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Cumberland River
In an effort to avoid the nasty boat traffic this time of year, I was thinking about trying the cumberland river out. Anyone been on the river recently? I live real close to Shelby Bottoms but would be willing to drive for some hot action.
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14 Replies
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I have many times put in at Ashland City based on crazy weekend boat traffic on OH & PP. I would think that anyplace you put in on the river would be as good as the other…however I also admit that I have never figured out a good pattern and have not been very productive. Once you get 1 mile away from the ramp you will have it mostly all to yourself. Good luck, Jim
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Thanks Jim! With the way my luck has been going on the big lakes lately, I’m going to give it a try. I’ve had some luck in the past on the cumberland, usually their smaller but from my experience, river fish typically seem to be more aggressive throughout the year. Either way, I’ll let you guys know how I do.
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I am headed back to KY lake New Johnsonville Saturday to try some ledge fishing again. Reports say that the bait fish and LM are returning to the ledges and major creek openings again. One report was 28 lbs in 6 hours on one 1/4 mile long ledge…now that’s a nice group of fish.
Good luck on the river…careful of logs floating just below the surface…friend of mine broke his jack plate on one 2 weeks ago.
Good Luck, Jim
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28# in 6 hours would be one heck of an unforgettable trip! Hopefully you can stumble upon a little bit of heaven in New Johnsonville. Get your “big boy” gear out, magnum everything, spoons, cranks, jigs, worms, rods, line, etc. Haha!
Yeah, rivers can be a bit sketchy to navigate, especially after a good rain but I still don’t know if I’ve ever been any place that has as much stuff floating around as Old Hickory.
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So right OH is a mess when it comes to junk in the water. Last major rain, my friend who has a cabin in the river around Gallatin saw hay bails floating by his place.
On Jul 14th myself and Sam Lashlee caught 28 lbs out of Paris Landing, to the north, from 7am to 1pm. 5 LM (three 5, one 6 and one 7). Best day I have ever had.
Anyway, good luck and be safe, Jim
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Welp, my struggles this summer continued on Sunday afternoon. I decided to launch from Cleeces Ferry on the West side of town, besides just being one lane, it was surprisingly a pretty nice launch.
I fished hard for about 5 hours before I encountered a couple guys that ran out of gas… But anyways back to fishing! I ended up getting three bites, lost two. One of which was a beast, 5-6# class largie. Hit at the very end of a long cast with a DD crankbait, thought for sure it was a big catfish, and when I pulled him up to the surface, as quickly as I saw he barely had the back treble, he opened his mouth and pulled off :(. Even though it was a tough day, I think I’ll give it another go and see if I can build upon anything I learned on Sunday.
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You fared better than I did. I ended up going to OH Saturday, put in at Lone Branch at 5:30am and fished top water in Cedar Creek for about 1 1/2 hours before giving up. I next moved out on the river and ran the ledges using side & down scan till around 9am only stopping to fish when I thought I was seeing 1-2 fish. Threw 10 1/2 green pumpkin worm texas rigged, 1/2 jig with crawfish trailer, 1/2 rattle trap chrome/black/blue and pearl fluke with 1/4 bell weight…again not a hint of a strike. Lastly moved to the opening and back into Station Camp and again side scanned creek bends, points and creek ledges looking for more fish like I caught 1 week ago…big nothing.
You must live on the west side of Nashville to have launched at Cleeves Ferry which is about 6 miles from my house. If so, we should gang up on them someday and both fish out of your or my boat. My plans this week are to fish New Johnsonville KY lake Wednesday and probably OH on Thursday. If you are interested let me know.
I am fishing out of a 2005 Stratos 20, 225 Yamaha, HB 899 console and HB 859 on the bow
Jim
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I fished the Cumberland yesterday morning and Priest yesterday afternoon.
The water on the River was insanely low. Even with a bit of current, the fishing was slow for us. We put in at the Donelson ramp and ran up river about a mile from Neelys Bend. Fishing jigs, buzzbaits and crankbaits, we caught a few small spots up there. Then we ran down to the stretch between Briley Parkway and the McGavock ferry. Down there, I caught a 2.5lb smallie dragging a jig around some docks. We caught a few more short spots. Overall, typical summer day. Once the current stopped, so did the fish.Then, to really amp up the lack of productivity, I took my son and wife out on Priest to go swimming…
While there, I caught a couple of yearling smallies [6-8″] at the mouth of the YMCA cove on a shakey head. Also caught a yearling largemouth off a point in 10ft of water. The YMCA cove was packed with shad. My graph was lit up with clouds of bait. Seems like the fish are getting ready to hit their fall patterns soon. At least I hope so. -
Speaking of junk on Old Hickory.
I went out last Tuesday and wasn’t able to run upriver of the 109 bridge due to logs and debris. Does anyone know if it’s cleared out at all? I ended up ditching my gameplan and stayed downlake flipping grass and fishing a frog in the shallows. Any thoughts? -
Still there, Jim
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Flipping wood in shallow water won a tournament out there last weekend.
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quote simplecircuit:I fished the Cumberland yesterday morning and Priest yesterday afternoon.
The water on the River was insanely low. Even with a bit of current, the fishing was slow for us. We put in at the Donelson ramp and ran up river about a mile from Neelys Bend. Fishing jigs, buzzbaits and crankbaits, we caught a few small spots up there. Then we ran down to the stretch between Briley Parkway and the McGavock ferry. Down there, I caught a 2.5lb smallie dragging a jig around some docks. We caught a few more short spots. Overall, typical summer day. Once the current stopped, so did the fish.Then, to really amp up the lack of productivity, I took my son and wife out on Priest to go swimming…
While there, I caught a couple of yearling smallies [6-8″] at the mouth of the YMCA cove on a shakey head. Also caught a yearling largemouth off a point in 10ft of water. The YMCA cove was packed with shad. My graph was lit up with clouds of bait. Seems like the fish are getting ready to hit their fall patterns soon. At least I hope so.Thanks for the update, J. Sounds like you’ve got that yearling pattern dialed-in at PP 😛 . Having said that, it’s definitely better than the zero pattern I’m working with currently, haha.
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Brian,
I was hoping to run to the back of Bledsoe last week. Any idea what part of the lake that tourney was won on? It seems that the flipping shallow wood in the backwaters is a pattern at OH that ALWAYS holds up. It’s how Kevin Wirth won the Elite Series event there a while back. If I recall, he was making repeated pitches to log jams with a 10″ worms and buzzbaits. The area looked like either way back in Station Camp Creek or in the far back of Bledsoe. -
Kevin was in the back of Spring way up lake. Dean Rojas was in there too casting his SPRO frog! Not sure on where the tournament was won last weekend.
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