Neely Henry reports?

Anyone been in the last two weeks and done any good? And on what? Thanks.

I've been there twice in the past two weeks. (Disclaimer: shallow power fishing is not my forte) Still have not caught anything of size shallow, grass bite has just been "meh", and apparently they sprayed all boat docks with fish repellent.

Have FINALLY started catching them dependably on the ledges, but again not much size. Don't know where the magnum spots are lately. But if you milk-run the ledges you can bring in 11/12 pounds of spots right now.

Historically, Neely is a great shallow water summertime lake. I gave up fishing in the summer though. Too hot and too many jet skis.....

Rough right now. Very little good quality fish being caught.

Done pretty good on Bass last week. Crappie bite is on at nite right now. Caught 90 keeper's in just under 3 hrs. In 3 trips this week put a little over 200 in freezer.

Dang Jeff. That's smoking!

Had a chance to go yesterday afternoon before the very rare east to west monsoon came in. Fished several rock points, humps, river ledges. Only one area produced fish. Probably caught 20 fish but none over 1.5#. Would not touch a crank bait at all. All came off Carolina rig and shakey head.

Update 8/2. SUX. lol. Fished from 3-23 feet and only got 5 fish, all under 1#. Anyone been lately?

Anyone?

Won't be back on Neely Henry for another month or two. Waiting on the heat to die down and the skiers to get lost.

How's the shoreline primrose and/or gator weed growing on Neely this summer? Always fun to sling a frog or swim a jig, or Chatterbait.

Too damn bad in sloughs, but some of the ones on the river did not grow as thick as usual. Guess the late cool snap we had retatded growth. OR, could be all those damn wake board boats destroying the shoreline and vegetation.

Neely Henry in one sentence:

If you aren't kicking up Mud with your trolling motor...you fishing too deep

Grass on river side or sloughs?

Not so good in the areas it has allegedly been sprayed with Round-up.

Got a tournament there this Saturday, haven't been since this last report. Won't even prefish, just gonna go!

Isolated grass patches with deep water access were always better to me than patches in the backs of sloughs

Ikillbux has got NH figured out!

I thought this was the thing to do anywhere!

I've always considered Neely the best summertime lake for super shallow fishing. The hotter it gets, the better it gets.

I fished for about 2 hours yesterday and got bit twice. I guess I've lost my touch. Have never had problems like I have had over the last 6 weeks catching fish.

Anyone do any good this weekend

Gonna try and get out today for a little while. Anyone been this week?

That's the way it's getting to be seems like since everyone is an "offshore" fishermen with electronics what they are today.

Clem, can you remember back when you'd be the only boat out in the middle of the river?

I can. Simpler times

Actually caught a few fish yesterday. All in grass that was close to deeper 5-10' water. Creature baits.

Tidbit about Logan, which I'll connect to Neely... Fished Logan twice the past week, it basically made me want to jump off a bridge, but... Places on the ledge where the fish have been all year, a month ago there would be what looked like 100 fish on them, now there are just a handful. I am confident that the fish have mostly left the ledges on the main river. However, a curious finding is that what fish I do see, are ALL EXACTLY 14' deep. Literally, not 13 or 15, only 14, and that' from Riverside to Pell City. (Where have those ledge fish gone? Heck if I know, they aren't shallow on docks or anything for me, I halfway wonder if they're not suspending somewhere with a thermocline)

Anyway, some of my friends fished the high school tournament yesterday on Neely, and guess where they found fish stacked up?...14' deep. But NOT on the main river. Any structure 14' deep in the creeks is where they caught them. People may not have been honest, but according to them most of the people commented there was no grass bite yesterday.

As a sprout I remember fishing with Dad and watching him watching the flasher, and I couldn't figure out how the heck he could tell the depth or if it was hard or soft bottom, or a point, or anything. All I could tell was it was 24 30 27 32 24 29 32 24-something feet deep - maybe. LOL

Then the paper graph arrived. Holy smokes, that was like getting handed a map instead of a rock with chiseled coordinates!

The first time I saw the downscan imaging I was on Smith Lake with a friend and we trolled out of Speegle's messin' with the unit. A concrete block popped up on the screen and a fish was suspended beside it. Could see it clear as day. Blew my mind. Now it's like playing video games. "Oh, there's a fish" and plunk a dropshot beside it.


Years ago in GS/OB we went out with an old charter captain who kept referring to the "fathometer." He was I think in his late 70s or early 80s then. He said when he was a kid they used a rope with a weight on it slathered in Vasoline or grease to see if the bottom was sandy or muddy.

