Fishing Ray Roberts the first time this Saturday. I'm sticking to the west side of the lake between the dam and 3002 (Lone Oak Rd). I know there aren't boat lanes defined, but how bad are the main channels leading into the coves/creeks in terms of stumps and timber I should be aware of? When in doubt I'm idling, but I was hoping it wasn't as bad as the area between Wolf Island and 377.

Below the bridge, it's not bad and do-able until you get to any Hazard Poles. Mostly look out for LONG POINTS!!! they can get shallow, especially around Spring Creek.

This..and coming down from the bridge to the dam run more to the middle or left hand side to avoid some of those shallow areas and points...also as far as running into the creeks themselves use caution as some, especially on east side, that have timber just outside the mouths.

I am sure you will get better responses...this is just my take on it

Thanks guys. I've spent a few hours on the chart viewers and noticed the long points. I'll swing wide of them for sure. I'm sure I'll probably spend more time than I'd like idling, but I'd really prefer not to have to buy a new prop/prop shaft/lower unit.

Stumps, concrete, and all kinds of stuff in the circled area. If you don’t know the lanes into the creeks don’t go past the red marks on the map or telephone poles on pad. You’ll be fine, just remember she’s a couple of feet low so some of the shallow areas are VERY shallow right now. Love having that water level offset on my graph for that reason.

Awesome, thank you for this. I'll definitely be idling past those red lines. Hopefully after a few times out I'll get the lanes down.

do you have google earth pro? look through the timeline to see the low water times and you'll see lots of underwater features. ray bob is one of those lakes I despise cause it's tough.

Yep I've been doing that too, but I'm having a hard time telling how low the lake was when I go back. It does give me an idea of where the majority of timber is in the areas I'm looking to target.

might be able to google historical lake levels at certain years and correlate that with the google earth imaging.

You can do this.. to to tpwd, fishing ray roberts, lake level, period of record and you can find the exact level on an exact date...I do it all the time..

Long points a definite look out right now. I've never been on Ray Bob but with the lakes down right now I'm finding this everywhere I go. The shallow areas on the map just assume they are going to be to shallow to navigate with the big motor. They probably will be.