Lake Shelbyville on April 30

[robow7]

Well Uncle Dave and I headed down to Lake Shelbyville Sunday evening. The weather could not have been nicer and after two days of sun and warmth, I thought the fish would be up. Well they fooled me again as the fishing was very spotty. We managed 35 fish, 12 carp and 23 short nose gar with severalnice shortnose weighing in at several pounds. The real story is the water level is so down at Shelbyville, it's down about as low as I have seen it. We twicegot stuck out on mud/sand bars in the very middle of the lake several hundredyards from shorethat normally you easily go over. A lot of the places we normally fish you simply couldn't get back into because it was so shallow. Hello Slim and Indy boys with the fan!! In fact several of the normally very large creeks and overflow areasarebone dry. No chance of any vegetation in the water anywhere, and so it made locating the fish tough.And to add insult to injury a lot of the lake's water clarity was poor. Fortunately we stumbled on several shortnose just before heading in or our numbers could have really looked ugly.

[fishngame]

Nice going Robow and Uncle Dave! At least you guys stuck a decent amount of fish. Drew and I went out to Evergreen Saturday night. What a horrible night! Drew shot six commons and I got skunked! The water clarity was very lousy! Oh well, I guess it's good to just get out. It's still BETTER than the best day at work!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Mikey

[CHZHead]

JohnnyB, KBI-Prez, Deb & I went out Sat night to Vermilion Hills Fishing Club and almost got skunked! The water was very high and cloudy. We saw about 5 fish and only shot one, and then it pulled off while reeling it in. (That's the "almost got skunked" part). We were really expecting to shootalot offish and were very dissapointed.

[robow7]

Mikey and Chezhead, been there and done that skunked thing way more times than I care to remember.

[Bowfisher5]

Thanks Rob for letting me tag along. Maybe the next time we can shoot out of my boat. Railing is done, just needs some paint and wiring.

Fishing was tough at best. Water clarity was not good in most places but is to be expected shooting on a nice weekend when all the other boats get the water churned up on a weekend. The water is really low. Sand bars sticking up out in the midlle of the lake. AIr boaters dream. Did I mentyion the l;ake was real low. Suppose to rain most of this week so maybe the lake will come up a bit. If the water doesn't come up it is going to make for a very interseting Sate Bowfising Championship. What ever plan you thought you had last year that might work this year for the state shoot, you might as well forget it. You had better pre-scout the lake again and change your game plan.

Robow and I where just about ready to call it quits at 2 am when we tried a different game plan and found all the gar one could shoot. Now most gar don't add up to some big fat carp and buffs, but they are better than an empty barrel of fish.

Dave R

[bowman15]

Mark and I are planning on coming down the weekend before the state-shoot to scout. I did have an idea I was going to try based on what I saw on Christine's boat year before last, but if it's as low as you guys say, I won't have much luck. We'll see what it looks like in a couple weeks.

[Mark S]

Yup, we're serious this time now that we know the boat floats. Heck, maybe there will be a fan on the back by then. Hmmmmmmm

[robow7]

Are we talking about a Cub fan or Sox fan on the back, either way, bring a pair of waders and you're in the money.

[Mark S]

That shallow? Wow.

[garslayer]

think lake shelbyville is about 1/2 foot above winter pool.
if the lake stays this low in june you will have to try something else.
the fish can,t get to were they where last year.
good thing I only live 15 min. away. been shooting every week this year. and the fish are in other spots now. and are real spotty.