Well....It's Lay Lake Time!!!!

[SmallJaw]

High School Tournament season is about over. Nothing but the 2 day state championships left. The school I captain a team for, Hartselle, is in 4th I believe. If not 4th it's 5th. I'll know Friday for sure. We need a strong finish and it will take 2 good days of fish to do it. All the help you guys have given me this year on Weiss, G'ville, Smith and Tuscaloosa, has been a real blessing and help. We caught fish using many of the tactics and places you gave me. I need to go to the well one more time this year and see if any of you have any experience or recent knowledge of Lay Lake. I fished the lake several times in the early and mid 80's but have no real idea of what's going on there since I haven't been fishing it. As any of you know by now I always try to reciprocate help on the lakes I know a little about. Heck, I'll help even if its not due to reciprocity. We just do that on here I reckon. I'm planning on going down to practice with the kids this weekend. The tourney is next weekend on a Friday and Saturday. 10th and 11th of May. Thanks guys.:wink:gone fishing

 

[SmallJaw]

Update. We had a ball on Lay practicing this weekend. Both days we fished the boys were able to catch some really nice stringers of spots. I don't know what will happen next week but it was a good lake to us this time around. Tourney days are always different though!:banghead:very happy

 

[GotMyAlly]

I only fished Lay a couple times when I lived in Tuscaloosa but it was always a fun lake to fish. Swim jigs for big fish and shakey heads for numbers was the ticket for me. I may have an old paper map of Lay too.......but I doubt it has as many notes as my tuscaloosa map did, if any at all, but it's yours if you can use it.

 

[SmallJaw]

I only fished Lay a couple times when I lived in Tuscaloosa but it was always a fun lake to fish. Swim jigs for big fish and shakey heads for numbers was the ticket for me. I may have an old paper map of Lay too.......but I doubt it has as many notes as my tuscaloosa map did, if any at all, but it's yours if you can use it.

That map of Tuscaloosa was great, especially because I had not seen it at all before. I feel pretty good about Lay though. Not because we have some big secrete hole, but because we caught fish in a number of places and under several conditions. One of those places will hold up till next weekend. Deep fish generally are consistent. We sure did have fun even given the cold conditions. The BFL took just under 20 to win Saturday and we had around 13 with high school boys. I'd like to think that me and another adult with experience in tourney's could have added a few more pounds to that number. We had 12.37 yesterday so our fish are pretty consistent. We just need largemouth's to win. That I am sure of for the most part. We had 1 in 2 days of fishing! LOL

 

[GotMyAlly]

That's definitely spot country. And in the couple times I was there, it seemed like those fish were very dependant on current, too.

 

[SmallJaw]

I used to fish Michelle all the time when I lived in B'ham. If the current was on, so was the spots. If it was off, so were the spots. I expect lots of current on Lay given the rain this week. More coming they say late in the week. I just don't feel like we can get 15 lbs of spots 2 days in a row. I hope so as that is good anywhere, but I'm being realistic. I need to locate some largemouths to have a chance for the boys to win it outright.:wink

 

[jcoats3]

Were is the tournament blasting off from. If you close to lower endpaint creek ain't to bad for some large heads. Lots of grass.

 

[jcoats3]

Have not been over there hardly any this spring. Took my 5year old boy and we saw alot of males guarding fry. Back in there.

 

[SmallJaw]

Were is the tournament blasting off from. If you close to lower endpaint creek ain't to bad for some large heads. Lots of grass.

We are going out of Beeswax I'm pretty sure. There is a conflict with another tourney going out of Beeswax too so we might have to move to Paradise Point. Either way we are about 18 miles upriver from Paint. We did go in Paint on Saturday. It is a pretty creek no doubt. Big though with lots of water to cover. We just rode through and looked around. Went about a mile back before coming out. I've heard it was good in there.:wink

 

[jcoats3]

Im still pretty new on the lake trying to learn it myself. Good luck with the fishing. I probally be up there one day next week but stuck with shutdown at work. 12hrs a day till around may 22.

