Lakes of the Kisatchie

Knowing that my days on the water will be limited once the baby arrives, I spent a day in the Kisatchie National Forest looking for largemouth bass. Normally if I wanted to do some bass fishing I’d prefer to spend my time on a river, catching spotted bass until I was flat wore out. On this day, however, I was going for a home run, looking for an above average bass. I had never laid eyes on any of the lakes in the Kisatchie, much less fished them, but I had good reason to believe there were some nice bass in at least one of the lakes I fished.

Upon arrival the lake was as I expected – empty. The water was crystal clear, the entire lake bottom covered in grass, deeper toward the dam, covered in lilies on the shallow end. I wish I could tell you fishing was spectacular, but it wasn’t. I caught two, both around 12″, a disappointing result when you drive 2.5 hours. Still, the lake was beautiful, one of the nicest I’ve seen in Louisiana.

I had time to head to another lake that was the site of an old timber mill 100 years ago. It wasn’t as nice as the previous lake, it looked like who ever managed the lake had been doing a lot of work clearing brush around the lake’s shoreline – not sure if that is the best thing from a fishery perspective.  This lake also had a shallow end covered in lily pads though these lilies were much bigger. I pulled three bass out of this lake with the biggest going 13″. In both lakes the bass were caught in the shallow end swimming a bait along a grass edge or popping a topwater next to the lilies.

I went for the home run, looking for big bass in distant lakes, but all I could muster was a bloop single. I did enjoy scouting an area of Louisiana that actually has some elevation to it though. It was a nice change of pace with a drive time similar to that of Grand Isle to Baton Rouge – not like I haven’t done that in a day.