Patoka report ?

[jsnfltn]

Been about a month since I fished patoka, caught a bunch and a few 5 to 6 lbers in 5 to 10 feet of water bouncing a jig. Any recent reports on the bass? how deep? where at? and what lures? Going this weekend and would like to catch something but dont have much luck this time of year on patoka, haven't figured out the warm weather bit at patoka yet.

Thanks for any info.

[Embrey]

if you caught a bunch with 5 and 6 lbrs, id say you have great luck there myself

[King31]

went the past weekend mainly crappie fishing since i was with my dad but i bass fished a little bit. caught a nice one on a spinnerbait up near the bank. he hammered it too, bent the spinnerbait all out of whack. not much info really but if you get out early or stay late i would definitely throw a buzzbait along all of that standing timber at patoka

[Moveon]

went the past weekend mainly crappie fishing since i was with my dad but i bass fished a little bit. caught a nice one on a spinnerbait up near the bank. he hammered it too, bent the spinnerbait all out of whack. not much info really but if you get out early or stay late i would definitely throw a buzzbait along all of that standing timber at patoka

Great Advice. White Spinner Baits (various types) can be fish on the surface speed reeling them or buzzing them along the surface or fished deep with a pump and go fashion. It's a great all around bait and you can fish all depths with these baits.

I never fished them when I was younger but after Patoka Lake opened up with all those flooded trees I learned to use the spinner bait though the top of the newly flooded submerged tree tops in deeper water.

Back then the Northern Pike were plentiful and you could catch them easily on spoons or spinner baits. Didn't fish crank baits at Patoka due to all the timber that they left in that lake. The lake filled up too quickly so the time to cut down the trees ran short on the CORP. I used to use Crank Baits almost exclusively on KY lake but that was after the lake was 40 years old and most all the wood was gone except for a few stumps on points the islands.

I have a friend that Fishes for Bass and Crappie almost every day from March though Nov and he's been doing that since the lake opened. I'll have to call him and see what's biting. It's been a while since he called me and we talked. I missed his last phone call as he had to just leave a message on my answering machine. I need to call him back and get a Patoka Fishing report. If I do I'll try to remember to post.

[King31]

Great Advice. White Spinner Baits (various types) can be fish on the surface speed reeling them or buzzing them along the surface or fished deep with a pump and go fashion. It's a great all around bait and you can fish all depths with these baits.

I never fished them when I was younger but after Patoka Lake opened up with all those flooded trees I learned to use the spinner bait though the top of the newly flooded submerged tree tops in deeper water.

Back then the Northern Pike were plentiful and you could catch them easily on spoons or spinner baits. Didn't fish crank baits at Patoka due to all the timber that they left in that lake. The lake filled up too quickly so the time to cut down the trees ran short on the CORP. I used to use Crank Baits almost exclusively on KY lake but that was after the lake was 40 years old and most all the wood was gone except for a few stumps on points the islands.

I have a friend that Fishes for Bass and Crappie almost every day from March though Nov and he's been doing that since the lake opened. I'll have to call him and see what's biting. It's been a while since he called me and we talked. I missed his last phone call as he had to just leave a message on my answering machine. I need to call him back and get a Patoka Fishing report. If I do I'll try to remember to post.

that sounds like a plan and man do i envy your friend. i'd do anything to be out fishing and enjoying the days out on the lake.

[toomanycasts]

Bass are starting to spawn on main lake. Caught 8 nice keepers in the river, all postspawn. Biting on top early, and flipping the rest of the day. Water temp low to mid 70's.

[Moveon]

that sounds like a plan and man do i envy your friend. i'd do anything to be out fishing and enjoying the days out on the lake.

Well my friend called me today but I missed him so he left a message on my answer machine. I called him back and asked him about what's going on at Patoka.

He said that the lake is down a bit. Probably a few feet below summer pool of 536. I'd guess around 534 or 533 maybe.

He didn't give me anything specific as we talked more about other things than fishing. But he said that the crappie still have some eggs in them. They are shallow some times and deep the others.

I'll know more next week if I got up to fish with him for a couple of days. We fish the deeper brush piles in the summer and late fall months.

Bluebird skies will drive the phytoplankton deeper in the water column and the entire food chain will follow them down to the 15 to 25 ft depths during the heat of the day. While other fish will go hide in the submergent vegetation where they find shade, shelter and food along with plenty of Dissolved Oxygen. But to find the cooler waters they will go deeper in the open water areas. if there are standing submerged trees I'd fish the shady side of those trees with a long pole and a jig on a tight line so as to feel them inhale the bait. set the hook quickly as they will spit the jig out as fast as the inhale it. Watch a fish flair it's gills and open it's mouth and **** in food and then spit it back out so fast it will seem like it was never in their mouth if they don't like what they just took in. They do this very quickly if you watch them eat. Go to an aquarium at feeding time to see how the fish eat. Preferably a fresh water aquarium with bass or crappie in the water. I've watched crappie feed in an aquarium for more than 5 years and have just told you how the eat a minnow.

I'm going to do some slow trolling with crank baits this summer. Crappie like to suspend out over the deeper water at depths from 10 ft to 25 ft down below the surface. Once you find the depth that they are suspended at then all you have to do is troll a crank bait or two through the school at the right depth and speed. Crappie will hit a crank bait going though them at 1.0 to 3.0 mph. They like it best around 1.5 mph or slower. Change the color of the baits to see what bait colors are working best. Some days they will bite on different colors. I guess it depends on the light reaching them in the depths. And the water color or clarity has to have an effect on the bite as well.

You might also try using side planer boards to get the baits away from the boat. I've noticed that my boat puts a lot of air bubbles in the water behind my boat by going back though the path that I just came from and looking at the water with my SI sonar. SI = side imaging. I can see the turbulence that's left in the water from my boat's propeller.

[Moveon]

I'm thinking that the bass suspend over the deeper water during the hot day light hours. If they are not suspending then they will tuck into the weeds where there is plenty of shade and Oxygen. Sunlight get the green plants producing lots of oxygen and taking up lots of CO2 out of the water. Even though the water is hot there the plants produce more than enough dissolved oxygen to keep the fish happy. Fish eat more in the summer months than in the winter time. Their metabolism increased in hot water as they are cold blooded and take on the temperature of their surroundings.

Check the weed edges. I use to scuba dive in the pits at night using underwater lights. I've seen a lot of bass that were sleeping right at the bottom of the weed edge. Weeds in the clear water of the strip pits stop growing at about the TEN FOOT depth contour and that's where you will find the bass at night in Lynville's Strip Pit. I suspect that the bass do the same thing at Patoka and other lakes. I use to spear fish at night but that was 40 years ago. I could swim right up next to the sleeping bass and poke them with the spear or my hand. They would wake up and swim off into the open water. I'd shine the spotlight on them and they would not move until I touched them. I figured the bright light would spoke them but it didn't always. Sometimes a bass would take off when I shined the light on them. DNR should do their surveys with scuba gear instead of electro shocking boats. LOL

Been about a month since I fished patoka, caught a bunch and a few 5 to 6 lbers in 5 to 10 feet of water bouncing a jig. Any recent reports on the bass? how deep? where at? and what lures? Going this weekend and would like to catch something but dont have much luck this time of year on patoka, haven't figured out the warm weather bit at patoka yet.

Thanks for any info.