Three Easy Pieces

One aspect about Kerr Lake spring largemouths is their beautiful coloration. Some anglers believe the green-and-white comes from living in the sweet-gum trees during high-water and spawning periods.

Bass anglers who want to test their skills at a major impoundment should divide Kerr Lake into sections and learn to play one part at a time.

Long before I moved to North Carolina, I had heard of Buggs Island lake.

Buggs Island, technically John H. Kerr Reservoir, had a reputation for massive largemouth bass and prime spring fishing. With the passage of time, I have not been disappointed in Kerr Lake/Buggs Island bass.

Because of a large forage base of gizzard and threadfin shads, blueback herrings and a variety of other critters, not only are largemouth abundant, lunkers exist as well. Most largemouth run a couple of pounds, but 5-pound fish are quite common.

Kerr Lake is a massive reservoir, nearly 49,000 surface acres, straddling the North Carolina-Virginia border. Most of the lake is in Virginia, but a reciprocal license agreement applies allowing anglers from both states to fish anywhere on the impoundment.

Because Kerr Lake is so large, lots of anglers are intimidated. With the advice of some top quality guides and anglers, however, a visitor can make sense of this big impoundment.

Andre Powell was backfield and special-teams coach at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill until last December. While Powell was on a recruiting trip, new UNC-Chapel Hill head coach Butch Davis sent word he’d been dismissed as part of a general house-cleaning. However, Powell quickly landed on his feet when Clemson named him runningbacks coach.

While I can’t comment on Powell’s football coaching skills, I’ve fished with him at Kerr Lake and elsewhere. He is a great fishing companion.

Jeff Samsel, long-time writer for North Carolina Sportsman and now working for PRADCO Lures, fished with us during our last trip.

In addition to his coaching duties, Powell hits the spring bass tournament trail hard. He often fishes the BFL, ABA, and Fishers of Men tournaments.

Powell fishes Kerr Lake frequently each spring. Early on, he hits stumps hard.

“Bass at Kerr Lake are around the stumps, not on the stumps,” he said. “You throw to a stump, and you can see a bass come from near the stump toward your lure.”

Powell relies on several approaches for spring-time stumps at Kerr. One of his favorite techniques is to fish a shallow-running or suspending jerk bait.

“The most productive jerkbait is a clown Rogue,” he said.

Powell casts the jerkbait, lets it rest, then causes it to dance and dart with a series of pulls, twitches and jerks.

Another quality jerkbait at Kerr Lake, used in the same way Powell uses the Rogue, is a Swim’n Image. In discolored water the fire-tiger paint job seems to work well. In clear water, throw one of the shad colors.

Powell also fishes a “whacky worm” near the stumps. A whacky worm is a straight plastic worm. Rather than fished with a weight and rigged through the nose of the worm, a whacky worm is hooked through the center of the worm.

“My favorite for the whacky worm is Yum Notta Worm, cotton-candy color,” Powell said. “I throw it up by the stumps. Sometimes I simply dead-stick it, let it swirl slowly by the stump. Sometimes I work it; depends on what the bass want.

“The whacky worm also works near the piers and docks at Kerr Lake. Near the piers and docks, I throw the whacky worm and let it drop near the pilings. If nobody grabs it on the fall, I bring it back and throw again.”

In spring, Powell searches for stumps in the abundant creeks at Kerr.

“Lots of times the best stumps at this time of year are in the back two-thirds of the creeks,” he said. “They’re filled with stumps. They may only be in 3 feet of water, but they are productive.”

Powell also recommended a Carolina-rig for spring-time anglers at Kerr.

“There are several reasons why a Carolina-rig works,” he said. “For one thing, it gets to the bottom fast. The big weight drops the worm through the water column quickly. You don’t have to wait while it sinks.

“Another reason, with a Carolina-rig, you can tell what your worm is doing. You can feel lots of stuff — clay, stones, brush. So you can tell what the bottom is like and determine a pattern where the fish are.

“Finally, with a Carolina-rig, you can fish a variety of ways — flats, points, stumps. Fish a light weight or a heavy one. A big worm or a little one. The Carolina-rig offers a bunch of options.”

In addition to stumps at the backs of covers, Powell also likes windy points. Main lake points, especially those with wind blowing into or across the points, hold pre-spawn largemouth.

Try deep-diving crankbaits. A Fat Free Shad is an example of a crankbait that works.

A few months after I fished with Powell at Kerr Lake, he asked, “Are you still throwing that tube grub?” At Kerr I caught several with a white Yum 3-inch tube, rigged with an 1/8-ounce jighead, including a largemouth just shy of 7-pounds.

Powell fished the portions of Kerr Lake called the Graveyard, Ivy Hill, Little Nutbush Creek, and Flemingtown Creek.

Jerry King has had a varied career, part of it as a largemouth guide at Kerr.

“There’s lots of water at Kerr Lake,” he said. “Come spring, I concentrate on the several areas, first, the creeks and coves off the front third of Grassy Creek, areas like Buckhorn, Beaver Pond and the smaller unnamed creeks.

“The rocky points at the main area of Grassy Creek can be good in the early part of spring.”

King also has another hot spot.

“Next I look at the Butchers Creek/Rudd Creek portion of Kerr Lake,” he said, “at the creeks and coves. And these can be from the front to all the way to the back of the main creeks, as long as the water remains clear.”

