Hello October! Lake Allatoona Fishing Report October 16th 2026 -'The Bite'
Hello, October! It's good to see you again. Here on lovely Lake Allatoona, everything comes to life when there's a nip in the autumn air. Current water levels are right around 5 ft. below full pool, and steady afternoon generation is not uncommon this time of year. It's also helping to produce a great afternoon bite.
This past week, generation has been pretty steady, from 27 to 45 megawatts, starting around 4:00 p.m. The time is more important than the generation numbers, but it should be noted that moving water tends to trigger a better bite overall.
Try to always remember you're fishing a river that has been dammed up into a reservoir.
And the creeks—don't forget the creeks! So much is starting to happen in the backs of those creeks. Wink, wink. 😉
Your surface water temperatures range in the 70s and have fluctuated even this past week. On Sunday and Monday, I clocked 70° in Little River early a.m., with temps of 73° around Galt's at the same hour. We've had a couple of warmer evenings that have raised the surface temperature and even brought some afternoon temperatures back up into the high 70s. It was 76° mid-lake at 3:00 p.m. Thursday.
Here's the good news: We've got a front coming that's going to definitely put a little nip on that top layer of water. For all species, that's great news for you and me. :-)
Everything seems to be chewing pretty well this time of year. Naturally, all of the fish eat year-round. I even watched some gar playing in the flats and creek backs, chomping on threadfin and making their longnose presence known.
If you know me, you'll know I can make longnose jokes, but you can't—unless you really know me.
This week brought a cornucopia of species up on the boat, from the black basses to the striped bass, white bass, hybrid striped bass (a personal favorite), slabs of black and white crappie, bluegill and redears, channel cats, and blue cats. Dear other Mr. Fish, please forgive me if I forgot to mention you and yours.
There is no doubt that some frisky threadfin shad, gizzard shad, and herring have done most of the damage when fishing with guests, but we've also put it to them with small riser baits, spoons, jigs, and worms. If it was tied on a rod, we tossed it and caught on it.
The bait—everywhere! The last hatch and young-of-the-year threadfin are just a little over an inch long, and there are clouds and clouds and clouds of them from Allatoona Creek to the delta. Baby shad. Bobby Garland knows just what he was getting into. But even within a lot of these pods, you will find larger baits mixed in. I often note that they are on the outside edges and/or toward the bottom of the schools. The herring are there. Believe it or not, most of the deep bait that you'll notice 30 to 50 ft. down, prevalent from Stamp Creek to Little River, is still threadfin. Even micro-baits—and there are simply millions of them.
The Y.O.Y. herring are prevalent in a few spaces. They're even mixed in in some spaces, but for the most part, the high heat and low oxygen of this past summer were not conducive to many of the adults holding over, and I believe many simply perished. I catch a lot of bait fish: 500 to 1,000 a week just for fishing trips. It's hard to believe even when I say it, so don't feel bad for doubting me. But if you need proof, come on the boat with me for a fishing trip. I rarely show up to the dock without 150 to 200 baits, unless it's just one of those mornings when God is laughing at me and doesn't fill my nets until 20 minutes before pickup time. :-)
Even on those days, it seems I always have a little more than I need to get the job done, and I just set the other ones free.
Here's the thing: You're never going to catch me dragging around a half-alive bait fish for an open-water-column hybrid or striper. At that point, you might as well just cut the tail off and drag it around, bleeding on the bottom, with a likely better result.
Want some pro tips on catching bait? Me too! Seriously, though, for some of my website forum members, we spill a little of the secret sauce on bait and all species' behaviors. The top comes off even a little more on the upcoming subscription page.
Guess what, guys and gals? I pay a few anglers a few bucks a month for their subscription content. When I entered college, none of my books were free. I don't mind paying for the secret sauce. I'm thankful I don't have a Starbucks budget, but even if I did, I know the value of the secret sauce. Many of you who have been on a guided trip with me know that I will give up some of the goods as added value during our adventure.
