Taylorsville Night Fishing Trip

Me and my brother in law and a buddy from work are planning to take the pontoon out on Taylorsville Lake on Friday night 7/2.

I am not real familiar with the lake so I want to get out before dark and anchor in a productive spot for some catfishing. Planning to stay the whole night! Good times!

Anyone have any advice on what part of the lake would be best?

Also, I am noticing that the O2 content in the lake drops big time below about 10 to 12 feet so should I fish on the bottom in water less that 12 feet or suspend bait under a bobber in deeper water?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Where are you planning on launching ??

What bait are you planning on using ??

Which "catfish" are you fishing for ??

Do you have a castnet ??

Reason I ask is -

If you launch from Settler's Trace Marina .... you're going to be close to many good areas. But, you might also have "bass tournament" company.

Shad are probably the best bait for Cats ... and, you also need to know that chicken livers may draw more attention from Hybrid Stripers, than the catfish :p

T-ville has Channel Catfish & Blue Cats ... and from what I understand, the Blues should be pretty big, by now. I've only fished for, & caught, Channel Cats. I'm sure there's other catfish species in there ... probably Flatheads, at least ... and there used to be alot of Brown Bullheads, but I haven't caught any of them over the last several years of fishing there (and that was many years ago).

A castnet will get you plenty of Shad ... and they work, dead or alive. It's what I always used, when fishing for Cats, or when "live bait" fishing for Hybrids.

If the o2 content drops dramatically below 10-12ft .... then that's the thermocline level. I'd concentrate on the 6-10ft depths ... mouth points of creeks, or out in front of small pockets on the main lake banks.

... cp :cool:

Thanks for the reply CP!

We are putting in at Settler's Trace and another buddy of mine told me about a place he calls Little Beach not too far from there so I believe that's where we'll try 'em.

We want to target the blues but to be honest, some good eating sized channel cats wouldn't be hurt my feelings either.

We are planning to cast net some shad to use for bait and we are taking some old standbys (crawlers, livers, etc...) just in case.

My brother in law was supposed to get some catalpa worms from a place he knows of, but he said they weren't on the tree this year for some reason. I'm gonna let him go anyway!:D:D

Thanks so much for your reply! I don't post much on here but I read the posts almost every day. I love pretty much all kinds of fishing but I just got my first pontoon and so I am anxious to get off the bank!

I'll let you know how we do!

Crappiecracker,

Congrats on the pontoon, they are great to fish from, especially crappie/cats. As for cats right now CrappyPappy knows taylorsville and I dont but I do know that lots of cats are in spawn mode right now so lots of rip-rap, rocks, logs, etc. should hold fish. Id say they are pretty shallow too, right around the 10 ft range is where I would concentrate since they are near or in the spawning phase. Hope you get some shad cuz cut shad is killer on catfish, esp blues. Good luck and let us know how you do.

BTW...what CP said about the thermocline, wasting your time below it so if its at 12 ft then just go shallower and that narrows your options down a lot and should help you find a good spot, although 12 ft sounds shallow for a thermocline, im used to seeing them in 20+ ft but thats at cave run, clearer less fertile water

Thanks Slabber,

Yes I love fishing from the pontoon! What makes it even better is that this old boat belonged to my late great uncle, who handed it down to my Dad, who recently bought a newer pontoon and handed it down to me. It's nothing fancy but it means a lot to me.:)

The o2 info I got from the COE website and I have heard that the thermocline is usually shallow at T-ville.

We are leaving for the lake in about an hour and should have time to get some shad before we hit our spot.

Thanks for the input. I am lucky to have you guys on this site and great friends to point me in the right direction/

I hope to be posting pics of the trip here sometime this weekend!

How did you trip to T-ville turn out CrappieCracker? I might ride up there in a few days and do some fishin.

went yesterday and did catch good size cats on my spider rig set up......nice eating size bass but, they was 13-14 inches.......15 inch limit @ T-ville lake on Bass.......bunch of gills too......I put in at Van Buen ( to avaiod water skier,inner tubers , non-fishing jerks) .......it work till it go warm bout noon....but caught fish tho!!!

Had a great time at T-ville Friday night but didn't set the world on fire by any means as far as the catfish go. Ended up with 5 channel cats, small ones but great eating size! No blues.

Did find out that soft shell turtles are plentiful in T-ville and they LOVE chicken livers. We probably hooked 10 of them, a couple of them the biggest softshells I have ever seen!

We stayed all night and left the lake about 8am Saturday morning. My buddy was snoring big time at about 2:00 am.:D

I was freezing my rear end off by about 3:00!:eek: Next time I'll take my coveralls.

My wife had the camera in her purse so I don't have any pics this time. None of us are what you'd call "photogenic" anyways.:)

Thanks for all the help and good luck!