Pickwick April

[Gary Harlan]

Pickwick Fishing Forecast for April 2011
Water temps: 56 on river, warmer in sheltered areas
Clarity: stained

  Fishing has been good through out March and looks to continue into April. Tournaments are taking from 20-25lbs to win. The recent BFL had a good turn out of 167 boats and was won by Roger Stegall of Iuka, MS with 24+ lbs. Andy Houpt (one of Roger’s associate guides) was second and I was 7th, pretty good day for the “home team”
   We caught good numbers of smallmouth last week most were in the 1-3lb range on Wild Shiner jerkbaits and Coffee tubes. The Shaky head bite is picking up further back in the creeks and pockets. Use a 3/16 oz Strike King shaky head and Watermelon w/red flake or Green Pumpkin/red flake Super finesse worm. The water on the river is stained but a few fish are still falling for jerkbaits in bright colors. The water temps staying so cool are due to the flood gates still being open as of today 3/21/11. The level will stay around 410 for a few days and then should start rising slowly to summer pool in mid April. Look for the faster moving baits to produce as the water warms (spinnerbaits, crankbaits etc.) The new Burner Spinnerbaits  and the KVD series crankbaits should be the ticket once the bass make the move to shallower  water.
     I would expect the next full moon on April 17th to be when many of the big females LM & SM to go the beds providing the good weather holds out and the water temps make it into the 60’s. April is a great month to catch slab Crappie on Pickwick as well. Please practice catch and release especially during the month of April. Don’t sacrifice a trophy fish just to put it on the wall. Have a fiberglass replica done. It will look better and last longer than an actual mount. Take several pics and measure the length and girth. A good taxidermist can take it from there.
Be safe and good fishing!

[Jeffray]

Thanks for the input! I got a trip planned for april, 9th and 10th so it should be almost prime by then

[crazydog]

Thanks for the input Gary. I'm not quite sure the fishing is so rosy yet for us non-guides! haha. Let me provide a laymen's report from last weekend on Pickwick. Surface water temps were 54 in the main lake and 57 in Yellow Creek. Water clarity in the main lake was almost muddy, yet Yellow Creek was significantly clearer. Fishing was very slow and only managed to pick up about 5 small spotted bass all day, 2 white bass, 1 drum and 1 catfish. Most were caught on a shad-colored 3" jerkbaits, including the catfish. They didn't seem to like the larger or brighter jerkbaits yet. Caught the nicest fish (2lb) on a small shakyhead. The few bass we did catch were still gray and lacked any color, indicating they were just now starting to come up out of their winter pattern. Spoke with a game warden as we were leaving and he was doing a creel survey and indicated nobody had been catching much. If the weather stabilizes and the water warms into the 60's, I'd expect the fishing to get a lot better in a few weeks but for now you still have to work for the few fish that are being caught.

[Gary Harlan]

After this weekend (3/26-27) the lake will be back over summer pool again....the whole Tennessee valley got over 2" of rain just on saturday...Pickwick is supposed to be running over 100K for a few days. The muddy falling water is what messed your bite up.As far as the Jerkbaits go we are having to "soak" them a long time to induce bites.