Another of King’s favorite spring-time spots at Kerr is Eastland Creek at the Virginia side of the reservoir.

“I really like this area in the spring,” he said. “The water stays clear in this creek under all conditions, it has good rocky and gravel banks, a good many rocky and gravel banks, and rocky points that hold fish in the earlier part of the spring.”

Roger Harrison fished Eastland Creek several years ago and did well with suspending Rogues.

Finally, King recommended portions of Kerr Lake near Clarksville, Va.

“The pockets and coves around Clarksville,” he said. “These can be very good in the spring if the water remains clear. Muddy, cold water in early spring is a bad combination.”

King described several stages of spring largemouth fishing at Kerr.

“When water temperatures are in the upper 40s to low 50s, (that) means fishing with jigs and suspending jerkbaits,” he said. “For jigs I like a 3/8-ounce black rubber-skirted model or black with some blue. Add a pork chunk or a Zoom chunk for a trailer.

“Fish it around main points and secondary points. Look for points with lots of rock.

“Another choice, and one that caught lots of fish in the spring of 2006, is a suspending jerkbait — a Pointer or Rogue. These are fished at deeper points for fish that hold out over the points. You must, however, be fishing clear water.

“Work the bait slowly over the points and you will be surprised how many nice-sized bass will rise to take the bait.”

Gradually, of course, water temperatures in spring move upward.

“When water temperatures get into the low 50s to 60 or so, I like to speed things up a little. I always start with a heavy spinnerbait, ¾ ounce, and work it in ’slow roll’ fashion around rocky points back in the creeks and coves,” King said. “I also have luck just fishing banks with brush, deadfall trees, stumps and scattered rocks.

“The spinnerbait, at this time of year, catches big fish.”

In clear water, a willow-leaf and Colorado-leaf spinnerbait may be a better bet, while in stained water a big Colorado blade will provide greater “thump” as the blade turns.

King also fishes crankbaits at this time.

“I also use a crankbait in these same areas, as the bass seem to prefer it over the spinnerbait some days,” he said. “I like the Speed Trap in shad color for this kind of fishing. The Rapala DT-7 was another good crankbait last spring.”

Successful crank-baiters also throw a wide-wobble, shallow crankbait for the circumstance King described, something like a Balsa Model B.

According to King, the next stage of spring is when water temperatures exceed 60 degrees.

“When water temperature is over 60 degrees, it’s time to start looking for spawning fish,” he said. “They’ll be back in protected clearwater pockets with a hard bottom and cover. This is primarily sight-fishing.

“Soft plastics are the thing for this kind of fishing. This is more like hunting than fishing, so be prepared to move around a lot, just looking for fish.

“You’ll need good polarized glasses and a hat for this kind of fishing.”

Rig a lizard or worm Texas-style or a tube grub, toss the rig toward a bass and let the lure drop to the bottom. Often a bass will come over and pick up a stationary offering.

After the spawn, according to King, fishing at Kerr Lake is more difficult for a while.

“Post-spawn, things get tough for a while,” he said. “This is a good time for junk fishing. Throw everything at them. Buzzbaits, floating worms — probably your best bet — and small crankbaits. Carolina-rigged soft plastics fished on clay points can be good at times.”

Mill Creek and Grassy Creek are good places for floating worms (floating worms do not really “float”). Yet rigged weightless, the worms sink slowly. Strikes came just as the white worms sank out of sight.

There won’t be sudden tugs on the worms, they’ll just stop sinking. Six-foot, 6-inch spinning rods and 8-pound-test line is recommended.

“Move out to the main points in these same areas,” King said for later spring fishing — May and June, “Carolina-rigged plastics and larger crankbaits can be effective. I’ve had very good luck using a Bagley’s DB3 crankbait at points at this time of year.

“I especially like clay points with scattered rocks or stumps.”

Long casts are required to permit the crankbait to dive to its maximum depth. If the crankbait is not banging the rocks or stumps from time-to-time, it is not running deep enough.

If the Kerr Lake water level gets to 300-feet above mean sea level, largemouth bass take up positions in the flooded bushes along the shoreline. With flipping or pitching gear, toss a Texas-rig or jig-and-pig to the flooded cover.

During cloudy or breezy days, bass will be near the outer edge of the cover. When weather is clear or during calm days, largemouths may burrow deeper into the cover. A strike may require you to snatch fish out of the bushes in a single stroke. It’s hand-to-hand combat and lots of fun.

Examples of the best flooded bushes are in Nutbush and Little Nutbush Creek.

Jim Nolan of the sales and promotion division of Ranger Boats recommended the flooded cover on the islands just east of the bridge in Grassy Creek.

Because Kerr Lake is so large, folks who haven’t fished it sometimes find it a little intimidating. One way to overcome the feeling is to divide the lake into smaller portions and work on one section at a time.

A feasible division would consider Nutbush and Little Nutbush Creek as one section, the area between Nutbush Creek and Clarksville as a section, and the more river-like portion west of Clarksville as the final section.

In any event, lots of water and prime spots exist at the three sections.

Kerr Lake largemouth bass have been kind to many anglers during the years. BASS pro Denny Brauer of Camdenton, Mo., who has fished world wide, calls it his favorite bass lake.

Kerr/Buggs contains lots of fish with pretty good size, including quite a few over 5-pounds.

And springtime is primetime.

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