I like the technology, though. Although I love fishing shallow it's still cool to see what's on the bottom anywhere.

I continue to learn how to use my garmin 73sv/dv more and more. Saying this, I find more things on the edge of creeks, river channels, and such I never new was there. I fish them and can see fish but am not schooled enough to know how to target them. The fish I found Friday on ledges were 10-14' and would not hit a damn thing I threw. So, I went to the grass and caught my fish. BTW, My garmin countour lines vs a navionics on my lowrance is so much better and accurate for Neely.

Anyone been lately? I may try and get out for a couple hours this weekend.

I went Saturday and Monday. We slayed em. Had a couple 4lb spots each day. Still not great but it's not that far away either.

you should try a hummingbird it is fad superior to both above mentioned.

Yea yea yea. I will have to say my Dad and I went out Monday to run his crappie boat. He has a 898? at rear and helix 7 on front. Some of the things he was picking up on spots I showed him was impressive. I just need someone that is a whiz on Garmins to set mine up.

Finally got out today, been about 2 months since I've been on Neely. Caught a few early then the bite just died nothing really after about 9. Was a little disappointing . Anyone else go.

I did not go Sunday like I wanted to. Not many trucks at rainbow landing at all.

Last 2 trips out we caught several fish. Just couldn't get a kicker to go with them.

that was always my issue there: a kicker fish

Anyone been? Gonna go tomorrow afternoon. Was told water temp has dropped to 72. WOW. What week can make.

Went Saturday morning for a little while. Bite was whole lot better. So was quality of fish.

Caught 5 fish, and one was a stripe about 3#. Rest of bass were small. They are already chasing shad on flats. At least that is what I caught. May try and go back next weekend. Water temp 74 deg already. Most came off lipless crank.

Went to Logan yesterday from about 2:00 till 6:00, the bite was greatly improved. Caught 12 total fish (which is about 11 or 12 more than the last two trips, LOL) and about half of them were 2 pounds or bigger. Water was 80 degrees though, last time I went it was right at 70 degrees.

Fished from the dam to Beaver Creek this morning from about daylight till 12:00 noon. Did okay, better than I have been doing. Still can't get a sniff on a buzzbait, and I didn't catch anything period from the grass. Caught 5 (I think?) from docks, and then maybe a dozen more spots on a couple of offshore places (about 8-10 feet deep). All the shad and fish were at the mouths of creeks for me, had no action farther back in the creeks. Saw 84 degree water before I left, that's crazy considering two Saturdays ago it was 69 at daylight (at Guntersville though, not Neely).

ikillbux, that is crazy about the water temp. You are right, last Sunday here, it was 72 here. I am going this afternoon. We rode on the pontoon yesterday with some friends. There was a pretty good size tx here. Saw on area of the river where there was 5 boats out on the river ledge. STILL MAKES NO SENSE to me why these fish have not moved up shallow. Oh well, that is why I am not a pro.

What's the best way to get on crappie this time of year especially when the the temps start dropping in the next week or so. Will skipping piers still work.

Yes, some ppl are catching come good ones right now. I had a good afternoon yesterday catching spots. Biggest about 4#.

One of the biggest ones I caught, as soon as I got it out of the water into boat it spit up a crawfish about 6" long. Man, I was sure wrong about what color they should be this time of the year.

Good to hear. One of my best days ever on NH bass fishing was in mid Oct son maybe things are starting to turn around.

Went tuesday to chase some crappie and the water was 84deg and the air felt like about 95 with zero breeze. I only had an hour, so I just decided to ride around in the boat it was such a pretty day otherwise.

Hey, I talked to Daniel White today and he says the crappie on Wedowee are really ramping up, we made some loose plans to go in a few days. Just dropping the info if you're interested in going that far.

Jeff, I will have to pass. Thanks a bunch anyway. I weill tell my dad me may get one of his buddies to go with him. Just an FYI. I heard that 2 men went to Logan Monday and caught 65 stripe. He said they were stacked together like he had never seen before. I have been trusting this mans word for 48 years .

Wedowee not to far, but I'm in and out of town for the next few weeks.

Went to Logan this morning from daylight till 8:30, finally got on 'em pretty good!!!! Fish were super shallow and aggressive this morning, if you had grass there was fish in it. Still can't get fish to hit a buzzbait at all (or a whopper plopper), but they killed everything else this morning!

I caught a 4 pound head on a frog all the way in the back of some grass up against a seawall, if I would've missed that fish I would have sworn it was a big carp or something...oh my word she absolutely donkey-stomped it!!! It was the loudest toilet flush you've ever heard!

