Lake Report: Mill Creek Reservoir, Canton TX

I posted this over on FB, meant to put it here, too. I went over to this small lake, about 237 acres I believe, launched Super Bowl mid-morning, fished 4 hours. I caught a nice bass, my best of the day . . . on my first cast about 50 yds away from the launch, 3.5 lbs. or maybe close to 4. Then, I had some luck over by the dam, caught the one in the photo attached below in the 2.5 to 3 lbs. range. I thought I had a monster but it turned out that I had my drag set really loose. Ha!

I think this little lake used to have a better reputation, then the grass was killed off. I think I read that it is more of a panfish diet here for LMBs, not so much a big shad lake, so usually this means it fishes like a large stock tank. That was my impression.

I used dark blue plastics since the water is not really clear. Lake vegetation like we have on Athens filters the water to a clearer state. This lake lacks that but I don't mean to say it is dingy water, just a bit darker.

Since the water is still cold, I threw only finesse stuff: a wacky rig, a T-Rig, maybe one other. All on the bottom. I'd take some other lures next time to work different areas in the water column. I would like to cast a Keitech small shad bait around, maybe even a spinnerbait.

No fee for kayakers, very little traffic on this day, maybe 3 boats and me in my kayak, a few bank fisherman. Nice parking area in full view, easy places to launch either from the ramp or off to either side.

I sure wish I had some electronics. One angler was in a jon boat and was motoring around at idle looking for schools. I assume he knew more about the lake than I did. I don't know if he spotted them or not.

I'll likely go back soon, even possibly Saturday as this day seems to be setting up to be the warmest.

Too, the north end of Lake Palestine looks super enticing. Lots of things in the water (old bridge abutments, timber, etc.) so bigger boats generally stay to the south. It'd be great for kayaks up there where the river and creeks feed in.

And, white bass will be pushing up into the Neches River pretty soon. The males are likely starting already to do so. But, it is heavily bank fished. I need to look on a map and see if it could be fished from moving in from the main lake. Might be a long trip, not sure.

Brad

Great report man thanks for sharing!

Not a bad day at all for this time of year if you ask me.

Awesome post and a solid fish. Good job.

Excellent lake for bass and crappie. Haven't been there for years. Used to be a lot of brush piles there put in by us crappie fisherman. Most bass we caught were in areas you would never expect. As in do nothing type banks.

marktx, not only whatever the crappie anglers have dropped in, but Mill Creek was one of the lakes that TPWD put in a few man-made brush piles. There is a website on TPWD where they list the lakes where they've added these fish attractors, the points are shown and the cooordinates given.

One of them on MCR is directly across from the ramp. I got bit over there but missed setting the hook. I liked the dam area, a few others.

If a few guys want to get together one weekend on a nice day, count me in.

This is a good kayak fishing lake!

Brad

Great!

Were not sure now but I knew of a dozen bp there plus the channel in the middle plus back left was full of underwater trees on the drop of a old roadbed. Never did much bass fishing by the dam never caughtamy there but to the left of it is a.shelf and wore them out on c.rig lizards. At one.time the record was I believe 14/and was mounted at son nations outside of Kaufman and he displayed it there was caught by the dam on a water dog in the winter time. Good lake but haven't. Been in years since selling my boats.

I was getting bit at what is identified as MC-2. As a matter of fact, it was the one place I WAS getting bit consistently, so I floated back and forth from the spillway (center of dam) down to and beyond this point about half a dozen times. By consistently, I mean 2 fish caught there, one miss, as I recall. It is still winter, after all, so this seemed pretty good to me. The other place was by the swim platform (first cast of the day).

Since I have no electronics (gonna remedy this very soon!), I didn't know what I was over I suppose. And, I hadn't refreshed my memory of the approximate locations before fishing there. But, you can see two others marked.

Hmm? Now, I really want to go back. If you go to the website, you can get the exact coordinates.

Bert would be a fun guy to have along; he really knows how to work his electronics from a kayak.

*** That'd be great identify all of the crappie piles, have those to fish, too.

Brad

Fish Attractors on MCR