Fishing report May 14

This fishing report was compiled for the week of May 14, 2013

Editor’s note: After bragging that the lakes were stable last week the rain did its best to make a liar out of me. The rains started in Morehead Saturday night and continued until Sunday night making Sunday a challenge to get out on the water. While the rain may have kept many anglers off the water, it hasn’t slowed down the improving chances to catch a good fish. If you get out on the water, let us know how you did. chris@ashlandbeacon.com

Cave Run Lake:  The lake is just about at summer pool this week and water temperatures have been all over the place from 63 to 67 degrees. This should trigger bass to move to spawning areas. Musky: The muskie fishing was good this year for the PMTT tournament the top ten teams caught 12 fish, the largest hitting the tape at 50.75 inches. For more information check out the Cave Run section of the KentuckyAngling.com message board. Smallmouth Bass: Reports of smallmouth are spotty fishing weightless worm rigs. Largemouth Bass: I had the best success using a swim minnow in a ¼ oz. ball jig fishing the deepest edges of the lay-down trees. White Bass: I had no reports on the white bass this week. If you caught some, let me know how you did it. Crappie: The crappie are nesting. I found them in lay-down trees in about 10 feet of water. They were eager to hit my two-inch twister tail jig.

Grayson Lake: Water levels are a little over summer pool and the upper areas of the lake were reported muddy. Lake temperatures have improved to near 65 degrees. Bass: Fair and improving fishing jerk baits and plastic worms on flats. Some fish have also been caught fishing crank baits around discharge areas in protected coves. Crappie: Fair to good fishing swim jigs around down timber and brush piles. Crappie are spawning in this lake. We expect to get some good reports in the next couple of weeks.

Greenbo Lake: This lake is producing both trout and bass. Water temperature is 66 to 68 degrees. Bass: The bass have been reported spawning. We don’t encourage removing these fish while they are spawning so we will not cover methods this week. Trout: Greenbo was stocked on Jan. 30 with 5,500 rainbow trout. While some trout can still be taken using normal methods, this week success has been reported on blade and spinnerbaits.  Catfish: Slow to fair fishing very early and at midday. Fish live bait, chubs, small bluegill and cut bait.

Ohio River: The river had a lot of run-in this week causing some creeks to be muddy and some areas are just not fishable. Largemouth Bass: fair. Increasing discharge has made it hard to locate bass that were in a pre-stage spawning pattern. As the river recovers, we should see a return of good fishing. Below the Dam: With water levels unstable, dam fishing reports were poor but should improve. Sauger and Walleye: Twin tail grubs on 1/4 oz.  ball jigs are still the best producers using slow bump-the-bottom retrieves. We also got reports that running a two jig setup has been producing better strikes. One of the two baits needs to be a little off the bottom. Bass: Above the dam has been fair this week. As the water returns to normal we expect to see this fishing to rebound. Catfish: We didn’t get any reports from catfish anglers this week.

Yatesville Lake: We had some report this week that the lake was high and the fish were in the trees. However, when I checked the lake levels with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers the lake level was only .3 over summer pool. Water temperatures are creeping into the mid-60s. Bass: Our reports this week said that the bass were in the trees in shallow water. Fish were taken on jerk baits and spinnerbaits. Crappie: good. Fish the edges of flats in channel bends and old fish attractors using 32 oz. white crappie jigs or live bait.

Reports and pictures of your catch can be submitted to: trimmer308@windstream.net