JC's 2009 Lake Lanier fishing reports

Well I guess I should just take my reports and make them an ongoing thread for the year like Muskyman.

Last night was a little better than the night before. Got home and kicked on the dock lights at 11:30pm and sat down and waited quietly like a church mouse for about an hour seen a couple rouge herring pass threw the lights but no mass schools like previous nights. Heard a big pop right at my feet and saw the tail end of a small striper jet back into the darkness this was my queue to get up and get fishing. Managed to catch the smaller one after about 15 minutes of casting not big but a great fighter on 8lb test. About 35 minutes later Rick woke up and I guess he seen the lights on down at the dock and tried to scare me by sneaking up on me and throwing a big rock down the shoreline from the woods. I heard it and wasonly slightly spooked as I had a feeling it was him (hoped like hell it was him lol). He had just walked up when I took a cast far left and whammo hooked up with this decent striper in the low teens after a 10 to 15 minute back and forth battle on the ultra light he snapped a picture and off she went. This of course made him grab my spare rod and begin casting himself PJ's and all LOL 20 minutes later the skys opened up and I called it quits at about 2am.

Wow you been getting some nice fish terry congrats on all the catches, i like reading your reports and play by play action lolol and then try and put a visual to it all lolol, thanks for sharing buddy great pics to my friend.

North Star wrote:

Wow you been getting some nice fish terry congrats on all the catches, i like reading your reports and play by play action lolol and then try and put a visual to it all lolol, thanks for sharing buddy great pics to my friend.

I think all my complaining and persistence is gonna start paying off. The stripers seem to have opened up their appetites now and are starting to feed on bigger baits and not exclusively on those tiny threadfin shad. Im gonna switch over to braid soon on my spinning rods cause it seems anything over a 10lb striper is just manhandling my 8lb test ultra which is OK if they stay out in open water but if and when I do hook that 30lb+ beast it will be nearly impossible to land her on ultra light tackle. Especially since Ive heard of two 40+lb striper caught in the last week behind the house and seen pictures of one that was 43lbs. I love the ultra light action but I dont wanna lose that fish of a lifetime because of it.

Here are some other notables that didnt make the cut on an earlier report from last week



I usually would'nt take a picture of a fish of this caliber but I must say he had the heart of a lion and the appetite of a bear LOL

Looks like you guys are having a ball out there...Great pics!

Well the rains have come again and shut down my night time heroics. Everytime it starts to clear up bam another storm comes and mucks it all up on me. But on a good note if the rains keep up at this rate we stand a strong chance of Lake Lanier being at full pool by summer time. I guess my reports may come with whiskers till the water clears again.

nice fish

This report takes place Thursday evening and Friday evening mostly. Well it seems spring has sprung and the stripers are eating anything they see if you are in the right spot at the right times. We caught many many fish on many different baits including but not limited to; bombers, sebiles, flukes, bucktails, gizzard shad, blueback herring and Im sure there is more I just forgot. But as always just when things start looking up mother nature throws a right hook at us. Friday before that nasty cell of thunder hail and tornados ripped through we were hot on the trail of another good evening of top notch drag screaming action. Then the storm hit and man it was the most wicked show of nature I had ever seen we had just made it back to the dock when the hail started falling and good thing we did cause the bottom fell out soon after that and we ran to the house for cover. But after 2 hours of heavens wrath it did clear up and we got back out just as soon as the lightning stopped and managed a few more and lost a giant before the winds picked up and shut it down

Some day me going to catch some of those, awesome terry just awesome can't wait to see the next ones you get you and willy just been slaughtering them this year congrats you to..

We did catch tons of channel cats yesterday up to 4lbs back in the creeks behind the house but I didnt take any pictures. But on a strange note I caught a carp on a live herring yesterday and I know for a fact he was chasing it and eventually managed to eat the herring and then set the circle hook into his mouth as he tried to swim off with it. I guess there is just so many herring in that creek that even a carp cant pass up an easy meal. I did take pictures of that though lol

Awesome stripers Terry! I wish I had a place closer with a healthy population of big stripers like that. How big was the carp that grabbed live bait? I have seen them grab minnows but never any kind of big live bait.

catfish willy wrote:

Awesome stripers Terry! I wish I had a place closer with a healthy population of big stripers like that. How big was the carp that grabbed live bait? I have seen them grab minnows but never any kind of big live bait.

It wasnt a very big carp maybe 4lbs if he was lucky and the bait was fairly big 6inches

Nice Fish!!!

