Clinton Lake, Illinois?

[Bassbilly]

I have a club tournament on Clinton Lake, April 12-13. Anybody have experience on this lake in the spring? If the weather doesn't improve drastically it may be very cold and very muddy. It is a power plant lake, so that helps. Any tips?

[Scott C]

I'm not much of a largey fisherman (mostly stripe and crappie), but here are some spots that we normally get largemouth.  most of this, im sure you already know.....but:

water discharge = 40.171233,-88.771355

so i would stick to that side of the lake this early.  

there is a submerged roadbed near there with a bridge over the original creek channel at about 40.160706,-88.783607.  That make some nice cover.

if the whole water temp is up, the point and cove around 40.138859,-88.867571 has yeilded some fish before.  

also, this is the entrance to a cove that goes quite a ways back.  40.142078,-88.858463  there are a lot of trees, etc in there that will probably be holding fish.  

We have also had some success fishing the rocks north of the discharge where it goes to no wake.

good luck to ya!!  and don't be mad if my suggestions didn't pan out!!!   ;D

[Bassbilly]

This is great...thanks! I really appreciate the google map plots. That is really helpful. Anybody else have suggestions? Locations, Lures, Patterns?

[XbassmasterX]

just woundering where this is? what town I have not been there but I might live close to it and might go  ;D

thanks bassmaster

[IL_Bassman]

It's in Clinton, IL.

[Duma]

its about 40 miles west of champaign....

[Scott C]

so how'd you do?

not terribly nice weather for you....   :-/

[Bassbilly]

Dodged a bullet. Our club cancelled and rescheduled for April 26 & 27.

I would still love to hear any reports or tips for Clinton if you have them!

[Vitor Isaia]

Hello everyone! I'm new here, I live in Brazil and fish snook... I've introduced myself in the general forum... Is there a guide service or something in Clinton Lake, for bassfishing? I'm probably going to USA on September and I'll be in Champaign... and it would be great if I could fish there...

thanks a lot!

[Bassbilly]

Our rescheduled tournament was last weekend. It was tough. Cold front came through on Friday and dropped the temps 15 degrees and the wind was blowing 30 mph. On Sunday the wind wasn't as bad, but it was cold and rainy.

There were 6 boats and only 5 fish weighed each day (16 inch limit). I managed to catch 11 fish over both days and squeeked a keeper each day. A 2.80 on Saturday on a 3/8 ounce black/blue jig bumped over rip-rap in the Boondocks bay and a 3.85 on Sunday with a 3/8 chartreuse spinnerbait on my third cast in "Y Cove" on one of the points. Good enough for 3rd and 2nd place respectively and 1st place in the club overall after the weekend.

The 3.85 was also good enough for big bass ($60 and an extra 10 points). Not a bad weekend overall. Seemed like jigs were working well. Few guys caught fish on spinnerbaits and buzzbaits. I was a non-boater, so I was pretty happy with the way things turned out.