Lake Lanier Fishing Reports – January 2021

Lanier: Level: 0.5 feet low. Temp: 53-56 degrees. Clarity: Clear on the main lake to a slight stain in the backs of the creeks.

Bass: Guide and tournament angler Ryan Coleman reports, “Spotted bass fishing is good out deep and up shallow. The shallow fish are holding on rock in 5 to 10 feet of water and on boat docks on sunny days. The best way to approach these shallow fish is with a crankbait or jig, and take your time. Those fish are spooky, so don’t just blast in there. Take your time casting and approaching with your boat. The deeper fish have gotten on the football head/swimbait bite, and it is wide open. Take a 3/8- or 1/2-oz. SpotSticker football swimbait head and tip it with a 3.8-inch blueback herring or pearl swimbait. Put this rig on 12- to 15-lb. fluorocarbon line and get busy for the next couple of months. Fish are holding anywhere from 10 to 50 feet of water depending on the time of day right in the middle of the ditches. Make a semi-long cast with the football swimbait and just slowly drag it on the bottom back to the boat. Repeat. For less than 20 feet of water, I use the 3/8-oz. For deeper fish, I typically always go with the 1/2-oz. head. This will ensure that you keep your bait on the bottom, which is the most important part of fishing this rig. Give it a try. It will become your favorite technique for winter spots on Lanier. As the day goes on, I have been working a 3/8-oz. Georgia Craw casting jig out in the timber, along with a green-pumpkin-purple 6-inch Finesse Stick rigged on a 3/16- or 1/4-oz. screwball shaky head. Keep it slow and in contact with the bottom/trees.”

Crappie: Capt. Josh Thornton reports, “The hot bite target zone is 15 to 18 feet deep. Be flexible in your technique. Figure out what depth the crappie are biting and figure out if they want jigs or minnows. When using jigs, try putting two different colors on one line about 16 inches apart. See what color they are hitting, and then concentrate on what they want. There is no need in throwing all jigs if they only want minnows that day. Look for open-water brush in 15 to 35 feet of water. Plan on losing several jigs and minnows. You got to be down there with them to catch them. Look under docks that are in 15 to 30 feet of water that have brush or structure. Use your electronic charts to locate these areas. Try downlining a small crappie minnow with a sinker or set up a slip bobber. Jigs have been producing some big numbers. My jig recommendation is a baby shad green over chartreuse or a royal blue over silver single tail. Jigs can be used for short casting, vertical jigging or dock shooting. I’m using ATX Lure Company jigs on 5-lb. test, high-visibility yellow K9 braid for my line (unless I am using a bobber) and a Piscifun reel on a light action 6-foot B&M rod. Use scanning-type sonar (e.g. Down and Side Imaging) to locate schooling fish, and complement this with the latest in live-scanning sonar technology (e.g. Garmin’s LiveScope, Humminbird 360 or Lowrance’s LiveSight). Set waypoints on your electronic charts so that you can quickly return to productive locations. You can do this on a smartphone using the Navionics Boating app.”

Stripers: Capt. Clay Cunningham reports, “January is here, and the winter bite is in full swing. The stripers have followed the bait into the creeks. The north end and the south end have both been great. Finding the deep bait on your electronics like the Humminbird Solix is of utmost importance. Great electronics are critical. Downlines have been catching the bulk of the fish with live herring and trout. Rig up two Shakespeare Striper Rods paired with Penn Fathom Linecounter as downlines with a 2-oz. Capt. Mack Swivel Sinker, a Berkley Fluorocarbon leader and a 2/0 Gamakatsu octopus hook for the trout. Then two Shakespeare Striper Rods with the same setups but a size 1 Gamakatsu hook for the herring. So far this winter the downline has been best, but for a big fish don’t rule out a freeline. A freeline with a nice-sized trout will be hard to beat over the same areas of deep bait. The water quality is great right now, so be prepared for all techniques. If you see fish up shallow, be sure to have a spinning rod like a Penn Battle III 3000 rigged up with no more than 10-lb. Trilene Big Game. Most of the time a small 1/4-oz. Capt. Mack or a 1/4-oz. Spro Prime Bucktail will do the trick. White is the dominant color here on Lanier with the clear water. As a whole, fishing should be great this month, plus no crowds. Each year I find I like the winter months better than the summer months.”

Capt. Ron Mullins reports, “This January will be like the last few years with small bait being the key to catching numbers of Lake Lanier striped bass. Downlines on an Okuma 7 1/2 Striper rod with an Okuma 203 line counter with 15- to 20-lb. mono main line will be the most used rod this month. Attach a Capt. Mack’s 1.5-oz. swivel sinker to the main line and then tie on 3 to 4 feet of 10- to 12-lb. fluorocarbon leader with a No. 4 Gamakatsu Octopus Circle at the end. January stripers can be very finicky and reducing your hook and leader size to match the small trout, herring or medium shiners you will be using will keep these baits moving around more naturally and will get you those extra bites. We are seeing a good population of 28- to 32-inch (9 to 12 pounds) fish this winter, as well. These 4 1/2- to 5 1/2-year-old fish will eat a bigger bait quicker, so switch up at least one downline to a 1/0 or 2/0 circle and pin a medium trout or medium gizzard shad in the 7- to 9-inch range on. Oakwood Bait and Tackle keeps a great supply of all these baits as well as any tackle you will need. All of these fish, as well as the smaller fish, will be around large concentrations bait in 30 to 60 feet of water, and you will be fishing your baits anywhere from 2 feet to about 15 feet off the bottom. Use your Humminbird SOLIX to find these large concentrations of bait toward the backs of any creek on the lake. Favorites will be Bald Ridge, Shoal, Flat, Ada, Little River, Thompson, Yellow, and Johnson. Artificials for this month will be Captain Mack’s Super Spoon on schools of fish you find around the bait and Mini Macks for searching for spread out fish. Most of the downline fish will be caught on Minn Kota’s Spot Lock sitting on top of the school to moving around up to about 0.4 mph. If you lose the school of fish you were on, then speed up to 0.8-1 mph and put your Mini Macks out 20 to 30 feet down and stealth troll around the area until you find them again. The 3/4- or 1-oz. Super Spoon with silver or chartreuse foil with a dressed treble are the same size shad that you will see these fish spit up, so keep one tied on to drop down to any fish you see on the bottom around the large concentrations of bait you will find with your Solix. Find the bait, and the fish will be close by. Jesus Christ has blessed us with a new year, do all you can to tell him thank you by loving your neighbor.”