Old Hickory: What's wrong???

[tacklemake]

I have been out just about every morning fishing and found the bass before the sun came up. After it came up they were hard to find and if you did find them they wouldn't bite. The water temperature in the morning before the sun comes up is 87.6 and after in the evening 93.5. I'm still fishing in 3' to 6' where the lay downs are and catching bass on the 8" black emerald lizard by Zoom working it slow on the bottom. I have found that the better days are when it's cloudy all day with a little wind and the water temperature is around 80.5.

[spottedbass]

Got on a school of fish yesterday afternoon. Caught 25 bass in an hour. Had only 4 keepers and they would probably have barely weighed 4 pounds. They were a bunch of anorexic fish. There was tons of bait around. Why these fish were so skinny is beyond me.

[Mike Mofield]

It has become very obvious that the water has become very polluted lately and all the fishing/boating pressure is hurting the fishing. Took my granddaughter out today and the water is NASTY !@!

[Halli]

It's just algae nasty not polluted as all the water comes from highland reservoirs upstream as Nashville is down!

[MickT]

Low flow conditions make it worse too. The water stagnates when there isn't any rain to run through the dams when we are in dry conditions like we were through May and June. An early warm up like we had this spring raises water temps too and accelerates the algae blooms.

[deezelteck]

Originally Posted by Halli

It's just algae nasty not polluted as all the water comes from highland reservoirs upstream as Nashville is down!

I agree.. There is always a constant flow of water coming through Old Hick. Moving water is usually less polluted than still water.

[spottedbass]

Yeah, the current was ripping on Thursday afternoon. That is what had the fish schooled up.

[FishAddict]

I've been fishing the Hick for 25 years. What I have noticed is that the places I used to catch a lot of fish are so heavily fished now, I tend to catch a few but not as many. I still catch plenty of fish, but have changed "where" more than I would have liked to. I will admit I would like to catch a few more larger ones. I personally think it is amazing that with the pounding it takes, it still is a pretty good bass lake. Everything I know about the water quality suggests it is fine. Went out yesterday AM and there were a ton of feeding/busting bass (a lot were smallish but managed to catchsome decent fish). It is critical that we release our bass. I do really hate the tournament style fishing. I love the changes where people are weighing and immediately releasing the fish. That is the way that needs to head, and I know there are going to be offenders but that is what is going to protect our fish. On the sauger front I am looking forward to seeing that settle some now that Wolf Creek is done. I've caught some fish, but nothing like it was prior to the construction up there.

[Texas_Rig]

Fished way up river today. Up past Misty Cove. Caught quite a few fishing the small creek mouths and small main lake pocket mouths. Most caught on a white frog in about 1-4 fow. No big ones but a few keepers. Bass were feeding on bait balls that were up on shallow points