New to the area

[nomad60]

Hi all,

After living and working in South Korea for 14 years, my family and I are living in Clarksville. I love to fish, but in Korea I mainly fished for bass. I don't have a boat so will be restricted to bank fishing, unfortunately and I'm looking for some decent places to fish here locally.
It seems like every time I find a stream or some water, I see the dreaded "private property" signs. I've been told that there's decent fishing on the shores of the Cumberland river but that it gets really crowded and I'm not much into elbow-to-elbow fishing as that takes the fun out of it for me.
I don't need to catch 5 pounders (although that would be nice, LOL); I'm willing to go after anything that bites from bass, bluegill, crappie, catfish, stripers etc...any suggestions at all here locally? I'm not looking for specific spots but just some general advice to get me started...

Thanks!

[Travis C.]

TWRA stocks trout here March through August:

http://www.tn.gov/twra/gis/troutpdf/FortCampbellMilitaryReservation.pdf

You will need a additional base permit to the TN license/Trout Stamp.

[txnative]

Check out spring creek in billy Dunlop park. It's on e boy scout rd off of needmore rd. also, the fairgrounds has a good white bass bite along its riverside banks from August thru march. I run a pest control route in the Clarksville area and use my windshield time to scout new areas, along with "interrogating" any of the homeowners I service that have fishing gear, lol.


Chris

[nomad60]

Thanks guys. I live very close to Spring Creek on Trenton Road and am going to try to do some wading here real soon to see if I can find some deeper pools up and down stream but from the road it looks really shallow. I checked out the stream in Billy Dunlop park about a month ago but it was after a heavy rain so the water was high and fast. I'm thinking about taking my waders and giving that a try as well.

Quick question; what are the laws/regs as far as the streams running through private property? Someone at work told me that as long as you're in the water, you're good to go but I really don't want to take the chance of getting shot at because I'm wading through someone's property LOL

[Travis C.]

Someone at work told me that as long as you're in the water, you're good to go but I really don't want to take the chance of getting shot at because I'm wading through someone's property LOL

It's "on" the water. The public has the right to fish any stream that can be traveled by boat, canoe, raft or other floating vessel. You are not allowed to touch bottom, banks, anchor or tie up to trees along the banks. The only time you can touch bottom is when using the "right of passage" to pull your boat over a shallow stretch.

You can't cross private property to access the water either it has to be from public access to public access unless you have permission.

Example would be: If you put in at a public area then floated a mile or two down to a good stretch for wading. You would be legally entering the waterway where you put in but you would need the land owners permission to get out and wade fish after a couple miles down stream unless you were at another public access down stream.

[nomad60]

:(

Well, I'm glad I asked and that certainly narrows my prospects down. If I remember right, the fishing at Billy Dunlop park is only a small stretch, then there's a big "no tresspassing" sign downstream towards the end of the park.