Clarks Hill Fishing Report January 2012

Clarks Hill: Level: 10.3 feet below full pool. Temp: Mid 50s. Clarity: Clear.

Bass: Look for fish deep, and fish slowly for them. Try creeping a jig around rocky points along the main lake. Using a heavy 3/4-oz. jig will keep you in better contact with the bottom. A 3/4-oz. jigging spoon bite will help pick up those suspended fish. Keep catching fish on the jigging spoon as long as you can. When they quit hitting the spoon, drop the jig down to them. Fish grasslines along the creek channel with a Sonar Blade. Let it sink to the bottom, and pump it back. Keep it near the bottom. If fish like this, try the same thing with a 1/2- or 3/4-oz. Rat-L-Trap.

Linesides: William Sasser reports, “We will start fishing in the backs of all the major creeks with planer boards, freelines and live herring for stripers. Holiday Park and Buffalo Creek are general areas to start. Gizzard shad in January catch some large stripers every year on the lake. Just pull them behind the boat on a float or balloon. Hybrids will start showing up in groups in front of the dam. Live herring on downrods fished 20 feet deep will work. Pulling planers in shallow water is tricky because of the overgrowth of hydrilla in Clarks Hill. Just keep checking your bait to make sure there is none on it.”

Crappie: “The lake to yourself with no boat traffic, 65 degree afternoons, no wind, country music playing on the radio, livewell full of slab crappie — that’s as good as it gets,” said William. “Buffalo Creek in January will look like the pier at Myrtle Beach in July with fishermen lining the banks catching crappie on minnows and every imaginable jig. We will be fishing minnows on brushpiles in 25 to 35 feet of water in Georgia Little River. Nighttime crappie fishing around boat docks in 20 feet of water will catch fish.”