Watts Bar lake Help (Crappiepappy)

Crappiepappy or anyone else who can help,

I am looking to book a trip in the fall. I need the best time of the year in the fall. (weather is always an issue) Where should I put in at? Where should I stay. You got me curious about the place last year and I have a step-brother who lives within 30 minutes of there that would love to fish there. Any suggestions on type of style of fishing such as long line trolling or spider rigging would be a big help. I am guessing in the fall they will be high and tite to the wood so I would lean towards spider rigging but wanted to see how you do it. Help!!!!! and please don't tell me the best time is during gun season for deer. lol

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Originally Posted by Jigboy

Crappiepappy or anyone else who can help,

I am looking to book a trip in the fall. I need the best time of the year in the fall. (weather is always an issue) Where should I put in at? Where should I stay. You got me curious about the place last year and I have a step-brother who lives within 30 minutes of there that would love to fish there. Any suggestions on type of style of fishing such as long line trolling or spider rigging would be a big help. I am guessing in the fall they will be high and tite to the wood so I would lean towards spider rigging but wanted to see how you do it. Help!!!!! and please don't tell me the best time is during gun season for deer. lol

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I don't deer hunt, so I've got no clue :p

Anyway .... here's the scoop : I generally go down, for my Fall trip, in mid to late Oct. I have gone in mid Nov, and done good, also.
For the most part ... Fall fishing on Watts Bar, for me, has been dock shooting for Black Crappie. At least it was for the 5yr stretch of tournaments that I ran/fished, back in 2000-2005. The last several years, it's been warmer than normal, late in the year, and that's been a problem at times. It has to be on a cooling trend, to be productive ... not necessarily bitter cold, but the hotter the Summer, the longer into Fall it takes for the water to cool down. Water probably needs to be below 70deg, at least ... and cooler would probably be even better.
Deep water docks, and wood in 10+ feet of water or more, are the usual haunts of the WB Crappie. For the most part, the Black Crappie make up the majority of the catch, as the White Crappie tend to stay out in the channels/ledges areas. And as I'm not much of a "troller", and my partners boat isn't rigged for it, we tend to live & die by the casting/shooting methods.
We generally stay at Arrowhead Resort, which is in the mid-lake area +/- ... but do venture down towards the dam area, to a couple of places where we've had some success. Arrowhead closes at the end of Oct ... so if we go down in Nov, we'd likely have to hunt up another facility. That would likely be one of the camps in the Piney River/Spring City area (that's open at that time).

Here's a couple of reports from previous years trips :

http://www.crappie.com/crappie/main-...watts-bar.html

http://www.crappie.com/crappie/main-...watts-bar.html

The last good Fall (Nov) trip I had down there, we didn't really do any good dock shooting. I took a friend and his wife ... and even though I had taught them the basics of dock shooting, we found enough fish on a flat w/brush, that we didn't even bother with docks. We even fished along the rock cliff banks of the main lake, and caught some fish. Here's the report on that trip : http://www.crappie.com/crappie/main-...watts-bar.html

Hope you can glean some useful info from these reports.

... cp :cool:

I have to look at the hunting dates but I am pretty sure I am going to make a trip of it. I do a lot of dock shooting on Weiss. You can catch some real monsters that way. I will stay in touch with you about this trip. Might try to meet up with you guys while your there.

I'd be happy to provide you with any info on fishing Watts Bar.

It's a pretty good sized lake ... 39,000 acres. The main tributary waters are the Tenn River & Clinch River. It was started in 1939 & opened in 1946. It lies between Ft Loudon Lake & Chickamauga Lake .. on the Tenn River chain of lakes (which, as you know, ends with KY Lake).

It's a navigation route for some barge traffic, so there's not much standing cover left on the main lake. Even downed trees, along the shoreline, are eventually cut and removed. The TWRA fishing attractors are useless, with most of them (that I've encountered) being devoid of any cover under the buoys. Not sure if that's because the cover has rotted or been swept away (& not replaced), or if the buoys have been moved by high water.

