LAKE LU Fishing Newsletter
January March May July September November Inches of Rainfall Three Year Rainfall Comparison 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2 2018 Monthly Rainfall 2017 Monthly Rainfall 2016 Monthly Rainfall 0
January March May July September November Number of Anglers per month Three Year Monthly Angler Attendance Comparison 400 350 300 250 200 150 2018 Angler Attendance 2017 Angler Attendance 2016 Angler Attendance 100 50 0
Number of Bass Caught Three Year Bass Harvest Comparison 700 600 500 400 300 200 100 2018 Number of Bass Harvested 2017 Number of Bass Harvested 2016 Number of Bass Harvested 0
January March May July September November Number of Bream caught Three Year Bream Harvest Comparison 1200 1000 800 600 400 2018 Number of Bream Harvested 2017 Number of Bream Harvested 2016 Number of Bream Harvested 200 0
We received 8.6 inches of rain at the lake for the month of February. Secchi disc readings indicate 32 inches of visibility. The upper end of Lake LU is very muddy, while the lower portion is generally much clearer. Many bass anglers tell me that the best bass
fishing is on the line between the muddy water and the clear water. Water temperature is 71 F. February continued to be the month of the rattletrap. We had twenty big bass caught during the month and only two of them were caught on a lure other than a rattletrap (white spinnerbait). The boiled crawfish rattletrap has been running in first place, followed by the Big Eye and Chrome/blue rattletrap. Lipped cranks have not been productive
at all. Jig and pigs have not been used by bass anglers even though I know they catch big bass. We have experienced a slowdown in the number of big bass being caught and we have seen an increase in smaller bass activity. I predict that the spawn is going to come early this year. I caught some bass last week and their egg sacs were blood engorged throughout. To me this means that egg growth is at maximum, and I forecast bass will be holding on beds within two weeks. Soon the rattletrap will be replaced by the plastic lizard as the number one lure to use.
February bass angler of the month goes out to Trey Newman. Trey came out to the lake one Sunday afternoon and didn t get to the water until around 4 pm. I wondered how he was doing with his fishing, so around 5 pm I walked down to where he was casting. When I walked up, he was reeling in a bass and he had an 8-pounder lying in the shallows that hadn t swam off yet. He said he had caught about 4 big bass, but he said he didn t have a scale. I told him to give me his cellphone and I would video him catching his next bass. He said they weren t biting that good. So anyway Trey gave me his cellphone and on the NEXT CAST he caught the 6-pounder that is in this photo. He fished on until closing time and
at checkout Trey said that on average he felt like he had caught NINE BASS THAT AVERAGED 7 POUNDS EACH! I guess I should have named it Shelton/Newman Point.
Sam Henderson caught and took home this lunker 9.5-pound, 23.5-inch bass one Saturday. Sam was fishing with a rattletrap when he caught this whopper. The latest cost estimate on getting a big bass mounted is $10 to $15 dollars PER INCH!
When I looked into the mouth of Sam s big bass I saw this bream s tail sticking out. A bass has to be mighty hungry to want to eat some Chinese plastic when his tummy is already full of a half-pound bluegill!
James Snow caught this nice 7.75-pound bass one Saturday and he released the fish back into the lake. Photo by James Snow.
Jay Cowan, a UWA student and member of the UWA Bass Club, caught this 10-pound bass on a rattletrap. This bass was released.
Another photo of Jay with his 10-pounder. The big bass are very fat and according to Sam Henderson s bass s stomach contents, they prefer bluegill over golden shiners.
Jay caught this nice 6-pound bass while I was still standing on the bank after weighing his 10-pound bass.
Joe Hutchins caught this nice 9-pound bass the other day.
Four, five and six-pound bass are routinely caught off Shelton Point when they are biting. Collectively there have been about 25 big bass caught off this one point since the beginning of the year. 2018 BASS HARVEST REGULATION As soon as I hear of a regulation change I will inform the public Anglers have an unlimited bass harvest at Lake LU, as long as the bass is less than 14 inches in total length. In addition, anglers may also harvest 1 fish greater than 22 inches in total length, per person, per day at Lake LU. Please continue to encourage anglers to harvest small bass. ~ Jay Haffner Bluegill harvest REDUCED to 25 bream per person per day
February bluegill fishing really took a dramatic upswing when the water warmed from 50 degrees F to 71 degrees F. Bream were moving into the medium shallows and experienced panfishermen were pleased with their catch rates. People that were able to find wax worms out-caught anglers using other baits by almost two to one!
El Paso Brownlee and his wife Cheryl caught this nice mess of bream and bass one day. REMINDER: Bream harvest has changed and anglers may only catch 25 bream per person per day.
February has been an especially wet month. Early in the month we got a big 4-inch flooding rain and the boats almost floated away from the boat area.
February has been so wet that we have been doing a lot of work on the lake. Here we installed a goose tub that we fashioned from a cow molasses tub in hopes that a goose or eagle would build a nest in them.
We replaced a missing wood duck nesting box in the upper end near the beaver lodge.
John Womer and I got tired of playing tugboat with all the Christmas trees that the city of Livingston brought us. In all we put about 40 trees in Lake LU.
Earlier in February we started working on putting new landscape timbers down at the picnic areas but it has been too wet lately for us to return to work on these areas.
February seems like it s much too early to begin grass cutting season.
It finally dried out enough to begin some of the small scale burns on the various UWA blackland prairie habitat areas. Here is a photo of the Campbell House prairie burn. If anyone wants any information regarding fishing, nature trails or prairie wildflower blooming times, please give me a call at 205-652-9266 or e-mail me at lrr@uwa.edu. Feel free to visit the Lake LU website at www.lakelu.uwa.edu. Thank you, Robby Limerick Lake Manager Lake LU The University of West Alabama lrr@uwa.edu 1-205-652-9266.
All photos by R. Limerick unless otherwise noted.