A reservoir with a split personality

Either one of Lake James’ two main arms is capable of spitting out smallmouth bass like this one, but they do fish differently.

Lake James is a unique reservoir in that it is fed by two major tributary rivers, the Catawba and Linville, each of which has unique characteristics. The Linville side is deeper and clearer, with its headwaters at a relatively high elevation, just below the Blue Ridge Parkway near Grandfather Mountain. The Catawba side drains lower-lying areas from Old Fort east.

The two arms of the lake fish different at different times of year, according to guide Tim Laws.

“The Linville side is clearer, deeper and a couple of degrees cooler, and a lot of times during the summer, the Linville is the place to be. During the summer, the Linville gets a lot of boat traffic, and you can have a very defined mud line, with the clear, cold water off the bank and the shallow, dirty water up against the bank,” he said. “The Catawba side usually has a little dirtier water, because it gets a lot of runoff from farmland; it runs through four big farms between Old Fort and the lake.”

Veteran Lake James fisherman Mike Goodman said the best fishing he’s had recently has been in the Catawba arm. “The last couple of years, I have done better in the Catawba arm. Somehow, for me at least, the Linville arm has not been as productive as it used to be,” he said.

One factor that sets the two apart in the fall is the timing of the lake’s “turnover” — when the surface water cools and gets heavy enough to mix with the cooler water that stays toward the bottom of the lake for the summer. A lake’s waters will become murky during the turnover period, which will sometimes last a week to 10 days. It’s at the end of the turnover, when the surface waters clear, that the fall topwater bite often kicks off, according to Laws.

“The turnover is usually late September to early October,” he said. “You’ll get it earlier in the Linville because the water’s cooler on that side, and a lot of times it will turn over in the mid-lake areas a little later.”

So, fishermen can actually “run” the clear-water areas where the turnovers has either finished and expect better action.

“But this year, we’ve had so much rain that the lake has never rally stratified at all,” Laws said.

Be the first to comment

Leave a Reply