I tell ya what...

I made the mistake of hooking the boat up and going to Watts Bar Friday afternoon. I'll not be doing that again! Sweet baby James...I'm still riding waves. Wake boats, cruise boats, pontoons...my trolling motor was coming out of the water with some of those waves.

I tried finding another school of bass between some spawning areas and the main river. No go. I mostly idled around following my map contours and looking for baitfish and such. One thing of note here was I was the only person in the areas doing what I was doing. I marked some fish in one spot and tried to see what they were. I no more than got on my front deck and made a few casts when this guy in a white boat came by on plane, circled back, then idled all around me...came to within 50 yards of me scanning with his sonar, then jumped up and started fishing the same spot. Ok. No biggie. Just strange that of the many miles of ledges, he picked there. I left and went down river about a mile. I could still see the white boat from where I went to. I started fishing there and caught a gar on my crankbait. I was cutting the nicks out of my line when I heard a boat getting really close to me from behind. I turned to look to make sure I wasn't about to get ran over and there's white boat dude again. He had picked up from the other spot and followed me. I have no idea who he was or why he was following me. He scanned all around me then went to fishing again. I can only figure he was an out of towner and thought I knew some hot spots when I really don't. I didn't even throw back out. Pulled up and left and went out of sight.

Found some foundations from old homes and barns while following some road beds...they had fish on them but I didn't know what kind. Turns out it was crappie and sauger. I had never caught sauger in the main lake before so that was a surprise. I took several pictures of the crappie and sauger but for some reason they are all gone from my phone. All I got was pictures of the gar and one of the dude in the white boat that was following me. Took several crappie and 2 sauger home to eat. The picture of the white boat makes him look farther then he actually is.

Melton hill was some hot trash today. Only caught 2 fish between the 4 of us.

Chickamauga bass fishing in one picture. Watts Bar getting to be as bad.

I fished Watts Bar regularly from the late 80s to '06. It was rare to see more than a dozen boats in the 80s and the early 90s. Fishing started going down when the nuclear plant came online, (they just didn't pull water as often or as long during the summer). And all the KVD wannabes. Still used to make one or two trips a year, don't even try that anymore due to non-stop tournaments, and housing developments destroying what visible cover there was. Even had a few offshore spots that I would not fish in the daytime for the same reason CT stated.

I fished Old Hickory on Saturday afternoon, and it was insane. I was trying to scan some offshore stuff and see if any bass were moving out.

Many people are respectful and safe, but there's still a whole bunch that don't know basic boating safety and are idiots. People on jet skis running right where I'm casting.. within 50ft of my boat. I saw 3 TWRA boats out, and there were probably more. I'm sure they stayed busy.

We have a tournament on Old Hickory this Saturday, and I feel like I could catch a limit off shore. However, it's going to be slow and scattered and I'm not sure I can catch a limit before the recreational boaters get crazy. I'm not even looking forward to it.

Crow Terminator said:

Chickamauga bass fishing in one picture. Watts Bar getting to be as bad.

Click to expand...

To be fair, if I saw Jacob Wheeler or MDJ on a spot, I'd be fishing it too.

Britt Myers in the middle?

Those guys at least got beside one another and were casting in the same direction. Often, what people will do is get directly across from the other person... aka get on top of where they are casting, as to block them.

The last time I went to Goodfield on Chickamauga, I was catching crappie and white bass from the bank. Every cast. The mexicans saw what I was doing and came down right to where I was throwing, in kayaks and some in waders. I couldn't cast from my spot on the bank anymore. They blocked me from casting to that spot and I let them know I wasn't too happy about it but it didn't do any good. I lost a 1/2 oz Redeye shad by hurling it at them. It's not any better from a boat, as some of the other boaters will essentially do the same thing. One of my last trips to Chickamauga in a boat...was in the fall and we were on some schooling fish that were routinely busting on top. 3 boats were in a cove where this was happening and we were all giving one another room and all catching fish as they'd run the shad here and there. This other boat saw what we were doing and ran right through the middle of them just to scare the fish...turned around and came back through and left.

Crow Terminator said:

Those guys at least got beside one another and were casting in the same direction. Often, what people will do is get directly across from the other person... aka get on top of where they are casting, as to block them.

