Fishing downtown Chattanooga

[polo-dog]

Has anyone when they had a few minutes fished downtown from the shore? I took my youngest son downtown tonight and had an hour and fifteen minutes, so I threw a couple of rods into the car and dropped him off. I fished along the rip rap at Cooledge park and caught a couple of spotted bass. Had a few more hits but could see that they were mostly really small fish in the 8-10 inch range. It was fun. I caught them on a chug bug. Also had a buzz bait tied on but got no hits on it. I didn't try anything sub-surface 'cause I didn't have much time to fish, and didn't want to spend my time changing lures. I would expect that at times there are some good fish along the rip rap. A guy in a boat went by and told me that he had caught a bunch of fish recently in the area but mostly small. He did say that he had caught a couple of big fish a few days ago. Try it sometime when you have a few minutes. Does anyone know any sweet spots that could be fished from the shore downtown?

 

[jason]

I was actually going to post a similar question. Are there any good spots from the bank at the rear of Chatt State? Just downstream from the railroad bridge? I have been early for school several times in the last week and found myself wishing I had my tackle with me.

 

[ranman]

Don't tell anyone but there are smallmouth bass in mouse creek in Cleveland.
I love urban fishing specially the looks you get from people who have no idea that these creeks in town have fish in them.

 

[jim4596]

downtown there is a dock right up near the base of the dam, over behind chatts state. i have absolutely slaughtered fish there. not many bass, but a ton of huge bream, stripe, drum, carp, shad, etc. just fun to go over there if u only got a few minutes. i used to sneak out there between classes. u dont want the water to be pulling to much, just a little. but anyway, its fun.

 

[jason]

I found a pretty good spot today before class. There is a section of the Riverpark underneath Robinson bridge that has four fishing piers. With a green pumpkin Zoom finesse worm on a 1/4oz jig, I caught a bunch of spots drifting it with the current paralell to the bank. You wouldn't want to spend the day there, but it was great for a couple hours.

 

[polo-dog]

That's nice to know. I have toyed with the idea of keeping a couple of rods in my truck so that if I have an hour or so to wait on family I can hit the water.

 

[jason]

I fished the same areas yesterday with a Spook and caught several quality largemouth. They wanted it fast...as fast as you could reel and jerk.

 

[jason]

Used the same lure and retrieve at the Chatt State boat ramp this evening and caught four over 15"...each one was barfing up shad.