an example of lost spawning habitat

snuck away yesterday for an hour or so fishing. still a little scared to get too far from home. lol didnt catch jack except for some stupid skip jacks. usually this time of year i catch some black males off of shallow logs but the water still isnt warm enough.

anyhoo i remember conversing on here about crappie spawns and water levels, etc.

about 45 years ago we would ride our bikes down to this spot and catch white crappie in the bushes, except i remember the bushes being below where the water line is now. crappie would get under the button bush roots to spawn. i remember one time we found a suzy mallard sitting on eggs just to the left.

anyway thats how much spawning habitat we have lost over the years.

I think back to about 47 years ago on Norris lake and how much trees and bushes were in the water during spring back then, look at about the same time now and bare banks unless a tree or 2 has fallen into the water, no wonder the crappie and other fish have trouble keeping production up, yanking the water levels up and down hurts also I am sure, probably a normal happening with man made lakes, plenty of brush and trees in center hill back then also, not been on that lake in a very long time

Fished this area of KY Lake almost exclusively for crappie from the late 60's to the late 80's.

Fishing the buck brush in spring was what we dreamed of all winter.

By the 90's you could come up here and fish all day and not catch 10 fish.
That's when we got a place at Sardis Lake and started fishing there.

We noticed the wild water fluctuations seemed to start when they completed the Tenn-Tom waterway.
My uncle had a place at Ponderosa. We would drive down Friday afternoon and Hog Creek would be perfect for fishing the buck brush. Wake up Saturday morning and get to the ramp and all the buck brush would be on dry ground. Any crappie that had already spawned in there just lost all their eggs.

There was no limit on crappie back then. It was nothing to catch a hundred 1/2 pound to 1 1/2 pound crappie every day between two people. It was limited by how many you wanted to clean.

Sad to see what has happened to it...