The last time I went to Goodfield on Chickamauga, I was catching crappie and white bass from the bank. Every cast. The mexicans saw what I was doing and came down right to where I was throwing, in kayaks and some in waders. I couldn't cast from my spot on the bank anymore. They blocked me from casting to that spot and I let them know I wasn't too happy about it but it didn't do any good. I lost a 1/2 oz Redeye shad by hurling it at them. It's not any better from a boat, as some of the other boaters will essentially do the same thing. One of my last trips to Chickamauga in a boat...was in the fall and we were on some schooling fish that were routinely busting on top. 3 boats were in a cove where this was happening and we were all giving one another room and all catching fish as they'd run the shad here and there. This other boat saw what we were doing and ran right through the middle of them just to ***** the fish...turned around and came back through and left.

Click to expand...

Some people just ain't happy until they make someone else that way. Those are the times you wished you could mount torpedoes on your boat.

larry ipock said:

Some people just ain't happy until they make someone else that way. Those are the times you wished you could mount torpedoes on your boat.

Click to expand...

Heck, I don't even own a boat and I know better than this (I go out with my buddy just really started getting into bass fishing last year.) It's like hunting public land, if somebody is already parked in the spot you want just keep moving on down a 1/2 mile or so.

Don't even think you would need a torpedo. I am willing to bet a 250-300 grain round from my .338 Lapua would do the trick on the hill or the engine block.

I'm fortunate to have days off during the week. If I fish on Saturday I usually go to MS River oxbows or lakes that don't allow skiing. The morons with ski boats, wake boats, jet skis, and 300HP tri-toons have completely ruined weekend fishing on big water. And for the life of me I don't understand why they can't be arrested and put on death row for blaring rap music all over God's creation at 100,000,000 decibels. How is this not disturbing the peace or public nuisance or some other crime worthy of public hanging? I have a fishing buddy that is in the boat business. He said they come into the showroom to look at a $100k ski boat and the first thing they ask and only thing they are concerned about is how loud the stereo system is. When did middle aged "men" become attention whores that post selfies on social media every hour on the hour and get on the lake just to yell "look at me! look at ME!!!" with their stereo system???

COVID didn't help matters any. I see a ton of new boats everywhere I go. I won't even go out on weekends, and about ready to quit going Mondays and Fridays.

FLTENNHUNTER1 said:

COVID didn't help matters any. I see a ton of new boats everywhere I go. I won't even go out on weekends, and about ready to quit going Mondays and Fridays.

Click to expand...

covid made it worse. might be some good deals on boats in a couple of years.

There's somebody at Watts Bar that has a tri-toon with twin Mercury 400s on it. I don't know how fast that thing was going but I sure wouldn't have wanted to be pulled behind it on a tube lol.

I gave up on most of those lakes years ago. Just too much traffic. Best thing to do is to get there before light and fish until about 10:30am (when all the "partiers" start getting out there). Or I just go to KY lake, which is massive, and you can get away from most everyone and still catch some quality fish.

JCDEERMAN said:

I gave up on most of those lakes years ago. Just too much traffic. Best thing to do is to get there before light and fish until about 10:30am (when all the "partiers" start getting out there). Or I just go to KY lake, which is massive, and you can get away from most everyone and still catch some quality fish.

Click to expand...

Yeah Kentucky Lake isnt bad at all until you get around Paris. Even then its not that bad. Pickwick, Old Hickory, Priest are absolutely miserable on a weekend.

JCDEERMAN said:

I gave up on most of those lakes years ago. Just too much traffic. Best thing to do is to get there before light and fish until about 10:30am (when all the "partiers" start getting out there). Or I just go to KY lake, which is massive, and you can get away from most everyone and still catch some quality fish.

Click to expand...

yeah but looking at it this year so far, it is becoming harder and harder since the toons and ski boats have invaded the back water too. for the last few years ive been fishing through the week and now i went back to days probably in the evenings.

NumberOne said:

Yeah Kentucky Lake isnt bad at all until you get around Paris. Even then its not that bad. Pickwick, Old Hickory, Priest are absolutely miserable on a weekend.

Click to expand...

weekend before last birdsong was full of boats and undoubtedly someone got hurt because 4 counties where headed to the marina.

the boy scout camp had to put up rope barriers to keep them off their docks and beach.

Reading threads like this reminds me of why I sold my bass boat years ago.

thus why I only fish during the week.... the idiots on the lake

Fished WBarr, two weeks ago on Thursday & Friday most of the day. Come Friday evening the Van Damm wanna be's made it miserable. Hit the smallies pretty good. After Saturday early morning the place turned into a zoo. Went home.

Only fish tues-Thursday unless one of my sons wants to go. Then it's early and done by 10:30. It's sad.