Docks are abundant, throughout the lake, and are one of, if not the major, fish attracting cover. Brush piles are placed by locals, and if not directly under their docks, they're usually within a good cast's distance from them.
Open up Google Earth and it will show you a good chunk of the lake, down to being able to see boat docks & even boats on the water. A good topo map will also be a valuable tool, if for nothing more than navigation.

... cp :cool:

Sounds like a plan. I am getting pretty excited about trying a new place and I love hitting the docks. Most lakes here in KY are pretty useless for that. Either they are out of the water because of low water levels or they are floating and you can't get up under them. Some of my best days on Weiss has been shooting docks so I guess I need to break out a small garbage can and start practices my shot.

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Originally Posted by Jigboy

Sounds like a plan. I am getting pretty excited about trying a new place and I love hitting the docks. Most lakes here in KY are pretty useless for that. Either they are out of the water because of low water levels or they are floating and you can't get up under them. Some of my best days on Weiss has been shooting docks so I guess I need to break out a small garbage can and start practices my shot.

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You can hold off on the practicing with a small can, since the Fall water level generally leaves plenty of room between dock & water :p
But, then again, it never hurts to keep your dock shooting "eye" tuned up, and remind your jig/line release muscles about the proper release timing sequence. :D

I don't practice all that often, but when I do ... I like to use a picnic table as a target, rather than a can. From 10-15ft away, I shoot between the seat and ground for Spring water level training, and between the seat and tabletop for Fall water level training. The only reason/time I'd practice with a small can/bucket, is if I were going to be shooting under alot of pontoon boats ;) ... otherwise, you rarely have a small gap between dock & water, with the gap normally being at least a foot high (and several feet across).

If you haven't already done so, check out my article on Vertical Casting. Apply it to the outer dock posts of any dock with 12-15ft of water under the front edge. I generally start on a dock, from a distance, then move in closer, & then finish up with the Vertical Casting technique. Alot of times, the Crappie are holding at the front, or even out in front of the docks ... and I don't like to put the boat over them, or propwash them, if I can keep from it. At least not until I've run my jigs thru the area enough to determine where they're located. Once I've determined the general location/depth of the suspended fish, I can usually figure on them being in the same general position on other docks, and approach them closer or farther away.

If you have any intention of using minnows, rather than or along with your jigs ... I suggest you buy them around here, and transport them down, especially if you have a place to purchase them that bags them & has an oxygen tank to put air in the bag. They have minnows down there, but they're usually small Shiner minnows. I prefer the large Tuffy (Fathead) minnows, myself. We used to take a pound of minnows down, for 3 guys over 3days or more. That was back before we got into using jigs 99% of the time ;) ... but, as you saw in my previous report (Fall of '08 trip), we did resort to using a jighead/minnow in 20ft of water ... and that did help salvage the trip, even resulting in the catching of some of the larger fish. We bought the minnows there, and some were so small that I was hooking two on a jig :eek: Had we taken our own, we would have had a larger size. The fish we caught on jighead/minnow, were more prone to hitting the larger sized minnows ... with Bluegill, Drum, Cats, & Yellow Bass seemingly more interested in the smaller ones :o

Watt's Bar Crappie are not on the list of contaminated fishes ... but Catfish, Striped Bass/Hybrids are listed as "should not be eaten" (due to PCB contamination). This is supposedly from the Tenn River/Clinch River areas, but since those fish travel quite a bit ... I suspect that precaution to encompass the whole lake. The Yellow Bass is not specifically listed, but being as it's habits are similar to the Striped Bass & Hybrids, I wouldn't really trust them, either.

Legal limits are : 10 inch minimum size length on Crappie - 15/person/day creel - 30/person possession limit (after 2 or more days). Three day, non-resident license is $16.50 - ten day is $25.50 - annual is $41.00

... cp :cool:

Thanks for all the info. I am looking forward to it. You are saving me lots of computer time checking into all this information myself.