Environment - WKMS
(2012-02-03)
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Scott Ellison here, with the FLW Weekly Fishing Report.
The big news lately is the collapse of the highway 68/80 bridge across Kentucky Lake after it was struck by a freighter. Boy, has it caused a lot of inconvenience to working people and Murray State University students who live in Trigg County and points east. Either they've got to run down to Dover through Land Between the Lakes, then over to Paris Landing and up Highway 121, or go around on I-24 and down through Benton.
Lake boat traffic also has been affected. At airtime, the transportation cabinet has ordered recreational boaters to maintain a safe distance from the bridge. If you're below the bridge, you have to stay put. If you're above the bridge, same thing. You can't run under the bridge right now. Hopefully, that's not going to last much longer, once inspectors decide that no more bridge is going to fall in the water. If not, it's going to wear thin with fishermen. FLW has a tournament on the lake in June. The first two days, we'll launch boats from the dam; the last two days of the tournament, we'll launch boats from Kenlake. If they don't allow boats to run from up the lake to below the bridge, and vice versa, imagine what could happen. Most anglers will fish above the bridge, and if the seminfinalists can't get to their fish on the last two days because they're having to launch at Kenlake, they'll be in a world of hurt. So hopefully the rule keeping boaters away from the bridge will be relaxed by then.
Bridge or no bridge, fishing is good. Crappies are taking small jigs around brushpiles in water about 12 or 14 feet deep. Blood River is the local favorite, but really, crappies are biting all up and down the lake. Rockfish, or stripers, also are hitting out in the main lake now on little cleos and other types of jigging spoons. As for bass, Alabama rigs are still accounting for the best catches. Eric Benson at Benson's Sporting Goods says a fellow came in and volunteered that he had his best day of fishing ever on an Alabama rig. He and a buddy caught more than 70 keepers and the five best weighed between 30 and 35 pounds. It's phenomenal, and you just have to wonder how long it will last.
There's a school of thought that holds that bass will get conditioned to new lures and rigs eventually. When they first see them coming through the water, they'll knock each other out of the way trying to get to them. But finally, after those bass have been caught a time or two, their instinct kicks in and they avoid the lure or the rig. That's why the stuff that was red-hot a couple of months ago is just sort of mediocre now. Some anglers also believe that bass are predisposed to hit a certain lure or rig, and others aren't. When the suckers are all caught and nothing's left but the fish that don't want the lure or anyway, the red-hot bite also cools off.
Either theory might be correct, or both might be in play where the Alabama rig is concerned. Right now, though, it seems to be catching every bass that is close enough to see it go by, and it's really got fishermen fired up.
How long will it last? Who cares, just get out there and catch some of those good ol' big 'uns. This is Scott Ellison for FLW, wishing you and yours good fishing, on one side of the bridge or the other.
Scott Ellison is a lifelong fisherman and FLW College Fishing Promotions Manager
© Copyright 2012, wkms