Headed out ahead of the storm last night and pulled live giant gizzard shad and herring behind planer boards and balloons. 6 bites no fish caught. I had one of my mega shads that got grabbed and taken for a ride but despite having a giant bait hook in his mouth and a big stinger treble near the rear that striper still managed to come undone. On a cooler note there was many channel catfish roaming around near the surface last night. It seemed each throw I took with the cast net there was almost always one in the net when I pulled it up. I probably could have caught a mess of them but I didnt have the right gear with me. They were nailing 7inch herring in the top foot of water over 80ft depths they were running around like they had stripes instead of whiskers LOL

Terry it really sounds like you have some exciting fishing down there right now, is it like this all the time in the spring once the bite starts, or is it a hit and miss type of thing.

Sounds like fun...fish or no fish.

I wonder why such a low hook up ratio? It seemed like you could hook them fine before. At least they are biting though. I can't believe the fish didn't bite better around here today.

April is the main month for fast pace action for stripers in the shallows down here most times you turn on the spot light and see 15 to 20lb stripers swimming around near the surface surrounded by herring but only picking and choosing when to strike. On Thursday and Friday if your planer board wasnt dragging the edge of the shore sometimes you were to far off the shore and nothing like watching 15+lb fish shoot up from below the surface and hammer your bait. The problem we have with the hook ups right now Willy is hook size and ferocity of the bite. The stripers are only a foot or two at most below the surface right now at night looking up and smashing the silhouette of the bait against the night sky and 50% of the time they miss and when they dont its chaos drag screaming rod creaking and what sounds like a bull alligator trying to make off with a buffalo and at first your like a deer stuck in the head lights till you realize what just happened and rush to grab the rod and half the time its already over by the time you get to the rod and when its not over you had better have 10 to 20 minutes of time to kill cause they just keep going till they are almost exhausted to the point of death at times.
The stripers want to look up and see a lively bait and as such we need the smaller hooks in the herring to keep them swimming freely near the surface as they arent a very hardy bait like a shiner or sucker. I just hope it stays a little cool for a tad bit longer and the water clears so we can get back into them again before the warm water chases them towards deeper water because those stripers hate warm water and bright sunshine. Come mid May and on through the summer we will be trying to catch them suspended in 30 to 50 feet of water over 80 to 120 foot depths which is hit or miss most days. Not to mention right now is the trophy time of year where the big boys drop there guard and get careless

Great read Terry thanks for the report, i always like a good read like that keep on catching them buddy.

As hard as you work at fishing those stripers Terry you should end up with a monster sooner or later.....Whats the lake record?

Awesome reports, Terry! As well as AWESOME fish!~! As Mike said, I also look forward to reading your reports. It's like we're there with you when reading them. Glad to hear that the fishing has picked back up for you. I still haven't gotten out yet this year. It will more than likely be a week or two yet before I get out to fish.

Here is the report from saturday. We had caught a ton channel catfish nothing big maybe tops 5lbs but we did catch around 35 to 40 and had to go back deeper in the creeks and cast net some more bait as 3 dozen didnt last long with those hungry catfish. I would have taken pictures but we were catching so many we just kept releasing them and catching again. But here is that carp that chased down and ate that herring. Also included a couple pictures of the creek that flows in behind the house. Catfishy aint it??





Here is the lone little striper I found later that night.

Just went down to the dock and it seems as though the water has cleared a bit I guess I will give the stripers a go tonight after work if the wind dies down.

Good Luck. Great pics!! Congrats.

Well last night I got the news from the powers that be that I will be working Saturday and Sunday from 3pm to 3am both nights no biggy I can use the money but.............when am I going to fish???? After mulling over all possibilities I asked my boss if I could cut out an hour or two early last night and permission was granted LOL I finally hit the water at 9:30pm and was all fired up cause the lake was a sheet of glass. After an hour and a half I didnt see much action and hadnt even had a bite. I was beginning to think last night was gonna be a bust. Lots of bait around but there werent anything feeding on them. At about 12:30 I started seeing some action out over the main creek channel and headed that way. I was pulling 2 gizzard shad in the 14inch range and unfortunately I was being lazy and didnt stick a stinger hook in the rear of neither bait. Around 1am I was startled when a big striper came and smashed the smaller of the 2 gizzards boat side as I was making a turn he took a good run but by the time I got there it was over and the shad was dead Now I rebated that hook with a big herring and set him back out there. I was at that time getting a stinger hook ready for the second gizzard shad when that rod took off like a bat out of hell and even turned the rod holder towards the back of the boat with the brute strength but again I made my way over to the rod only to reel up an empty hook So now Im left with just herring and not that herring are bad but when there are 500,000 of them around your boat it kinda narrows your chances of winning the lottery. After that the only bites I had till 2:30 were 3 fish came up and took shots at the planer boards but never gave a run at the herring. But as I was fizzling out I got lucky when this guy came and nailed my herring in a spot that I just knew there would be a few hungry fish lurking. Sorry about the pics auto camera is hard to get right when your in the dark lol The second small striper hit as I was unloading the boat at the dock right off the back of the boat in his defense he hit and fought like a whale LOL