The lake is holding about a foot above summer pool and if we get the rain they are calling for June 24-30th. They are calling for as much as five inches. The lake will go up a couple foot or more. The south end will remain clear though.

Water temps are in the low eighties and clarity is about three-feet so very clear. The crappie are already set up on their summer patterns and recovering from their spawn quite nicely.

We are using the Livescope to search out huge schools of crappie then pull off to the side and drift slip bobbers and a lively minnow across them. One of my favorite patterns and boy is it deadly. Been fishing water from Eagle boat ramp to the south end.

I am also picking up a 1/32oz. hair jig under a 1/8oz. or 1/4oz. trolling weight. The trolling weight has a barrel swivel on each end to help with line twist. I am then using my Livescope to target bigger fish down deep. This is how I fish Kentucky Lake. I run 10lb. braid down to the casting sinker then a 12in. 10lb. Fluorocarbon leader tied on to my 1/32oz. hair jig. You must be able to see this on your Livescope to correctly attack a brush pile but it is deadly on big fish that like to hide in thick brush or spook out the back if you get too close. The weight gets you down and then here comes that tiny hair jig behind it and as it falls below the weight hang on even the hardest fish to bite will hammer this.

The walleye and white bass are still on edges of flats from point three north. We have been using a more vertical approach and using my 1/4oz. Glow Bugs which are hair jigs tipped with a minnow or just plain. Then I have also been using a Jigging Rap. Both we are making about thirty foot casts and popping it off bottom back to the boat. You cast too far and you are hung in stumps.

The crappie are biting so well that it doesn’t take an entire trip to get three limits so we have been hitting points from Bo-Woods down to Eagle then switching over to the crappie gear. If we are really in the walleye and whites we might just keep after them.

I still have plenty of good trips available for July and August and if I could get at least 48 hours notice I can a day off work and do even more guide trips. All summer the crappie fishing is on fire and we usually get three limits every trip out for the next few months. This period is my favorite of all the seasons. Just wait until that thermocline forms and it will get even better.

Steve Welch
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