Lake Nottely Fishing Report – July 2010

Nottely: Level: 1.1 feet above full pool. Temp: High 82-85 degrees. Clarity: Clear.

Striper: Fair to good. Jeremy Seabolt said there’s a pretty good striper bite going on between points 2 and 5, and that the fish are starting to school up pretty tight on humps in the 20- to 30-foot range. Early on some mornings he’s had some luck freelining blueback herring with just a little split shot, but the best bite has been on downlined herring. Once the morning bite ends, try clipping the humps and points with an umbrella rig. Jeremy has been catching fish pulling white bucktails with chartreuse trailers on his U-rigs. He’s dropping them about 120 to 130 feet back and trolling about 1 1/2 to 2 mph. In the evenings, there’s a strong bite for numbers of smaller fish up the river all the way to the Highway 76 bridge. Jeremy said herring behind planer boards will do the trick up the river. He also said he hasn’t seen it, but there are reports of good schooling activity up the river in the mornings. Eric Crowley reports, “Look for busting fish in the early hours of the day on the main lake. Some of these schools are bigger fish, and some are just the little guys. It seems that the smaller the fish, the bigger the school. Look for the topwater bite to be on for a while as the fish in this lake will continue this through July. Later in the morning, start to look for the fish to go down, but not very deep. These linesides key on bluebacks up here, and they are a must-have this time of the year. Use your electronics to locate fish holding on points, near islands and off the main river channel. The bite has been really good from 5 a.m. to about noon.”