 

[SmallJaw]

Im still pretty new on the lake trying to learn it myself. Good luck with the fishing. I probally be up there one day next week but stuck with shutdown at work. 12hrs a day till around may 22.

I'll be glad to share any good places we find. I think we have got some pretty decent places right now. How good depends on what 300 boats fishing 2 tourneys on Saturday will mean, and how good the shallow water bite is. We went zip in the last tourney. My boys learned a great lesson in listening to coach. This time around they are all ears and ready to do what I want them to do. If they can fish 3 baits and fish them well they will come in with some good fish.

 

[JWW8]

I haven't fished Lay, but fished Lake Jordan a few weeks ago for the first time. Luckily, my partner had a lot of experience on the lake and put us on fish. We took first place catching all spots on shallow humps with current coming across them. Using mostly shakey heads with Zoom Trick Worms. I would think Lay would fish similar since they are both on the Coosa.

 

[SmallJaw]

I haven't fished Lay, but fished Lake Jordan a few weeks ago for the first time. Luckily, my partner had a lot of experience on the lake and put us on fish. We took first place catching all spots on shallow humps with current coming across them. Using mostly shakey heads with Zoom Trick Worms. I would think Lay would fish similar since they are both on the Coosa.

Kool. What depth were the fish and how deep was the surrounding water? Was it main lake or in creeks? Up river or down, mid-lake? Water clarity good or muddy? You know the drill. I'm trying to see if I can cross figure the same conditions on Lay. Thanks. Johnny:wink

 

[JWW8]

We were in about 6-8 ft and trowing to 5-6 ft. Had some cedar trees on the humps. Water was stirred up because is was post frontal and after heavy ran came through the day before. We were just off of the main lake in the mouth of a major tributary about mid-lake.

 

[SmallJaw]

Hmmmmm. I just saw on the news and on the internet where the Coosa was flooding. AL Power says 63,500 cfs being released. Best I can tell its 2' or so above normal pool. I don't have a clue what this will do for the fishing but I figure it will be time to go gawdy and close to the bank!:laughing

 

[SLOmofo]

On the bank in a flood. Throw it on the bank and pull it into the water. Whats the water temp?

 

[SmallJaw]

On the bank in a flood. Throw it on the bank and pull it into the water. Whats the water temp?

Last weekend (Sunday) when we were there it was still warming up from the Saturday's 43 degree flooding rains. Saturday at noon the water was down to 50 on the surface. We did find 60 in the main river which was down 10 degrees from the day before. I honestly expect it to be around 70 or 72 because the rains that are coming are a warm rain and not the cold mess we had last week. The largemouth should be going crazy up in all the grass and stuff next to the banks I would think. My plan is to have them boys tossing their arms off with big blades and otherwise loud baits against the banks and cranking it back.

 

[jcoats3]

If we don't get to much rain in next 36 hrs they probably have level back down close to full pool. They don't let the lakes stay up long. But they goy the BASS elite in Montgomery this. Weekend aand water upabout 5 to 6 there right now. They mighthold some up to get the riverdown in that area. They flooding it out below Jones bluff dam. We up 13 feet in selma area down river.

 

[SLOmofo]

big blades . Dinner Plate sized blades, O YEA !

 

[SmallJaw]

It was a difficult bite for us in the tournament fella's but we eaked out 2nd place in the State Championships in both the 2 man team standings and the School standings. I feel bad for my boys in that in the last 10 minutes of the tourney one of me 2 kids lost a big 6 pound class bass. He had lost another 3 pounder earlier in the day. Bites were so hard to come by we knew the 3 pounder was gonna hurt but the 6 pounder will bother him for a little while. We lost 1st place by 1.75 lbs! LOL. I wish it was by 7 pounds for my kids sake. I thank you all for your help. It was so much needed. I shared it with the team and it was this kind of help that gave us very respectable finish.:wink