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Lake Oconee
Lake Oconee is an excellent fishing lake located in central Georgia on the Oconee River near Greensboro, the real Buckhead and Eatonton. Oconee is known for very good bass fishing, great crappie fishing for huge slabs, and very good fishing for linesides and catfish. The lake was created in 1979 when Georgia Power completed the construction of the Wallace Dam on the Oconee River. Lake Oconee runs through Georgia's Morgan, Greene, and Putnam counties and is separated from its sister lake, Sinclair, by Wallace Dam. Lake Oconee is home to a number of golf communities, including Reynolds Plantation, Cuscawilla, and Harbor Club.
Lake Oconee Resources
Oconee: Level: 0.1 feet below 435. Temp: 65 degrees. Clarity: Clear. Bass: Guide Nick Knapp, with Elite Guide Service, reports, “During the month of December, I look for the fish to be toward the backs of pockets with bait in them. December is a good month to target fish shallow around rocks. With the cooler water, the fish will be a little slower, so slow down the presentation. I like to slow-roll a 1/2-oz. white spinnerbait this time of year. Check the areas around 44 bridge and south to Old Salem. Look for bait on the shallow secondary points with rock. The largemouth won’t be far away. I also like a green-pumpkin jig with a junebug trailer. It seems to get the bigger bites this time of year. It’s wintertime—slow down and use bigger-profile baits for bigger bites.” Stripers: Capt. Doug Nelms, with BigFishHeads Guide Service, reports, “It’s the most…
Read MoreLake Oconee Articles
They fight better than they eat… and they eat good! The hybrid bass has become one of the favorite freshwater game fish in Georgia waters. This fish, which is a cross between white and striped bass, is an excellent fighter, pound for pound, and can also provide some good table fare. The Georgia WRD Fisheries…
Since Lake Oconee first filled with water in 1979, I’ve seen a lot of changes take place on this middle Georgia lake, some good, some not so good. I’ve been guiding on Lake Oconee since 1980 and watched as the changes slowly took place. In the early 1980s, Lake Oconee was a lake with miles…
Jonathan Clifton, of Siloam, holds the current channel catfish record for Lake Oconee with a 34-lb., 8-oz.. fish he caught on May 31, 1998.
This Oconee slab wasn’t weighed until more than 24 hours after it was caught, but it still tipped the scale at 3-lbs., 12-ozs. Edward Rhodes, of Suwanee, caught the lake-record crappie Feb. 10, 1997 while trolling a 2-inch spit-tail grub tipped with a minnow.
The lake record for striped bass at Oconee was set May 10, 1996 when an Eatonton angler boated a 29-lb., 15-oz. striper. Fred Worthy was downlining a live shad 15 feet deep while fishing the buoy line at the dam when the big lineside hit. The striper hit the first shad Fred put in the…
Lake Oconee Record Fish
| Largemouth Bass | 12-lbs., 14-ozs. | Bill Brantley | 05/14/12 |
| Hybrid Bass | 14-lbs., 4-ozs. | Jan Allen Ward | 04/03/91 |
| Striped Bass | 29-lbs., 14.9-ozs. | Fred Worthy | 05/10/96 |
| Black Crappie | 3-lbs., 12-ozs. | Edward Rhodes | 02/10/97 |
| Channel Catfish | 34-lbs., 8-ozs. | Jonathan Clifton | 05/31/98 |
| Blue Catfish | 70-lbs., 2-ozs. | Koob Moua | 03/22/23 |
| Flathead Catfish | 62-lbs., 10.4-ozs. | Rob Allgood | 03/11/23 |
| White Bass | 3-lbs., 6-ozs. | Tony Couch | 04/02/93 |
| Longnose Gar | 20-lbs., 13-ozs. | Dustin Turk | 10/05/19 |
| Chain Pickerel | 1-lb., 2-ozs. | Terry Brice | 03/05/17 |
| Spotted Bass | 5-lbs., 3.2-ozs. | Austin Skinner | 03/19/22 |
| Shellcracker | 1-lb., 14.56-ozs. | Randy Smith | 04/23/22 |
| Yellow Perch | 11-ozs. | John Moore | 02/16/23 |