I went to a local lake last weekend we fished the lower end of the lake and the water temps were in the mid 40's.

We went back to the same lake this weekend and went to the North and Northwest side of the lake expecting to see water temps in the high 40's.

We arrived at our destination and the water temp was in the high 30's.

We ran back to the lower end of the lake and the warmest water we could find was at the dam and was in the mid 40's.

I was always told that the warmest water in any given body of water this time of year would be at the upper end, on the South facing banks.

Thanks for your replies!!!

Maybe it had something to do with the wind blowing the warmer surface water to that end of the lake.

Is one side of the lake mudddy while the other side is clear or lots of vegetation and little vegetation?

I find that in bass fishing all of the general rules are valid

except when their not.  :-?

Well Bud,

   There are few things to take into consideration when looking for certain water temps in the winter, the most important thing is the bottom content in the area. First off a sandy bottom content will warm the fastest with direct sunlight but once the sun sets it loses that warmth the fastest. Sand does not hold heat well although it does reflect the rays from the sun and warm the water quickly. These areas tend to hold bass fairly well in the cold months during sunny days.

  Another thing to look for is the areas with a dark bottom that is caused by dead vegetation once the vegetation is fully dead, key word being fully, this is because dying vegetation absorbs oxygen from the water. These areas attract fish first in the spring and can do a fair job of holding fish throughout the year if the area is protected and sheltered. the dark bottom content warms fast and holds the heat the best. other bottom contents do different things and it is up to you to determine how the bass react to the bottom contents in your lake, these are just base rules to follow and with varying differences in bottom content come different temps in the water.

 Another important factor is how sheltered this area is from the wind and how much direct sunlight it gets. If you can combine all of these factors you can catch bass in 6 inches of water in late january, I know i have and I arget these areas in the winter.

Good luck and do more catching than fishing,

Peter

I second what Avid said

As I'm sure you know, the lower end of a lake is normally cooler because of its "greater depth"

(slower temperature dilution) and "clearer water" (reduced solar gain). The clearer water and lighter colored soil near the dam are the result of advanced sedimentation.

Two conditions can skew this convention however: a "turbid feeder creek" near the dam, but more commonly and efficiently, the "current wind pattern". A persistent wind coming off the upper end of the reservoir will literally blow the warm upper layer (epilimnion) across the lake. When the warm upper layer clashes with the shore at the lower end, it is literally turned under. The lake behaves like a giant waterwheel, where the cooler water underneath is moving in the direction opposite to the warmer layer on top. Consequently, the cooler deeper water is ultimately forced to the surface by the bottom contour

of the lake at the upper end. The result is cooler water at the upper end of the impoundment

and warmer water in the lower end. By the way, that's a great observation on your part.

When one mentions a sandy bottom, the key is the hardness versus the softest,  Sand will not asorb heat as fast as mud.    

Darren, I believe that rule is true for when bass spawn, the first areas will always be in the North/North west areas because they recieve the most direct sunshine throughout the day.

Problem is the sun is to far away from our hemisphere and only lasts for 10.5 hrs versus the 13.5 of darkness.  By the end of Jan., according to the new sunrise and sunset tables, we will have 11.5 hours of sunshine and only 12.5 ours of dark, as the sun is nearing and the days get longer, those areas will start to show the heat absorbtion faster than the rest of the lake.  

Thanks for the replies!!!

After reading what you guys had to say I went back and looked at my maps and the lake itself.

The areas I went to were on the northwest side of the lake but, because of the sun being in the southern hemisphere those coves and points are not recieving the sunlight that I assumed that they would.

The bottom composition is this lake is predominently sandstone.

Also, we have had a fairly strong west wind which would blow the water towards the dam.

I really have learned a lot over the past couple of weeks being on the water!!

This whole temp thing is a puzzle on a whole bunch of lakes. The info passed here has been great and I had to stop and do a little digging before I would send this. When you are working with some of the temps you were talking it would have been good to know the ambient air temps you had been experiencing. A few days with very cold temps and steady wind can really screw a lake up when it is at certain temp points more so than at others. It has been mentioned that the top layer of the lake can actually be cooled enough by the air temps to do a wind current driven convection current against a bluff wall. A couple of things need to be remembered. Number one if indeed a convection current of sorts has been set up what goes down will come up some where in that lake. So if you have a wind aided convection current sinking on one side of the lake there should be a corresponding upwelling of at least marginally warmer water maybe across the lake, but there has to be some corresponding action to the low found on one area. Even a small lift in temps in an area under conditions such as you describe can trigger some fish in that area to be active.

Also keep in mind that water is at its densest point at I believe 36.9 degrees and at certain times of the year this temp point induced sinking of surface water cooled by the air above it can create what could be refered to as micro convection currents in a lake. Too much of this and you get what many of us experience in the spring and fall as lake turnover and you don't want that. Seems to really mess up the fishing until the water restratifies again. It is conceivable that you have some warmer water pockets in the lake that you are not seeing. I carry most of the time one of the old Color Selectors with the probe on the end of a 50 foot cable that will along with other things tell you what the temps are down to that depth. I am guessing you had some warmer areas in your water you just were ot able to find them with your boat mounted temp indicator as you were getting only surface localized readings.

In conditions such as you describe you can either stay home or play detective a little more and you might find some fish not put off by the surface chill.