minner
Well-known member
This is for the NA (north AL) emoSmile folks who might frequent this forum.
I was off Friday and low on bait for an upcoming jug trip so I set out at about 4:45 am and got set up to catch some skippies when they turned the water on at 6:00 at Guntersville Dam. As soon as the generators came on the SJ's were everywhere. Big ones too. I caught 26 in 30-40 minutes, and lost about that many more, all before it started to rain and the lightening ran me off. I broke my line (got to change it soon) 4 times and caught 5 fish on back to back....... casts.
Saturday evening I went back below the dam to jug fish with some friends from Chattanooga that had come down. We started out about 5:00 in creek with redworms trying to catch a few small bream for a little live bait in hopes of a yellow cat bite later on. We piddled around catching a few here and there when the girls grew impatient when, on my "one last cast", hooked a 2lb channel cat on a #2 aberdeen hook!!!!! That was my signal, time to go juggin.
We were setting out our 22 jugs in 14' of water when, on jug # 21 , we hear a commotion from the girls. We look up and 3 jugs were going crazy at once. These were the first three we set out and were a ways away. We finally got to them an only boated 1 out of three. Bummer!!! We finished baiting the last jug with skipjack and waited only 5 minutes when a forth jug was hit. We chased it down and gave our first blue some company in the livewell. We were a little taken by all the action and thought, "man, this is going to be a long night", when another jug went down in the distance and completely took it under for a 10 count. Not wanting to loose another fish I cranked up the big motor and got within short stone’s throw and finished up with the trolling motor not wanting to spook the beast. We got within a fingernails reach when the jug disappeared. We looked and looked, waited and waited, and hoped and hoped, but the jug never reappeared, assuming a submerged root or some other snag and laid claim to it and the trophy on the other end.......And that's when it happened, like a light switch,............. TVA CUT THE WATER DOWN........WAY DOWN. Dang it!!!! We struggled to catch one every now and then but the bite wasn't there. After a few beers and quite a few Kenny Chesney songs later we boated a nice 12 channel cat that we were proud of, and let live another day. An hour and a half had passed since the last sighting of lost jug number 5 when all of a sudden, we looked up back up river where our jug had met it's fate and THERE IT WAS, bobbing with fierce force not letting the cat subdue it again!!!!!! We cranked up and rescued the tired 18 lb blue on the other end and gently released her back into the Tennessee's tinted waters. A few more hours passes with a fish here and there when it was decided by the TVA it was time to go home..................they had had enough and left us without running water at 10:00. A less than average night all in all with only 50lbs of fish caught and only 7 of the 12 cats joining us on the long trip home.
I was off Friday and low on bait for an upcoming jug trip so I set out at about 4:45 am and got set up to catch some skippies when they turned the water on at 6:00 at Guntersville Dam. As soon as the generators came on the SJ's were everywhere. Big ones too. I caught 26 in 30-40 minutes, and lost about that many more, all before it started to rain and the lightening ran me off. I broke my line (got to change it soon) 4 times and caught 5 fish on back to back....... casts.
Saturday evening I went back below the dam to jug fish with some friends from Chattanooga that had come down. We started out about 5:00 in creek with redworms trying to catch a few small bream for a little live bait in hopes of a yellow cat bite later on. We piddled around catching a few here and there when the girls grew impatient when, on my "one last cast", hooked a 2lb channel cat on a #2 aberdeen hook!!!!! That was my signal, time to go juggin.
We were setting out our 22 jugs in 14' of water when, on jug # 21 , we hear a commotion from the girls. We look up and 3 jugs were going crazy at once. These were the first three we set out and were a ways away. We finally got to them an only boated 1 out of three. Bummer!!! We finished baiting the last jug with skipjack and waited only 5 minutes when a forth jug was hit. We chased it down and gave our first blue some company in the livewell. We were a little taken by all the action and thought, "man, this is going to be a long night", when another jug went down in the distance and completely took it under for a 10 count. Not wanting to loose another fish I cranked up the big motor and got within short stone’s throw and finished up with the trolling motor not wanting to spook the beast. We got within a fingernails reach when the jug disappeared. We looked and looked, waited and waited, and hoped and hoped, but the jug never reappeared, assuming a submerged root or some other snag and laid claim to it and the trophy on the other end.......And that's when it happened, like a light switch,............. TVA CUT THE WATER DOWN........WAY DOWN. Dang it!!!! We struggled to catch one every now and then but the bite wasn't there. After a few beers and quite a few Kenny Chesney songs later we boated a nice 12 channel cat that we were proud of, and let live another day. An hour and a half had passed since the last sighting of lost jug number 5 when all of a sudden, we looked up back up river where our jug had met it's fate and THERE IT WAS, bobbing with fierce force not letting the cat subdue it again!!!!!! We cranked up and rescued the tired 18 lb blue on the other end and gently released her back into the Tennessee's tinted waters. A few more hours passes with a fish here and there when it was decided by the TVA it was time to go home..................they had had enough and left us without running water at 10:00. A less than average night all in all with only 50lbs of fish caught and only 7 of the 12 cats joining us on the long trip home.
