approach this place??.though i had it all figured out till the rains put this lake 10+ feet over normal pool..now i have been there 3 times and have come up empty handed!!very fast current, lots of hang ups, bait fish by the millions!!!!!

Man i'd start by chunking fluks and swimbaits. I don't like using bait to much, but if artificials don't work, bait on a bobber. Chunk up and let it drift back by.

Think I'll go try a place like that out this afternoon.

12 foot surf rod...
6-8 oz weight...
8/0 circle hook...
and my rig!!!

L O P spillway is an excellent TROPHY FLATHEAD FISHERY!!!!

Cork n jig into the mouth of the dam.

Jerkbaits - get 'em down and then just let them drift with the current till something slurps 'em in.

..and thanks for the suggestions everyone cant wait to get out there again!!!

Castnet some of that baitfish and toss it out there!

What are you fishing for?

From your sig, I would guess catfish; nothing I can add to what has been said already.
If for white or striped bass, or some other preditor, I would agree with the others who mentioned jerkbaits, jig and cork, etc.

Where is that tailrace, by the way?

this is lake o the pines spillway out in east tx!the sig is a striper, but i really want to catch me a flathead, i have a feeling that there are some monsters in here!fishing here now is tough and have not really seen anything being pulled out of here the times i have went since they started releasing all that water!

Just use that rig I posted....Bring some big live perch.....scale one side of the perch....and toss it into the white water. If you dont get a bite in the swift water than let your rig drift down next to the wall! When LOP is releasing water like this BIG FLATHEADS swim up river from caddo.

I was there Sunday and the water was just that high. People sitting on the top step and getting their feat wet. I asked every one there what they were catching and no one was catching anything except some ladies down by the ramp using wrigglers and they only had a couple of small blue gill.
There is so much rip rap and just plain junk in the bottom of that water that most any sinker that hits bottom is going to get snagged up.
NO one was bottom fishing for cats. Most were drowning minners or throwing some kind of jig or bass lure.
I know the there are some big ones in there. The best I have done this year was a 10# blue on a hot dog.
The Shad are back so maybe the cats are there too. I have been fishing there off and on for 47 years and have never witnessed any big flatheads coming out of the spillway.
I sure would like to tough.

last time i was fishing the bottom out there, i caught some chain, and some old guy caught a brake pad...

Thats a shame....But if you fish that tailrace on bottom with live bait you will catch alot of flatheads

Here's a trick I learned years ago fishing the big dam up at lake Eufaula in OK.

Since the weight is usually the culprit in rip-rap hang ups, the idea is for it not to fall into and get wedged up in all the cracks and crannies of the rocks. So what you do is take you 6 or 8 good sized Since the weight is usually the culprit in rip-rap hang ups, the idea is for it not to fall into and get wedged up in all the cracks and crannies of the rocks. So what you do is take you 6 or 8 good sized crimp on (the long skinny kind) or slip on sinkers of your choice. String them together on a leader. Then pull the whole rig up inside a piece of tubing of some kind.. Make the tubing at least 12-18 inches long. put a swivel on the end. It's the same concept as this, but better.
The tubing allows it to lay on top of the rock piles instead of falling into them. Works quite well. Not 100%, but it vastly improves your odds of not hanging up.

Looks kinda silly...but who cares?

I think I know where I'll be going this weekend, at least to get some bait.