So, downlining has definitely been a go-to for the linesides. Both striped bass and hybrid striped bass have been returning from the river. More of our striped bass likely make the trip up into cooler, oxygenated water, but they are overall deprived of an abundance of bait in the river. Not all of them go. Some of your major creeks tend to hold a lot of the stripers in the reservoir region year-round, and our hybrid striped bass overall seem to thrive in the oxygen-poor, high temperatures during the summer.
Don't you know that's one of the main things they were hybridized for? That, along with a good food source for many parts of the country.
So, you should be seeing a return of the skinny stripers and even some hybrids. If you're not, you will be if you're catching these next couple of weeks while they are still fattening up. We've been catching a lot of 22–26" striped bass and even some 20-in. class hybrid striped bass that are nearly emaciated at first look. There's nothing wrong with them, except they have not had an abundance of food for months while up the river. Now they have buffets all over. It may also be noted that they might prefer to nibble on the one- to three-inch baits while they stretch their stomachs. These same fish are going to be so plump by mid-November, and many even sooner.
Spotted bass—those rascals! I don't believe it was just me, and I'm fairly certain that the stricter green-fish anglers even had a little head-scratching going on for a few weeks while this transition started. Don't get me wrong—it's not like we couldn't catch one or two, but we spent a lot of time in the mornings especially looking at bass looking at us looking at them looking at us. Traditional techniques, even pitching light-line presentations of threadfin to them, just didn't seem to hit like they do for 10 months of the year. That all seemed to change in the past couple of weeks. When going with artificials, it's noted that you can catch plenty on a minnow imitation, but you can also put the hammer on them with creature baits starting now. I'm a simple kind of man—there are fish, and then there are creatures. We're talking crayfish, worms, snakes, frogs, salamanders, insects and larvae, birds, and mice. I'm sure I left some creatures out. The point is, they don't always just eat fish, and sometimes when they're on a creature bite, they might just be laughing at your fish/minnow presentation. I'm pretty sure that I'm one of their favorite clowns.
So, look—there's some great content and anglers to follow out there who really like to teach. If you really want to learn about black bass in the Georgia reservoirs, I highly recommend a trip with Bill Payne Guide Service or Jason Muhlbauer with The Fish School. (Please don't confuse the latter with “School of Fish,” which is one of my business trade names.) And naturally, when called upon, I am more than happy to get out for a morning or afternoon of straight bass angling.
Basically, we both tie on a white Mr. Twister and see who can catch the most fish. Now, wouldn't that be an interesting little tournament day?!
The crappie are chewing. They always chew. They eat all year long. I'm fairly convinced that they eat more in the summer than they do in the early spring, but I can't prove that, and it may not even be true. It's something I tell myself when I want to go chase crappie on a June-through-August day. Kind of like a confidence builder. Anyhoo, it seems to work. I tell myself almost the same thing this time of year.
So, truthfully, the crappie have still been on deep structure overall, but now they are found roaming in the channels. Imagine how excited we were the other day when fishing open channel. I was fairly confident I was looking at a school of 25 down over 35 F.O.W. I blurted out “Crappie!” like someone would proclaim “Cobia!” And don't you know that we instantly picked up a couple of 13-in. white crappie on some little Tenderoni shads? :-) They don't have much of an air bladder, and I could have easily mistaken them for a school of small gizzards. Except the gizzard schools tend to elude me in the reservoir. If every one of them was that size in that school, they could probably call themselves a wolf pack. :-) I am proud to say that they transformed into sandwiches. We even added a couple of blacks the same size during that day trip. All crappies taste the same in a sandwich, just in case you were wondering.
