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Some days it just don't work out


Newt

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Went for a short session today. For any who haven't been on here long, my usual lake is really an old river channel with dams (and other lakes) at both ends. Water flow is controlled by some little gnome about 1000 miles to the East of me and his/her main aim is to keep the watere levels reasonable while maintaining enough flow to produce electricity for the company that owns the dams. Never any way to predict if there will be flow or no.

 

We've had some rain recently so the lakes are all filling up nicely and they are running water thru pretty often.

 

The lake (or the fish) are quirky and there are places where you will catch when there is a current and blank if there is none. Other places where the opposite is true.

 

Today when I got there around 2pm, we had a nice 2-3mph water flow. So I headed to one of my "when the water is flowing" spots and anchored. Took a while since you have to be really fiddly with the anchor lines and get situated across the current if you want to fish more than two rods. I wanted 4 so got myself settled.

 

Slow start but with dog food squeezed enough and into the water, it formed a nice cloud and drifted down stream. After about an hour the fish finally found me. Tiddlers at first but getting larger. Sunfish, white bass, catfish bit and the carp were active though not biting just then.

 

Things kept improving slowly. I was keeping anything under 1/2 pound since I am running low on cut bait. Larger ones get released with a "thank you for livening up my day". Sunset and still improving. Gonna be a great night for sure.

 

About 8pm both my downstream bite alarms sounded at the same time. Dang. No way. They coulda waited.

 

Wasn't fish but a sudden ceseation of water flow and the anchor lines rebounded since there was no strain on them any more. The boat had moved about 5 feet upstream and I hadn't been able to see it - dark and all.

 

Stayed another hour and not a touch. Grrrrrr. Home now and will give it another try tomorrow. Wonder if the water will be moving or not?

" My choices in life were either to be a piano player in a whore house or a politician. And to tell the truth, there's hardly any difference!" - Harry Truman, 33rd US President

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Oops - 1000 miles West rather than East which would be a distance into the Atlantic Ocean.

 

These dams are on the Tennessee Valley Authority control grid for some reason and their control stations are in Western Tennessee.

 

Lots more rain today so they will probably be running water thru again. Wonder if I should guess it will continue and fish those places or guess it will stop and fish those. Or try for some of the more "flow neutral" locations?

" My choices in life were either to be a piano player in a whore house or a politician. And to tell the truth, there's hardly any difference!" - Harry Truman, 33rd US President

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