Steve McCadams

Inclement weather continues to dominate the Kentucky Lake fishing scene this week. Nasty winds and several days of downpours have dampened the spirits of most of the winter crappie fishermen this past week.

According to the long range forecast it appears cold weather will linger into next week as below average temperatures are the story for next week’s weather too. Fishermen haven’t gotten much cooperation from the weatherman lately but they really can’t complain as they’ve had several nice days mixed in this winter that allowed some nice stringers of crappie to be taken.

No doubt scores of fishermen are now suffering from cabin fever as a week or two of bad weather has kept most at bay, dodging the rain or huddled around the fire waiting on the return of favorable conditions.

Not to worry; pleasant weather is on the horizon.

Meanwhile, prior to the recent weather dilemma a few winter crappie fishermen were scoring decent stringers while fishing both minnows and jigs around manmade fish attractors located in the 9 to 14 foot depth range.

Some credited their catches to even deeper structure located out on the main lake area in 16 to 20 feet.

Kentucky Lake is rising slowly and a lot of runoff has entered the system this past week. TVA has done a good job of keeping lake levels normal as of late but watch for an increase in elevation to occur in the days ahead.

Lake levels as of this posting were in the 354.7 range. Upstream at Pickwick TVA was discharging a large volume of water so Kentucky Lake will be rising some in the days ahead.

Current is now a factor in the main river channel as TVA has increased discharge rates at Kentucky Dam the last few days to 248,000 cfs (cubic feet per second). That’s pushing a large volume of water through the system at the present time.

Anglers will be addressing rising lake stages for the next week or so. It will be interesting to see how much the crappie scatter during the rising lake situation.

The fishing scene will rebound quickly once nice weather returns and stability returns to the lake’s elevation.