Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, May 19, 1994 TAG: 9405190169
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Bill Cochran
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
From the upper reaches of the 50,000-acre Southside impoundment to the tailrace water below the dam, Kerr has been bowing the rods of fishermen with a delightful variety of fish.
The lake's water level has been just above the 300-foot elevation mark, which puts water back into the shoreline willows and sweet gum trees, where big largemouth bass hang out. The abundance of water this spring also has kept tailrace releases active, and that has stimulated striped bass fishing.
Many of the stripers taken by fishermen casting bucktails and bait to the tailrace, near Boydton, have been small, but there have been some giants as well. Hugh Hamby, who operates nearby Castle Heights Grocery, weighed two recently that were 26 pounds, 4 ounces and 32 pounds, 4 ounces. These are huge stripers to be wrestled from the swirling water of the tailrace.
In the lake itself, largemouth fishing is rated from good to great, depending on whom you happen to be talking to at the dock. Plastic lures, such as lizards and worms, are hooking bass in shoreline cover, but the most exciting way to catch them is with top-water lures. The best concentrations are on main lake points at 4-to 5-foot depths.
As a rule, when the water at Kerr is high enough to stimulate bass and tailrace-striper fishing, it is too high for the best crappie action. That has been the case much of the spring, but the level has dropped to the point that crappie can be found over brush 10- to 15-feet deep. Hamby, who isn't known for superlatives, reports that the crappie fishing is bordering on fantastic.
White bass also are hitting; in fact, some people haven't gotten the message that Kerr quietly has become Virginia's white bass hot spot. It produced 43 citations last year, more than twice the number of any other body of water.
During the next several weeks, striper fishing should be productive in Kerr, as spawning fish return from the Dan and Roanoke River tributaries. Some fishermen already are taking stripers on live shad in the upper lake.
The fish have a history of moving slowly down the lake, as if an a post-spawn parade. They dispurse when they reach the dam.
NEW MEMBER: The Department of Game and Inland Fisheries will have a new board member when it meets in Richmond today. Charles McDaniel of Fredericksburg will replace William E. Fears of Accomac.
Fears, who was appointed in January by Gov. Doug Wilder, resigned earlier this month, citing his frustration with the lack of support for the agency by the General Assembly and the governor's office.
WOO IS IN: Woo Daves will be Virginia's only entry in the Bass Masters Classic, scheduled July 28-30 in Greensboro, N.C. The Spring Grove angler needed a good showing in the final BP Top100 tournament of the season and got it with a 23rd finish at Lake Norman, N.C.
David Fritts, of Lexington, N.C. finished the season as B.A.S.S. Angler-of-the-Year, after accumulating the greatest number of pounds and ounces throughout the tournament season. His total catch was 432 pounds, 7 ounces.
BIG BASS: Mickey Anders of Galax landed a bass so big - 9 pounds, 8 ounces - that you have to wonder if if lowered the level of modest Gatewood Lake when Anders pulled it from the Pulaski County impoundment. Several 4-to 5-pound smallmouths also have been reported from Gatewood.
State game wardens have been keeping an eye on striper anglers in the Cedar Key area of Smith Mountain Lake with ITT Night Mariner goggles. Large numbers of stripers move into the area each spring in a spawning attempt, a fact that has stimulated poaching in the past.
by CNB