Blood River on KY Lake

[SEMOsportsman]

I will be fishing the Blood river from Wednesday the 22 to Saturday the 25. Have never been to Ky lake and was hopeing for a report or a little help. It looks like it will be a really nice time to fish if the weather holds. Thanks in advance!

[caseydrew]

Fished Blood last Friday.....fishing was not the greatest. Ended up catching around 70 or so w/ only 24 keepers for the day between myself and another guy. We caught some males in 2' and some big females in 17'. Fish were very scattered (water came up quite a bit) w/ our best numbers coming from 8' to 12' of water in brush or stakes. Every fish we kept that came from 8' of water or more were female black and white crappie still full of eggs (yes, all the blacks still had eggs surprisingly). If the water levels don't drop I would suspect you could catch them pretty shallow as they have to be wanting to move up any day, but there are always some in the 8' to 12' zone that you can seem to catch if the shallows aren't working. Don't be afraid to visit the shallows after dark for some crappie if it gets above 70 during the day especially. Good luck.....I'll be there Friday - Sunday, but I'm about to make my move from crappie to bass (or green carp as most on the board call them) for the remainder of the year.

[Quackrstackr]

caseydrew, you did a darn sight better than anyone else that I've talked to.

We had 3 keepers Friday and 3 Saturday. We tried everything from 6" of water to 20'.

I'm about ready to start bass fishing as well. Couldn't keep those off of the hook over the weekend.

[acgriggs]

My brother and I fished the northern end yesterday. Only cleaned 7. Caught them in 2 - 7 fow. Probably would have caught more but the wind was fierce. The bite got better in the afternoon(the water temp rose 3 degrees from put in to take out) We also caught 8 bass.

[caseydrew]

caseydrew, you did a darn sight better than anyone else that I've talked to.

We had 3 keepers Friday and 3 Saturday. We tried everything from 6" of water to 20'.

I'm about ready to start bass fishing as well. Couldn't keep those off of the hook over the weekend.

I'm really not sure why the fishing was so difficult? It just seems like fish are in every stage of the spawn and very scattered. Friday was absolutely beautiful weather and everything seemed to be lining up for a good day, but we still ended up w/ decent mess of fish. However, I thought we would whack them in the shallows and it just didn't happen. Tired of working so hard for the crappie.....bass better watch out this weekend as is looks to be a good one and they are starting to show up in the bushes! I might sneak in a few redear trips in the next 3 weeks as well as they might be my favorite fish in the lake. Good luck to everybody this weekend.....I'm sure everyone will limit on the crappie since I'll be fishing for another species.

[pab1981]

I went Friday also, ended up with 8 at Blood River, but 6 of those were in the boat by 7am. They were real tough for me after that. Be off for a couple weeks after Thursday morning, I hope the weather/water settles out for my time off.

[mepperson]

Me and ole Fishtale ended up with 7 on Saturday and 5 from Friday evening. It was tough.

[klight1122]

Got back from Blood today. We caught 19 keepers yesterday. Caught all males except one. They were caught in 3 to 5 FOW just off the bank. Hope this helps. Pics will be in a new post soon.

[caseydrew]

Got back from Blood today. We caught 19 keepers yesterday. Caught all males except one. They were caught in 3 to 5 FOW just off the bank. Hope this helps. Pics will be in a new post soon.

Good deal....maybe the females will pile in there soon.

[joewildlife]

I was at Blood April 19-22 and it was tough. front came through Sunday and put an end to catching fish in shallow water. water dropped to less than 60 degrees. sunday evening we caught a few shallow casting and in the stake beds. From monday morning until wednesday afternoon, we caught them in brush 15' deep on humps and ledges, and only a few casting jigs or drowning minnows shallow or deep. The water is about 1 foot high. The highest water temp I saw was 62 leaving wednesday afternoon. The wind was fierce. Early in the trip we caught all females and they were spawning or not far from it, the egg sacs were running eggs. At the end of the trip we were catching males, from the same places. I dunno. It seems like nobody else knew what was going on either and not catching much. The fish cleaning station was a lonely place. The other thing that caught the attention of this fish biologist is that there is a STRONG year class of crappies in the 9.5 to 9.75" size range. These are next year's keepers you know. But there appears to be hardly any between that size and hawgs 12" and up. This jives with what the KY biologists said, that there was bad spawns a few years and that is why they dropped the limit. Now, these are general observations and don't take into account the two different species so nobody hang me... I think we caught plenty of fish but the fishing is rated "poor" by most standards if we have to let go 3/4 of the fish we catch. If we catch the same number next spring, and they are all keepers, it would have been a fine trip! Keep that in mind. All that said, with the weather predicted, the water temp should warm up and I think they will swarm the banks this weekend. While I'm not there. That is also the key, the fishing is better in the two days prior to my getting there and any other day I'm not there.

Joe