Made a trip to the upper lake today and fished for several hours. The water levels continue to rise slowly, water was pretty stained, but not too bad. Ended up catching 8 Blues from about 4# - 20#, in 3-6' of water on cut fresh herring and shad. One note for anyone going through Santee for bait. Santee General store sells the big ones for $2/per or $15/doz. Their competitors on the next corner will not sell by the dozen, strictly $2/per. Neds on 45 at the diversion also has the big ones for $15/doz. Better to call ahead anyway for the large ones. They probably won't carry them much longer, as the water is warming fast. (61.2 today)
Ill be back up there friday through sunday if you get a chance to come back up Tommy. Staying at Poplar Creek
The water is 72.8 this am which is 5.5 ft above the lowest level we had a few months ago.Next good rain should bring us up to 74+ which is the norm for this time of year.:big_smile:
nice report Tommy. If you don't mind my asking ,did you catch your fish in the dark or daylight hours? I've done ok in the past during dark in shallows but, my bite always seemed to slow/stop during daylight hours in shallow water. Mark
Mark, I fished in the afternoon. The sun was bright, and the fish bit kinda slow on the open water areas, but were tight to structure like stumps and logs. They don't like that bright light, for sure, but they are going into prespawn, and those urges take precedent, maybe. I don't know.
Ken, I'm working on Saturday. Probably won't be able to get back up there right away. I'm off on Friday, but have a pretty full schedule here at home. James, I caught one of your Pee Dee fish today; had about 20 minutes to spare, used some of the left over bait from yesterday and got one blue about 4-5 lbs. :big_smile:
Great Report. I also fished today, but in the middle section of the lake. Must have been 8 boats in the area. I ended up catching 4 and lost 2 coming to the boat. They were caught in 18'. The water temp was 58. Big fish a little under 20. Drifting with shad.
Fished upper Marion Saturday and had a blast untill the temp started to drop around 1pm and after that the bite stopped completely. Caught eleven from 730 am to 1pm with the biggest being 34 lbs, four in the 20 lb range and the rest from about 3 - 10 lbs. All were caught on threadfin shad and blue gill heads. Saw several boats with nice catches of shellcracker........made me want to dig out the old bream buster. Put in at Poplar Creek, no problem at all, they really did some nice work extending their ramp.
Nice trip. Yeah that temp did drop all of a sudden. if you don't mind my asking, was that shallow or deep? Thanks, Mark
The water level this morning is 73.03!!!Another 2 tenths rise and we will be 6 ft better than the lowest point of the drought.Normally the lakes are at 75.30 to 76.00 this time of year so we have a way to go.I suspect all that rain coming will probably get us in good shape.:big_smile:
