Tellico Monday 4/27

Fished Tellico today until the wind blew us off the lake. Not sure what is going on but the sun was shining, the water was as clear as Tellico gets, and to me it would dictate chartreuse, white, or another bright color. What we found was the fish wanted dark colors like you would expect on a cloudy day. We caught about a dozen shorts and only one keeper. We could not buy a 10 inch fish today. We did mark fish, all in about 21 fow over structure. They were suspended at about the 18 feet level, but did seem to want anything but dark colors. I am glad we did not use minnows or the bait would have eaten the fish we did bring in the boat. A couple of the fish were dark males and you could tell some of the females had eggs. The one we cleaned had eggs but they were dark colored. My Son did catch a catfish that weighed about 20 lbs. it was fun watching him fight the fish on a 12 foot crappie rod with 8lb test line. It was a good day to be out but I am a little confused about how the crappie are acting this year. If anyone has experienced similar things let me know it might help me keep from pulling the rest of my hair out.

Forgot to add that the water temp was 65 when we started and 67 when we left. We fished from around 8:30 until 1:00. Hope to try again tomorrow so will pass along tomorrow's findings if we get to go.

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Odd looking crappie, but at least it was over 10", this was the cat I wrote about earlier. We had three other lines out and the ole girl managed to tangle them all before we got her netted. With the wind, catfish on, trying to keep boat straight and get three lines in talk about busy-- reminds me of old saying " busier than a one legged man at a tail kicking contest---wouldn't trade the memory for all the money in the world.

she sure is purdy!

Think it's about over with for this year on tellico like about everywhere else. (spawned out) We were up there about 3 weeks ago and picked up some good ones. Water temp then was about 65.

Nice cat fish.

As promised we hit Tellico today. Water temp 64 at start 68 when we left at 2:30. The wind was brutal but a little better than yesterday. Managed only 6 keepers and 2 white bass, no kitty cats today. We threw back around 20 shorts. They
seemed to want yellow and white and did not want dark colors like yesterday and they did not even want chartreuse. They were all taken in 20 fow, suspended over structure between 10-18 fow. There were several dark males and I did not find any eggs in any of the fish. I guess the spawn is about done.

Great report! Thanks.