Catch them in that mud, laying on their bellies 😂

With that low a water temp you should have seen some shad doing the death twinge. Did you see any shad up shallow on their backs?

19 minutes ago, Stump bumper said:

With that low a water temp you should have seen some shad doing the death twinge. Did you see any shad up shallow on their backs?

Didn’t see a one... 

I don’t know how that WT can be right. I fished Thurs until dark around Rocky Branch and the water was still 48-49.5 even in the backs of some pockets. Readings were consistent on both of my Humminbird 998 units. May have an issue with your temp gauge. 

8 minutes ago, Champ188 said:

I don’t know how that WT can be right. I fished Thurs until dark around Rocky Branch and the water was still 48-49.5 even in the backs of some pockets. Readings were consistent on both of my Humminbird 998 units. May have an issue with your temp gauge. 

I don’t know.  I didn’t pay attention to it at the driver seat to compare.  I just launched and ran up following the channel and bluff lines.  I’ll look next trip.  Could it be because I’m way up on the south end?

I’m not gonna say it’s impossible to have a 10-degree difference from RB to the upper river area. 

25 minutes ago, Champ188 said:

I’m not gonna say it’s impossible to have a 10-degree difference from RB to the upper river area. 

Okay. I’ll still compare next time.  

3 hours ago, Lance34 said:

I don’t know.  I didn’t pay attention to it at the driver seat to compare.  I just launched and ran up following the channel and bluff lines.  I’ll look next trip.  Could it be because I’m way up on the south end?

I would think that is possible.  Not the deep mass of water on the south end to hold heat.

I've seen the river get that cold but the dam area is upper 40's. I betcha his temp gauge is correct Champ. 

It takes a really long time for the dam area to cool down, based on the volume of water. Conversely, it takes just as long for it to warm up in the spring. The rivers have been pushing cold water into the lake for the past 2 weeks, so it makes sense that its so much colder. 

Well I'll jump into the Great Temperature Debate - I was out on one of the smaller BV lakes Friday afternoon and the temp was 42-43.  

Not too unusual for water temps to be different in the river arms compared to main lake, especially close to the dam. That's why the turnover starts much earlier in the upper lake, sometimes as much as a month and a half earlier.  TrophyFishR and Ozark Flyer are correct regarding the difference in volume being a main reason for the difference.  The difference in average depth is also another factor as well as the inflow of cold river water.  

On ‎12‎/‎30‎/‎2017 at 9:57 AM, Stump bumper said:

With that low a water temp you should have seen some shad doing the death twinge. Did you see any shad up shallow on their backs?

It won't be long before we see the threadfins starting to stress and die if we continue to see frigid weather.  The worst years for severe winter shad kills happen when large areas of the lake become ice covered. Those conditions really kick their butts.  I've walked stretches of the shoreline during those types of winters and seen large wind rows of dead threadfin in most areas of the lake. Hopefully it won't be that severe this winter but the next few days look pretty bad temperature wise.    

PS,  Kudos to you Lance34 for your success in finding and catching crappie. I always enjoy your posts and pictures!