The lake is on friggin' fire.  Everybody is catching fish.  The creeks on the north side are producing the biggest fish, but there are plenty of fish in the main lake and south creeks.  The spawn is over.  The fish I caught today all hit hard.  They all looked like that could use a meal.   Lots of blow-ups in the pads and scum.  Caught 10 bass today in a just a few hours, with many more strikes.  Water temp in the low 70's.  Water clarity only a foot or two in the creeks, a few more in the main body.  

For you guys in the Richmond area, take a drive down, rent a boat from Ed Allens, bring lots of plastics.  You will have a ball.

How big were the fish?

Nothing real big, but plenty of fish. I posted pics of some of the bass here:

http://www.bassresource.com/bass_fishing_forums/YaBB.pl?num=1242174390

They were all in this size range.

Great news.

May try to take my boat and go next week.  

do they rent out jon boats from ed allens?  and is this lake able to be fished by a canoe?

Yes and Yes.

Although you will paddle your tail off in a canoe.  

do they rent out jon boats from ed allens? and is this lake able to be fished by a canoe?

Yes, Ed's rents boats.  They rent jons with both 6hp gas motors and electric trolling motors.  

The lake can be fished by canoe, but IMO a gas powered jon is better if you launch from Ed's main ramp.  It's a relatively big lake, by eastern Virginia standards.  If possible, I wouldn't launch a canoe out of Eds main boat ramp since you'd have to paddle so far to get to the good spots.  I would go to the campground and launch right into Johnson creek.  There's a ramp there, and I've seen campers launch there.   They will probably charge you a launch fee to put out there.  That's OK, though.  Launching there would put you in one of the best spots on the lake.  It is VERY canoeable if you put out there.

The river is not quite so good, or at least it wasn't last week. Between fishing Thursday afternoon and pretty much all day on Saturday I caught a total of three for a weight of about 4 lbs. The only thing I could say worked at all was lipless cranks in grass--where you can find grass. However, there was a tournament ran out of River's Rest where the winning weight was something over 14lbs. So perhaps it was simply my incompetence.

I went back out again today. Did just as good as yesterday. I post a few new pics in the thread-link above.

I'm not fishing tomorrow.  I want to go see the new Star Trek movie.  

looking at heading out sometime this week, how much does a rental out of eds allen cost for the day?  and if you feel inclined to tell a new guy where the good spots are feel free

Check Ed. Allen's web site for details on boat rentals, etc.

and if you feel inclined to tell a new guy where the good spots are feel free

There is no one good spot.  The whole lake is good.  Fish along weedlines and lilies close to weedlines.  I didn't catch much in the lilies out in open water or around cypress trees.  Throw your lure into pockets in the weedline and along the lilies.

There is not a whole lot of assessible hard shoreline.  There is some on the southside of the lake, and some up the creeks near the campground.  These can be productive, too.  There is usually deeper water near this hard shorline.

Last time I rented it was either $34 or $36 without a trolling motor.

how many hours did your rental go for?