DHaun
Well-known member
Jerdog and I launched below Chickamauga Dam about 5pm today and went looking for catfish first in the wind. There was a very small amount of current and no catfish to be found. I hope it's not like this next weekend or the Cat Battle is going to be quite slow... We then went to bounce some jigs and troll some cranks over some humps and caught a small bass, a drum, and a bream. Due to the lack of current we decided to go below the Dam and check out the boils. Only 1-2 turbines were running but Skipjack were busting very small threadfin everywhere. I threw my crankbait into the frenzy and hooked about a 3lb largemouth that jumped and threw it right back at me. Later, Jerdog caught another 3 pound largemouth on a redfin. The big fish of the trip ended up being a rockfish that wanted my bandit crankbait on 10lb line in the current, which was a great fight! Just before dusk we tried for cats again drifting the boils and on downstream with no luck...I was able to spoon jig up a warmouth in 32ft before we called it night around 9pm. All fish safely released.
We also found a jug bobbing in the river and as we approached it with the trolling motor it bounced a few times and submerged for about 10 minutes before it came back up in about the same spot. Later we went after it again and as soon as it saw the boat it went right back down for another 5 minutes. We gave it a third try thinking it had to be tired but it went down into the depths again like Jaws so we left and never saw it again. This was a jug about the size of a quart of oil painted bright orange. I have not been jug fishing yet so I don't know how big a fish has to be to pull one under 3 times out of site for so long. I figure it must have been pretty big.
We also found a jug bobbing in the river and as we approached it with the trolling motor it bounced a few times and submerged for about 10 minutes before it came back up in about the same spot. Later we went after it again and as soon as it saw the boat it went right back down for another 5 minutes. We gave it a third try thinking it had to be tired but it went down into the depths again like Jaws so we left and never saw it again. This was a jug about the size of a quart of oil painted bright orange. I have not been jug fishing yet so I don't know how big a fish has to be to pull one under 3 times out of site for so long. I figure it must have been pretty big.
I hope they are active next week in the CFF catbattle. It would have been nice to know what kind of fish it was with the jug wouldn't it!? Oh well, it must've been pretty big though!
