Spring is finally here to stay this time and the fish are biting well on lanier! The best thing going right now on the lake is the crappie bite. Most of my fish are being caught on a 1/32 oz chartuese Marabou jig tipped with a crappie nibble. Fish seem to be moving shallower, I have been catching good fish under shaded docks on the north end of the lake and some around brush. I will be out this week to check out the shallow action as I expect it is on right now!

After a cold winter in GA the weather is finally starting to warm up and the fishing is improving! Springtime is one of the best times of year to get out and enjoy a day on the lake or river in a kayak! The mild temps and reduced boat traffic/fishing pressure make for an enjoyable experience!  

As the water temps are cooling the fishing is warming up on the LAKE!! Fall is a great time to get out and catch a wide variety of fish from the kayak. Mild temps and reduced pleasure boat traffic make for a relaxing experience on the water. Expect a mixed bag of fish on Lanier right now and multiple tactics are working.
The stripers are still eating down-line blueback herring very well. Some big fish are also showing up, several 15 plus pounders were taken in kayaks over the past few weeks! Fall is a great time to land a trophy striper from the kayak! Downlines over a 40-60 foot bottom seem to be producing well right now. There are also some schools of smaller stripers hanging out shallower! Free-lined bluebacks will also start to work soon as the fish move up with the cooling temps. Often I will run both until I find out what the fish want that day.


Doubles in the kayak........a challenging sleigh-ride!
Spotted bass are also eating blueback herring right now. I landed several nice magnums last week while striper fishing. The spots are also coming up in the mornings and throughout the day. Keep a large topwater lure handy to cast at these busting fish (if you aren't too busy reeling in stripers!) I prefer a large superspook. The sebile swimbait in white also produces some good strikes from these surfacing fish. As the spots move shallower plastics, crankbaits and white roostertails will also catch fish.

For some fun fishing the lanier catfish are biting very well right now! I caught three in a row on a recent fishing trip that made a trip home to the fryer. They are eating cut bait right now and a 20-25 foot bottom seem to be the best. Bank fishing will work well this time of year also. Try cut-bait or live nightcrawlers and make sure to secure your rod in a rodholder!

For more information on kayak fishing on lanier, tactics, fishing trips and detailed reports visit our online forum at:

As fall begins there are a number of tactics working on Lanier! The fishing is good and the kayak is a great way to sneak up on these schooling fish! Mild temperatures and reduced pleasure boat traffic make this one of the best times of the year to kayak fish on Lake Lanier.
Right now the stripers are starting to school up good but seem to be moving very fast! Downlines, free-lines and top-water are all working right now. The fish will let you know what they want on the particular day! As the weather cools the top-water bite should get better. A large pencil popper will sometimes bring the fish up if you can't make it to them when they are boiling on top. When you do see surfacing fish, often there are more underneath so watch your downlines carefully!



The spoon bite is starting up for the spotted bass. My favorite is the flex-it spoon. Worked over points and humps this lure can fill the yak quickly when the bass are feeding. Use your electronics and work the lure down off the bottom. Heavy bait-casting gear is best for deep jigging spoons. Don't be surprised to also catch bass, sun-fish and stripers while working your spoons!

A mega school from last week! They are still out there, just moving around! Good luck on the water!

I have been out several times over the past few weeks for stripers and the bite has been good at times and slow at others!  The top-water bite for stripers has slowed down over the past few weeks with the warmer than normal temps.  I have been back to fishing downlines at 30-45 feet deep over a 50-90 foot bottom!  Kind of like summertime fishing!  Make sure to keep a topwater lure handy though just in case!

Spots are still coming up around points and humps.  Try out a large topwater plug like a zara spook or pencil popper for the surfacing spots.  The kayak is a great way to sneak up on the busting fish, often they will not even know you are there and continue to break close to the yak!  Will be back out later this week, good luck!

Finally made it out to Lanier for some fishing this week. The weather has been a combination of wet and cold! I fished the back of a southend creek in search of stripers but only found spots! I caught a few spots while free-lining trout for the stripe's. Next time out I will likely target only spotted bass as I did very well this time last year with flex-it spoons and bucktails jigs.  The lake is still full and looking great, very little pleasure boat traffic makes the winter months a great time to get out and fish!  

 

I made it out yesterday for a few hours in the yak and was greeted by busting stripers everywhere!  The only problem is they didn't want what I was throwing at them!  These fish were in small groups and were having a frenzy feeding on small shad.  It was awesome to watch these fish even if the catching wasn't that good! Several boats and yaks in the area boated one or two fish but that was about it!  

Managed to get out this morning for a few hours and got on a few spotted bass.  Could not find any stripers and there was very little top-water activity.  Best spot of the day pictured was about 2-2.5 pounds and ate a flex-it spoon vertical jigged.  The weather was nice, the lake still looks great!  I will likely target spots for the next few weeks as I did very well with them this time last year!   

 

Lake Lanier is now above full pool and looking great! I have been out several times this week, it has been either rainy or windy! Less top-water action than I would like but I have been catching a mix of stripers, spotted bass and catfish. I have caught fish this week with downlined and free-lined bluebacks, flex-it spoons and lost a striper today on a sebile swimbait. I did see one small group of stripers on top this afternoon, but as soon as they came up they went back down! Hope to get out soon to throw some bombers at night.

Made it out today to fish in the wind and rain!  Luckily the rain stopped but the wind was brutal.  I caught spots/stripers today on a flex-it spoon, sebile swimbait and even boated a 20 pound fish on a downline........the fish was right on the bottom.  Took about ten minutes to reel it in......fun day on the lake despite the weather!