Ok I'm going to go night fishing some starting this weekend. All I hear about is that the "ledges" are the place to be this time of the year on KY and Barkley Lakes. I know "ledges" are the drop offs into the old river channels. My questions are:

How do you pick the right spots?

How do you fish the area? Texas rig, Carolina, Jig and pig??? Spinner? Parallel to the ledge? From the bottom up or from the top down???

Are old feeder creek channels the same in big bays like Eddy Creek on Barkley Lake?

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=eddy+creek+Kentucky&hl=en&ll=37.015712,-88.023748&spn=0.053524,0.077162&safe=strict&client=firefox-a&gl=us&z=14&vpsrc=6

Should I go to where the old creek channel meets the old river channel?

I've beat the banks and fished some old road beds in Barkley. Now I want to learn to fish the ledges. I've chased the shad jumps at sunset and had good luck. This weekend I'll have 3 nights of fishing.

Basically needing some advise from the wise ones here on this site.

Deb if you have a little local insight I'd love to hear it.

If you have a good Sonar unit use it to find something different on a ledge. ( Structure on structure )

You can start by running parrell to the ledge throwing deep cranks to find active fish, when you do slow down and hit with Texas rigs, jig, drop shot, etc. Fish may be active enough to fish the crank baits the whole time. Try different things. Throw top to bottom then bottom to top, parrell, fast, slow. It all takes alot of time and experience to hit a pattern fast and make the constant changes to stick with the fish. Even then sometimes its hard to get bit. Dont expect to be overly successful fast.

Just saw you mentioned night fishing. depending on depths, fish will come up and hit a topwater if conditions are right. Maybe not be exact info your looking for but hopefully helps.

I have caught fish on a Carolina Rig but I always did best stroking a jig when fishing ledges. I do it a little different than most. I do a hook set every time instead of a slow stroke. I cast to the ledge, let jig sink to bottom, set the hook, let fall back until slack is in line. count to 3 and set hook again. Swing for the fence. I have out fished guides on Ky and Barkley doing it this way.

Kelley

Thanks guys. I did not do so good last weekend but I will give it a try again in a couple of weeks. There was not current at all last weekend and I think it hurt ledge fishing alot. I found a creek bend about 100 feet off shore. From the shore to the old creek channel was 6-8 feet deep, then dropped to 13 feet with a big brush pile, then dropped into the creek channel that was 25 feet. I fished it for 3 hours thinking for sure there were fish there. Caught 1 14". Really thought I had found the spot to be at.