Shad

[Quillback]

I pull into a cove today, and fish about halfway back into it where another small side cove splits off.  I'd say that side cove went back about 100 yards and if you ran your boat down the middle, you could cast to either bank.  That side cove was absolutely filled with 1.5" shad.  Incredible how many were in it.  As far as I can tell they were unmolested by game fish.  I sure couldn't get any bites and could not see any game fish activity.  I have seen this before, and it always makes me wonder why there aren't game fish of some sort back in there tearing those shad up.

[Bill Babler]

Jeff, you and I are having quite a dialog.  We are seeing and posting very similar junk.  Today in a couple of short main lake pockets at the mouth of the Kings River and also down the White between Shell Knob and Campbell Pt. we saw huge rafts of swimming threadfin shad just under the surface.  I mean millions  of them.  Nothing was bothering them on the locations we saw them, but the schools were massive.

Between Campbell Point and Baxter there are latterly hundreds of gulls, diving on the same 1.5 inch shad.  When you are jerkbaiting the bluffends you can see them dying and fluttering everywhere.  For some reason these shad are very near the surface

[willyfish]

How would you guys describe the shad kill this year? What was the coldest water temp you ran across?

[Champ188]

I haven't seen anything below 41 that I can recall. Ben Gillespie's water temp posts on here would be the best resource.

[Bill Babler]

Yes, yesterday I was showing 44 as the coldest and that will make them sick.  They were very near the surface so I'm sure that is contributing to the mortality.  I've got a feeling it is going to warm up from here on out.  I have 46 here at the house at 5 AM yesterday it was 31.

[Fish24/7]

Guys I'm seeing the same thing on Bull  Shoals. Lots of diving gulls and bait on the surface. Catching some keeper walleye and fat bass in those places with a susp. jerkbait and homemade underspin . I would bet there are plenty of predators around those shad on TR. The deal for me is I have to be there when they all decide to munch. I fished the same cove for 6 1/2 hours last Friday. Went a few hours without much action then when they finally turned on late in the day caught about 30 off the same point that I'd been fishing all afternoon. When the WT is still in the 40's I seem to have the best luck picking an area loaded with birds and bait and just staying put until something happens. It can really play with your head seeing these fish on the screen for hours and they just won't bite until they are ready.

I've not seen any signs of a shad kill on Bull.

[96 CHAMP]

I hit on this a couple of weeks ago but a few years back I was 2/3 of the way back in a deep, good size cove throwing a jerkbait with the water temp at 43 when I seen a small school of shad swim by right near the service, I grabbed my grub rod and began to fan cast when I found a school of ks' in the far back where the deep channel came up to the flat in back and they were stacked in there, all of them appeared to me to be fat females, I was throwing a small 3" grub, about 10' deep with a slow steady retrieve, it was one of my best days on TR, I'm not sure if I found them before they found the shad or what, I have had that happen up in the back of big creek many years ago also, right time right place the way I see it, just goes to show what we don't know about fish. I remember the weather also, cloudy rainy and chilly to cold. Somewhere around those shad there are fish. Good luck

[Dewayne French]

That's a cool note about the fish relating to those shad balls. I can usually catching them like that also, but when the main shad die off starts I can't catch a fish in a barrel then if you know what I mean.  Most threadfin shad are not long lived anyway and are short lived (2 Yrs I think) around here in our highland lakes. Mainly due to the cold winter temps.   With water temps dipping into the low 40's upper 30's for long periods of time that's when I/we generally start to see them "die off".  My general thought was that was older one's that are generally more prone to stress of the cold water temps.  I have always had bad luck fishing when the small shad are dying be the "billzillons" in every cove every where on the lake. I figure there isn't a bait made like a natural dying shad and to compete with them is usually futile in my boat anyway. But hey it beats office work right??

Those dang big gizzards are another good source when you find them shallow?