Fishing Jim Chapman Lake/Cooper Lake?

Anyone have any advise on this lake?
Ive never been there and will be camping in early May at the state park.

wish you could have fished cooper in the 90's...

I was at school in Commerce in the late 90's and man Cooper was a fun lake. I fished it over Fork all the time. It had some huge bass in it!

I used to fish this lake a lot with Grumpy and have my best days ever on Cooper many years ago.
My best 5 went over 47 lbs if this tells you anything about the lake. Closest thing to Sugar lake to me is Cooper back in the early 90's. I have been fishing Fork exclusively since Cooper died and have still not had days like that, even when Fork was in it's peak.

What's the story with Cooper? I remember it never lived up to expectations and all of a sudden the largemouth fishing was considered dead. I know a few guides who started on Cooper and ended up at Fork.

What was the story? I've often wondered if all these years no one is fishing for largemouth and the fishery has recovered.... but haven't made a trip up there to see for myself

it was better than fork for years, esp during the spawn for DD's.

Yes, I would like to know what is happening now with Lake Cooper. We also fished it back in the 90's. I know they had issues with keeping the water at a constant level, but really didn't understand what killed the fishing off. Loved staying at Fishermans Landing, waiting for the lights to come on each morning for an alarm clock.

I think it evolved into a good hybrid/sand bass lake. Florida's seem to have a hard time assimilating with those two and sometimes I think TP&W could care less.

So can anyone give me advise on it now?

The Pressure killed Cooper

Biggest fish I've ever had on was at Cooper, about 17 or 18 years ago.

Coopers lake level fluctuates sometimes to the extreme. Also hybrids and sandbass will run larger bass out of the big water, fighting for dominance in the reservoir

Fish for hybrids and sand bass (period!)

I would prob run up the doctors creek arm of the lake and try there. Should be lots of bushes to fish

Seems like it's been full a good while now....lots of brush and grass got flooded. Seems impossible that there are no bass in it.

It's probably came back just no one wants to talk about it

I would like to think so, but based on what I've seen on the TFF if the fishing had improved, their would be a tournament circuit fishing it.

Thanks Doug.... I guess I'll have 5 days to figure the lake out. Surely I can find some fish.

If not.... The fam would love some good sand bass fishin!

When a lake like Cooper goes from 14 ft. low to 8 ft. high it ruins fishing. Even the sand bass and hybrid fishing has been bad. TPWD stocked over a million hybrids in the lake the last two years. We will see how this goes. LMB fishing in Cooper is bad. Plan on fishing for silver fish or crappie.

When a lake like Cooper goes from 14 ft. low to 8 ft. high it ruins fishing. Even the sand bass and hybrid fishing has been bad. TPWD stocked over a million hybrids in the lake the last two years. We will see how this goes. LMB fishing in Cooper is bad. Plan on fishing for silver fish or crappie. No telling what the lake level will be in May. Without rain it could be down 6 - 8 ft.

Bass fishing is pretty tough over there but they are still a few in there up river and shallow.

After this rain up river may not be the best bet so I would suggest the coves on the south side and fish shallow for the most part.

Also if you go up the river there is a old church site on the north side and there are a few humps just off the river that will be ok if the water is not to muddy.

It was a great lake back in the days.

Cooper is the only lake ive seen multiple catchable giant bass spawning on horizontal oak tree limbs up top in 30 foot of water along the river channel. evan, its full of road beds and tank dams. theres a good road going across the mouth of doctors. used to wear em out flipping the roadside bushes with a junebug tube.

What Senko said. I remember running the boat lanes and finding the creek channels that crossed them and jumping in them. Jigs and running a spinnerbait over fallen trees or limbs would dang near get your arm taken off! hahahaha.

Thank you Mark, Senko and Sinkey!

I'm not camping/fishing there until the first of May.
If it stays cold thru Feb and some in April they may still be in spawn.

I'll keep all info in mind. Thabks again!

look for silvers schooling around the timber line in the middle of the lake.

you can thank the corp of engineers for ruining the lake and fish populations. when it opened it had established hydrilla, well that went first, gone in 18 months. then came the lake draw downs every spring / spawning season. with the lack of shoreline grass when the rains and wind came it severly muddied the lake, again ruining any hopes of decent spawns. after a few seasons the bass population was decimated.

kind of sad, since the lake was highly touted as the next fork when it opened. could have been if it wasn't for the mismanagement.

if you cant find any bass get some shad and go fishing for blue cats. float over the humps and ridges in front of the dam.

That lake used to be fantastic, most lakes got through up and down cycles but this one reminds me of aqilla, once it took a cr@p it never really came back.

Fished it a bunch back when it opened and maybe for the next 5 years. Caught some great fish there and a whole bunch of 12-14 inch fish. When it first opened you could throw pretty much ANYTHING and get bit. 100 fish days were the norm. All pretty small though but fun to catch.

Camped at both state parks quite a bit and they were very nice. I don't remember what year it got bad but it happened real quick. Have not been back for several years.