandit 300's. I chose the Chartreuse and Blue colored ones that were sold at ####'s Sporting goods store. I used a new Shakespeare 8ft long Ugly stick and a new Abu Garcia Ambassadeur 10003LP bait casting reel. I loaded the reel with 10# test stren line. I added a shakespeare line counter to the rod and it worked great with 10# line. You can find them at Walmart. Would not work very good with 6# test. I guess the line has to be a certain diameter for the thing to work. Too thin a line and it won't work right. I let out 50ft of line as was trolling with a 35 HP Johnson Outboard motor on idle speed. Going into the wind (10 to 15mph winds today out of the SW) I read 1.5 MPH On my Garmin GPS eTrex Vista unit. I was using the map view and track up to show my location on Patoka Lake. Remember that the lake is 5 ft over summer pool so the 10ft contour line at summer pool is not 15 ft deep when the lake is at 540ft elevation. Anyway I fished the Lick Fork Area North of the 164 highway. I went and fished the Bay East of the Boat Ramp. Fished the North Side as the wind was blowing into the area. I hooked my first crappie while trolling after only about 5 minutes. That got me fired up. I was wondering what the rod and reel would do when I actually had a fish on. Just like I read the fish came to the surface when I took the rod out of the rod holder and started reeling the line it. Fish scooted across the surface. Threw the motor in to neutral while reeling in the first fish. Trying to grab the crappie's lower lip with sharp treble hooks every where was a trip. Got the hemostats out and that did the trick. back to fishing and caught the second fish in the next 15 minutes near the same area. I estimate that I was getting the bandit 300 down to around 10 ft with 50ft of line out the back and going 1.5 mph into the wind. Fish were over submerged vegetation. The Patoka Lake Fishing Hot Spots paper map shows this area with grass or they call it submerged vegetation. Remember the lake is 5 ft over summer pool so the grass beds are 5 ft deeper this time of the year due to the high water. Fish are still relating to the grass.

I saw one other boat leaving the lake when I arrived around 1:30 pm They had about 8 to 10 nice crappie in the live well and told me that they fish Patoka once every week. This guy had fished with Roger Grant who side pulls his baits. They had the trolling motor mounted on the side of the boat about 1/3 the way up from the back motor. All the rod holders were on the other side of the boat. They used a 74# 24 volt trolling motor up front too. They had been fishing most of the day and said they started early. I saw were they were last fishing as I drove by the lake on Hwy 164. One guy had on a orange hunter cap and he stood out easily in that boat. So when I saw them coming into the dock I knew that was the same boat that I saw fishing. I pretty well know what they were doing and managed to catch two fish there before I went to check out another spot.

These guys told me that the were catching them in deep grass. My crappie were not huge fish. Maybe 10" to 11" long. They had a couple of fish that went 13 to 14" long. Said that they caught one a while back that was 18" long. That was a 2.0lb crappie at Patoka. He weighted it first and then put a bag of 2lb flour on the same scale to check it's accuracy. it was spot on. Seems like an 18" crappie would weigh more than 2lb though. I guess it was a stunted fish or something. Check the deep grass in the 15 ft range.

South of the 164 bridge the water was muddy still. I caught one more fish back where the creek makes a fork and splits in too. Caught another crappie on a jig and slip bobber back in the bay in about 6 ft of water near a tree in the water.

I was checking out a new area and to tell you the truth I was not impressed with the South end of Lick Fork these last two days. I only have about 10 fish to show for the two days of fishing. I think the rain has messed up that area's fishing. Yea that sounds like a good excuse to me! LOL. The guys that were coming off the lake as I arrived said the fish had stopped biting though which is why the were leaving.

It turned out to be a nice day until around 6 pm when the storms moved into the area. I was back on the road home by 6 pm. I left the lake at 5:30pm.

Fishing area #5 on the Patoka Lake FHS map is about where I fished. Only I fished a bit too far West of where I wanted to go. I fished the old submerged road bed not the grass. The grass is a bit farther West of where I fished. I just checked my lake map to make sure. Maybe this area will do better if you fish with minnows and tight line or slow troll them or pull them.
Regards,

Moose1am

[mperry]

Thanks for the post Moose. Thats good info. Maybe I'll get lucky but still a little concerned about the cold front moving in. Still think that it might give them lock jaw.