Louisiana Trophy Bass Lake on the Rebound

My sister sent me this link of Facebook. It's a story about Caney Lake near Jonesboro, Louisiana. This Lake was impounded in the late 80's and is around 7500 acres. In the mid to late 90's produced 4 state record LMB's ranging from the 14's to mid 15 pound range. It was well on the way to giving Lake Fork a run for its money until the state decided to do weed control with sterile grass carp. They severely over stocked it and the lake was plucked clean of all vegetation effectively killing the growth of trophy bass in this lake.The past few years the carp have hit their maximum life expectancy and have started dying off and the lake has recovered. It is a very beautiful piece of water, usually very clear and surounded by pine hills on sandy red clay based soil. If your just looking for something different to fish that has the potential to produce some really nice trophy bass this may be your lake.......
http://www.louisianasportsman.com/details.php?id=7999

awesome story on that link!

That's awesome. Did those carp not reproduce?

Wish I knew someone that had a place there

That's a great story and a beautiful bass.

Bissett, I've read before that they put sterile carp in lakes to control the grass, at least that's what I've seen in Texas. I've also seen people that don't believe the carp are sterile because the population increases significantly and all the grass disappears. Not sure if TPWD mixes some non-sterile carp in or what, but some people are skeptical that the fish are sterile. Either that, or they put too many in the lake to control the grass.

Since this took place in Louisiana, I know even less about using carp to control grass. The OP said they ate all the grass in this lake, but it appears they never reproduced, so maybe they figured out the sterilization part over there.

I also heard of another 13 out of it this year already

That's awesome.. Mudd, we fishing sunday? lol

I have a good friend that lives in the N.E. part of La and he always tells me stories of the glory days of a lot of the La lakes saying "we could load the boat with 5 pounders" back then, but now its hard to catch a fish. This guy is a bass fisherman, but also eats every legal fish he can get, and from what I hear La has a 10 fish limit. My friend also blames the decline in fishing to "too many tournaments" lolol,, we argue a lot because he absolutely don't think taking all those 5 pounders all that time has 0 to do with the lakes declining. I have met a lot of La guys in the past few years, and it seems waay more of them keep everything thay catch.

I used to live on this lake in the 90's, my parents had a camp in the state park arm of the lake. I think this lake is a sleeper cell waiting to bust loose and produce some true monsters. It has several chicken house operations around it and those have a tendacy to raise the nitrogen levels in the lake. It need weed control because of this. The state just over did it. If you google earth this lake you can see the vegetation coming back in the northern reaches of this lake. I fished it when it still had green timber in it, catching 30 to 50 bass out of it on most trips. I think my biggest was around 6 pounds.......could there be a new Louisiana state record lurking in its depths? I think it is very possible. New world record? With the environment this lake has I wouldn't rule it out. It has all the makings of the perfect storm for monster bass and as it recovers who knows what is liable to come from it's depths........ And yes this is the second 13+ pounder this spring......

Awesome fish!

I use to hunt all around this lake in the late 70's early 80's we used to ride 3 wheelers all around the east side of the lake and in it before it was dammed up, we used to swim in the blue hole where u could jump off the ledge about 10-15'high and be only bout 5-6' from the edge and it was 50'+ deep It was kinda L-Shaped best I remember and the water was ocean blue and clearest water I've ever seen.

We use to set out Yo-yo's and catch crappie and when we would bait up the one in the front the one in the back of the boat would go off couldn't keep them yo-yo's baited fast enough.
we bought a lot on the lake in the early 80's, They dammed the lake in 1986 and it was at full pool in 1989.
was looking at some old pictures of the monthly board at browns landing of the size of all the big bass that was caught and weighed and as early as 1992 they were catching 10-12lbers and in 1993-94 it exploded with the 13-15lbers with the state record being caught in 1994 at 15.97lbs.
its good to see the lake grass coming back and (2) 13lbers caught from it this year so far. may have to take a trip to it later this year.

I have a cousin who will straight MURDER you on Caney. He has two DD out of there so far. Those carp didn't die, they got caught by my kinfolk and eaten.

We used to do a lot of yo-yo fishing too as well as trotlines. I stretched a trotline across the bar pit holes in the lake where they dug out the dirt for the dam; had to suspend it because there was nothing to tie off to, and on the very first run I caught 9 blue cat ranging from 9 to 22 pounds. We caught a lot more right behind our camp as well on trotlines. We used to catch crappie like crazy too, frequently limiting out. My dad was a die hard bluegill fisherman and when they would bed up we'd catch them by the 100's with lots of shell crackers or as we referred to them chinquapin bream. Those things would rival most large size crappie in that lake....All the state record LMB's were caught at and around the time I moved to Texas. I kind of missed out on the prime times of this lake which I believe are in the process of returning. I knew it going to be an awesome body of water even in its early days when the green timber was dying off I was already deep cranking 5 and 6 pounders out of it. I had some of the first pics on the wall @ Brown's Landing. You could easily find a school of under slot fish back then and catch them until your arms gave out on pretty much anything you wanted to throw......
I loved that lake and hope to retire there and maybe do some guiding once I've been back at it a while.

Used to take turns riding the mower along the lake while the other one would shoot carp! Once they are all the grass they would dang near swarm after grass clippings on the bank!! Glad to see that lake rebounding. Fished it in the early 90s

Possible state record in it. I know from shocking on another lake that there is a state record in it still alive. Lives in same spot still.

If it wasn't so far to haul my boat I would fish there a bunch, just go during hunting season now. I normally cast off my boat dock each afternoon I'm there hunting, but never catch anything.

Lmk when u here Brad and I bring the boat over

If it's killing wildlife or sucking the sysytem for welfare, those people from the great state Louisiana are always overdoing it....

I'll take you up on that, your welcome to stay at my camp have covered parking for the boat. Ramps just around the corner.

Awesome. I've never fished there but want to

I use to bass fish it with my uncle, but that was 17-18 years ago. We can make a weekend of it my camp is nothing special, but it does the job.

Nothing special needed go fishing. Lol