Pushing cranks

[rayzor65]

I've been on Old Hickory twice trying the pushing technique with cranks. I like that you can follow the contours closer vs. pulling 80 to 100 feet behind the boat. I put in at Cairo and followed the channel starting in the 22 fow range and worked a stretch of channel going shallower in 6 foot increments. I caught several small walleye and sauger on the deeper pass several yellow belly and two short crappie. Its more getting the feel of this than loading the boat up, the 1/3 more line than the depth you want the crank at is pretty close if the line is trailing at 45 degree. I'm going to fish a MTCC tourney at Tim's tomorrow morning, I've never seen the lake, I know it has docks so I'm going to do some shooting, if there is a thermocline I may drop the cranks about 4 feet above the thermo and cover some water. Looking at the TOPO map its a deep lake with very few flats which most articles I've read is where you want to troll, we'll see

Happy fishing,
Ray

[drdore]

Ray, the trolling doesn't seem to be as productive at Tim's. I think you will do better dock shooting and fishing blow downs. Be prepared to travel and explore. If you don't get hit in the first ten to fifteen minutes on a spot, leave and check the next spot. Good luck tomorrow. At the meeting last night, there weren't many reports of good catches this past week. Hope that doesn't hold true tomorrow.

Sam

[rayzor65]

Tim's is so sprawled out, its a little intimidating looking at the map, You could spend a morning in just one hollow, I was going to head mid lake and start there. I've fished lay downs on Old Hickory but you're talking shore to 20 fow, their a lot deeper on Tim's, that will take some getting use to, I've never fished water deeper than 25 feet. I read an article about pushing crank baits in deep water lakes when the Thermocline comes in, it made a lot of sense especially if you find bait and suspended fish. I'm looking forward to "Expanding my horizon" as they say. Thanks for the feedback.

Ray

[Dave and Lynn]

Hey Ray. Most people will probably head up river to fish. I know that is where I am going. Mid lake at Tim's can get bad if we have a good bit of wind blowing like the weather man is calling for. There are plenty of docks up river and in dry creek area that hold crappie. You may even be able to pull your cranks up that way. There is a good bluff on the left hand side of the river channel with docks on it. See you in the morning.

[rayzor65]

Its funny you say that, at lunch I was looking at the map and there are some areas that looked pretty good to me. Some flats with the creek channel close by, I've been assuming the crappie would have moved to mid lake or closer to the dam, on Priest they are mid lake to the dam now. I've also been looking for areas where the pleasure boaters might not run. Will leave the house around 3:00 to get there in time tomorrow, probably won't get much sleep worring I won't wake up to the alarm LOL. Wife doesn't fair well in the heat and she's not a shooter so I'll be on my own tomorrow.

See you there

Ray

[Kingfish1]

Good luck! Let us know how you did.

[rayzor65]

It was a tough day, I shot docks, spider rigged and pushed cranks, I didn't catch a crappie till 10:30 and it was on a dock with minnow buckets all over it and a bunch of poles laying around, I would guess they had fished under the lights and were in bed sleeping. I caught 4 short fish there and a 20" smallie. A short while later I hit another dock that the side scan showed was loaded with brush, I picked up three shorts there and a 22" smallie, hit several more docks after that, I caught a couple more all short before I headed back to weigh in. I had two fish that when you squeezed the tail hit the 10" BARELY, I put them back, looking back maybe should have kept them but I didn't want to chance it, would have got me in the top 5. After weigh in I went back out and caught a mess of nice gills, had the yesterday, boiled em then put them in ice water, when they were good and cold ate them like shrimp, dipping in cocktail sauce. Awesome appetizers!
Pushing cranks I caught the most fish, a couple cats, some got size yellow bellies and a couple 14" plus hybrids, no crappie, lost a couple cranks that got hung but was happy with the technique, followed a drop along a flat (Tim's doesn't have many of those) and was able to follow the contour fairly close,
Planning on hitting Percy Priest early Saturday, we'll see how I can do there.

Have a great day,
Ray

[Dave and Lynn]

Tough bite for sure Ray. Would have liked to stayed and fished with you but had motor problems early on and just managed to putter around that day. Let us know how it goes on Priest.