A.H. Stephens State Park Lake Buncombe Topwater Bass

Back in the day, before internet search engines were around to give anglers instant information, we relied on word of mouth—or we hoped GON might send a writer—when looking for information on small lakes open to public fishing.

It’s surprising how many small public lakes there still are where there’s simply no information about the fishing. Many of these lakes are on DNR state parks and WMAs. My longtime fishing buddy Alan Shultz and I aim to see what these lakes have to offer and fill some gaps where there is a lack of fishing information. Whether what we find is good, fair or bad, at least there will be authentic reports for these small public lakes.

Alan and I have been fishing together since we met in college, and by happenstance we both ended up living in Morgan County. About 20 miles east on I-20, just across the Greene County line in Taliaferro County, is a big DNR property called A.H. Stephens State Park. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve passed the sign on I-20 for A.H. Stephens and never got off the exit to poke around. I finally did, and surprise… there are three lakes on the park… and no fishing information.

We made a call to WRD Fisheries to see if there was any history of biological sampling at the park, but we didn’t hear back, so we simply loaded the kayaks Oct. 10 and made a blind trip to see what this DNR state park had to offer anglers.

A.H. Stephens is best known for equestrian trails, camping facilities and a Civil War museum. The park’s webpage doesn’t list the sizes of the three lakes, but the largest is Federal Lake and our guess is that it’s maybe 20 acres. Unfortunately, Federal Lake is not open to public fishing. It’s only open to fishing for guests at a special group camp (not the regular campground) or one of the park’s rental cabins.

Cabins are available for rent at A.H. Stephens State Park. Only cabin guests or guests at a special camp are allowed to fish Federal Lake at the park.

There’s also a small pond about an acre in size, Lake Liberty, located at the park office.

Lake Liberty is small lake at the park office that is open to fishing.

Alan and I fished Lake Buncombe, a 12- to 15-acre lake open to the public.

I had my kayak in the water at 7:30 a.m. about 15 minutes after daylight was breaking over a thin, early October fog that wafted across Lake Buncombe.

I fish from a Hobie Mirage Passport 10.5, the entry-level fishing kayak from Hobie. I haven’t added any bells and whistles—I’m fishing with the basic boat I got from Jamie Koza when he had a great deal on them at his Dugout Bait & Tackle booth at the Outdoor Blast a few years ago. It has pedal drive, a steering rudder controlled with a finger, and without a battery pack and electronics, I can easily load it alone in the bed of my pickup.

We found decent bass fishing at Lake Buncombe on A.H. Stephens. From daylight to about 1 p.m. on Oct. 10, we boated five bass, including four that hit a Bang-O-Lure on top.

There’s not a boat ramp on the lake—the asphalt stops about 15 feet from the lake’s edge—but it’s an easy launch for a kayak.

There’s asphalt leading to the lake’s edge for easy launch of a kayak and sliding in a jonboat, but Lake Buncombe doesn’t have a boat ramp.

The dam is right there, so my first casts were to the dam corner—often a hotspot on any small lake. There’s some type of thin grass growing in the lake—not a mossy weed, but fishable aquatic vegetation—and I started with Spro Bronzeye Frog Jr. After about a dozen casts with the frog into the corner and starting down the dam, picked up my other rod with a silver/black Bang-O-Lure with a tail prop. I love this bait. If they’ll eat it, that’s what I’m throwing, and on my third cast an 11-inch bass ate it. Two casts later a solid bass sucked it under and I caught the fish pictured here.

I had two topwater bass in the boat before Alan made a cast—this was looking very good. However, from then the bites were sporadic. We fished from 7:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. and worked the entire 12- to 15-acre lake several times. We put five bass in the kayaks and missed at about the same number of fish on solid bites. Not great, but certainly not a terrible morning on the water.

The day we fished featured bluebird skies with a steady 10 to 15 mph wind out of the northeast—far from ideal for fishing, especially from a kayak. I can’t fish a worm effectively from a kayak when the wind is blowing, so I didn’t even try. One would think that fishing a Texas-rigged or Carolina-rigged plastic would have added to our totals.   

Four of the bass caught hit the Bang-O-Lure, and I missed three others that hit my favorite bait, including one that seemed like a good fish. Those were the only bites I had—granted I fished the Bang-O-Lure 80% of the time. I also tried the frog a fair amount, and I threw a Rat-L-Trap, including fan-casting the lipless crankbait to open water, which often produces some hits for me on small lakes.

While I primarily stuck with the Bang-O-Lure, Alan tried a variety of lures.

“I fished the frog quite a bit,” he said. “I fished a little split-shot type worm rig with a Mojo weight on it and got bit the very first cast, but the wind was blowing me in a circle, so I didn’t get a good hookset. I threw a Senko and never had a bite on that. There’s not a real defined edge to the vegetation, which for that Senko bite is what I look for. I caught one on the lipless crankbait. Then the third cast with a Trick Worm, one hammered it, but he tight-lined me—got me right in the middle of a twitch. I thought, all right, this is it… but then nothing.”

Our bites and catches were spread out from one end of the lake to the other, and other than the sporadic grass in the shallows, the lake was rather featureless. There’s were no apparent ledges or drops, and very little wood cover that we found other than right on the shoreline.

“I kind of had high hopes… well, let me back up. You don’t ever get your expectations too high for this type of lake,” Alan said. “But when I saw the vegetation, my expectations went up a little bit. I thought we might do OK. It’s a grassy-type weed. It’s definitely fishable. You can run a Super Fluke through it, I threw a swimbait through it. And you can drag a worm through it if you don’t have too heavy a weight.”

“I think it is probably a lake that doesn’t have a lot of nutrients, doesn’t have a lot of bait in it. All of the fish were kind of lean. And it just doesn’t seem like there’s a heavy fish population in there. Might not be fair to judge it by today, but that’s kind of my take on that lake.

“It’s very kid friendly if you’re fishing off the bank. They have the bank mowed pretty well over about half the lake,” Alan added.

Jonboat rentals are available. A.H. Stephens State Park is located just north of Exit 148 on I-20 in Crawfordville. There’s a $5 parking fee to access the park, so bring a $5 bill for the drop-box envelope. You can purchase a daily parking pass online, but the pass is only valid for the date of purchase. For info, visit gastateparks.org/AHStephens.