Jug fishing on OH

[Turkeyhunter_2008]

Hey guys my 17 year old son wants me and him to make a jug fishing trip. With our usual spots on Barkley being a little flooded i was wondering if anybody had any suggestions on where to go on Old Hickory?

[Jim]

Same kind of areas as you would on Barkley, but you may want to go up river from Gallatin if you are jug fishing in the daytime during the weekends. It gets really crowded on the water from Gallatin to the dam.

Plenty of eating sized catfish in Old Hickory. I like fresh shad on my jugs, but probably most anything will work.

[countryboycansurvive]

I'd set them shallow around the edges of coves in the creeks. I was spider rigging in Drakes Creek a couple weeks ago and had a cat take a minnow in about 3ft of water. his tail came out of the water as he was taking off and I'd judge it to be a 20lb plus fish. About an hour later I hooked another about the same size. With a 10 ft rod and 6lb test I couldn't even slow them down. The first one broke off and the second ran to the center of the cove and up into some structure. I may take my sons out this weekend to do some jugging if the weather's good.

[Jim]

countryboycansurvive is right on as far as locations. I do great in shallow water this time of year. The other key is to look for shad schools in the coves. If they are there the catfish will be around for sure. Daytime is as good as night right now as long as the bait is thick.

Good luck and enjoy a good fish fry!

[Turkeyhunter_2008]

Thanks guys. That's alot of good info. I have not fished OH much for cats but I was looking at the drakes creek and station camp creek areas, y'all have given me a little more confidence in those areas. They are about as close as I can find to being similar to where we fish on Barkley. I really do appreciate the help. Hopefully we are gonna go on Friday evening.

[Turkeyhunter_2008]

Finally made it to Old Hickory to run a few jugs last Friday morning. Got on the lake later than I had wanted to but still managed to catch a good mess of fish to give fillets to my mom and wifes grandparents. I think I caught almost all of them on cicada/larva that I picked up the evening before!! :D