Kitty cats! Wow and wow. We have such a great population of channel catfish in the reservoir, and they have been truly showing out for us these past couple of weeks. I'm thinking we've had four over 8 lb. and one so close to 10 lb. that we're just going to say it was 10. They are not all like that, and there's plenty of 4- to 6-lb. fish to go around. Here's my tip on the kitties: mouths of creeks, long points, and 50 ft. down, even in the middle of nowhere. Cut bait. Herring. Cut herring. Yes, they will eat threadfin and gizzards, but a bag of frozen herring has been coming with me on almost every Adventure these past couple of weeks, just in case that's what we want to target for a little while.
Me—I love catfish. I love to catch them. I love to learn about them. I do even like to eat them on occasion. Fresh catfish are yummy to me, but not when they are fried in some restaurant fryer that has had shrimp, hush puppies, french fries, and you-name-it seasoning in the same grease for the past two months. I'm not knocking any one place in particular, but it was unfortunately one of my first catfish experiences here in the South that kept me from eating catfish for years, until I just one day decided to fillet a couple and do it myself. Again—yummy! :-)
Also, I have found that many of my guests over the years are a little intimidated by cleaning a catfish, and that's the main reason they just don't harvest any. If you can fillet a fish, you can fillet a catfish. You don't need to peel the skin off, and you don't need to be intimidated by it. For myself, after it has been properly dispatched, I do like to break off the sharp barbs of the dorsal and pectoral fins with my pliers. I keep custody of that sharp little arrow all the way to disposal. From there, I'm going to fillet it like any other fish, with the exception of where I may start with my first vertical cut. As their structure is a little different in the way the rib bones develop (Weberian apparatus and swim bladder shield), my first vertical cut is going to be behind that area, and then I'm just going to fillet like any other fish. Fillet off, and then use a knife to separate the meat from the skin.
Your next cut will simply be to cut out the lateral line/mud line. A sharp knife makes real short work of this. Just cut it out like a little strip. Now you have the fixings for some tasty catfish fillets. Yeah, they might be just a little different because they are just a very “advanced” design. They hear exceptionally well.
Their olfactory senses are superior. They taste delicious, if you're into eating fish and all that.
There are bream all over the banks still. All sizes and all species have still been noted right along the banks. When you get a really good view of the spotted bass hunting these, you'll never forget seeing it. It just seems that most of the time, the little bream are faster than the bass. :-) Then again, sometimes the bass are so fast that you see 30 bream scatter, but you didn't notice that three out of four spotted bass got them some candy.
I've been poking at some bream just because it brings me back to my childhood. While I like to keep some of the little fellas for bigger fish food, I also enjoy trying to trick the big, smart ones into eating my little red wiggler, mealworm, or cricket presentation.
I do a lot of kiss-and-release with fish, and these are no exception. Unless I'm hungry. When I'm hungry and I'm holding a potential delicious sandwich in the palm of my hand, well...that's the food chain for you.
My friends, that's all I've got for now. Please forgive any grammatical errors or dry humor. Or don't.
It's really early, and I'm going to strive to be better on the weekly report for everyone, not just Insiders. I love our fishing community, and I've always just wanted to see everyone catch fish.
For many of you who have graced me with your presence on a trip, you know that I do like to teach a little bit where I may. And yeah—here's another thanks for fishing with me! For many who are just out on their own adventure, I do hope this helps with your own self-service fishing trips.
For anyone wishing to come out on a full-service Adventure, just ring me up. I'm easy to reach directly at 404-919-4918, unless you're trying to call from 6:45 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. When I'm with guests on the water, my phone is pretty much off except for the camera.
I would also invite you to take a little peek at our website, heronoutdooradventures.com. Even if you're just taking a little peek and letting me know what you think, I appreciate you looking and providing feedback. I don't have a fancy website designer, social media guru, or marketing team. It's just me and my fishing pole and I'm saying, “Let's go fishing!” I do get by with a little help from my friends and family and your support.
And, of course, the good Lord, Who woke me up in a right mind with the breath of life once again this morning.
God bless us all, and tight lines, friends!
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