I went by myself and was just messing around trying to catch fish on all kinds of stuff since they were that aggressive. I think I caught fish on 8 different baits.

Sounds like a good morning.

It's really, really amazing how shallow they will get and we anglers out away from the bank think, often, two things: "they wouldn't be THAT shallow" or "eh, stupid carp, let's get out of here."

Back when BASS had one of their tourneys on, I think, Jordan about 10ish years ago I got my photo boat driver to put me out on a peninsula where I could walk around and shoot some of the guys. Swindle was trolling down a bank toward a gnarly line of gator/primrose that honestly looked like it maybe wasn't any deeper than 8-10 inches, if that. I asked if I was a distraction (No.) and was firing with my camera.

I was close enough to see where he was casting but not so close that anything in the water might spook. About the time his frog sailed over some grass and literally landed maybe a foot from the bank, a 5+ pounder surged at it and missed. I saw its back and it was wide, green and gorgeous.

He reeled in and got ready to make another cast.

"I don't need to ask how big that was, do I," he said.

I just said "You don't want to know."

Huge and shallow. Throw in the dirt!

Get somebody that doesn't fish to read this post and tell you what they think it's talking about. LOL

Some of the "insider lingo" in Bass fishing and Duck Hunting just is hilarious.

You got dat rite. I bet that bass put lead in your pencil quicker than anything Pfizer makes.

I'll be in the dirt all weekend at Martin.

Year before last, early in the year around late March, we went one afternoon to Logan Martin and caught a 6-1/2, 5-1/2, two 5-0's, and another fish in the upper 4's, all on consecutive casts. That's the biggest 5 fish limit I've ever had on a Coosa lake (we were NOT in a tournament though). Every one of those fish hit a "Spittin' Image" and they couldn't have been 10" - 12" deep. We kept remarking about "how can we not see those fish????"

Went for three hours this am. East wind 5-10 mph.

Fish-1
Me-0

Dang I thought about going tomorrow sounds like I may be better off spending the day scouting the deer woods. Tomorrow looks like about the same conditions as today.

Yes. I am still going..................., but........

I've got about 2 h to fish tomorrow morning down around canoe creek. Should I chase bass or crappie? What say ye?

Stay in. Watch sunrise with a good cup of java. BTW, 14 and change won the TX Sunday at rainbow landing.

Man that's brutal. About the time it starts getting good, it will be time for me to start deer hunting. It's tough to have so many hobbies. 😂

Anyone been this week?

Should be getting about spinnerbait time up there.

Went for about an hour yesterday and fished a ledge I like to fish where I could see them on my finder, but no bites. It was windy as all get out.

Saturday should be prime with the front coming in that evening.

Went yesterday. Caught 4 in about a 50 yard stretch on top. Had one big one come out and over lure. Shad are EVERYWHERE. Caught two more on creature baits but none of which would help win a tx.

Fished Sat and Sun. Sat sux all small fish. Yesterday better but not great. Grass bite mostly. Actually saw some smaller stripe surfacing a few time but could not get to them.

Should be getting good there soon.

I fished Logan Martin Sunday afternoon and did surprisingly well. Water is down about 18", temps in upper 70's. We only fished 3-1/2 hours and caught 8 fish, 7 largemouth and 1 spot. But three of our largemouths were close to 3# each. No big secret, they were on shallow boat docks in pockets.

Had a friend who fished Logan from daylight till lunch on Sunday, and they had a boat full of big spots though, said they caught them on chatterbaits in the grass (but I don't know where any grass is that's still in the water).

I don't know what type of grass you're referring to, but Fur lite and myself fished yesterday in the wind, looking for crappie. There's lots of grass in the water up above Rainbow landing. Not hydrilla type grass under the surface like we got on Big G, but some kind of grass that's growing out of the water. Lots of points had it on them. Alligator weed too.

Well they don't lower Neely Henry, that shoreline grass (water willow) should still be in the water. But Logan Martin gets lowered several feet to winter pool each year.

Any luck with the crappie Fur?

Danged if you didn't write Logan Martin and I read Neely Henry! LOL

It was so windy we couldn't fish many docks. I got skunked. My son caught one. His first Coosa River fish.

Good Lord willing, we'regonna try the Big G again in the morning.

Gonna try and go this weekend again. Was told last Sunday was hot on outside of grass with anything white. I however, only caught a couple.

My notes have me winning a club tourney and my partner coming in 2nd about this time several years ago. Spinnerbait on the outside edges of the deeper grass was the deal.