General Fishing

My first time on this site! Has the catching started to heat up at Harlan? We got to the Lake one time last year and really liked it. Plan to come again within the next month.

welcome to the site.

Welcome aboard, Larry!

I know the walleye tournament there recently was fairly tough, haven’t heard much since. I used to fish down there quite a bit, now I hardly ever make it down there. Hopefully someone will chime in with some info.

Welcome to IDO Larry.

I heard a few reports from Harlan from over the weekend and it sounds like things are picking up a little bit in the walleye department down there. The Gov Cup tournament is this weekend and the results from that will tell a better story for you. I’m sure someone will post some updates this weekend.

How are these big storms affecting lake levels?

2.5 feet above full pool.

Harlan Water Level Data

Daryl Bauer
Fisheries Outreach Program Manager
Nebraska Game & Parks Commission
[email protected]
Bauer’s Barbs and Backlashes

OK. Middle of this coming week we plan to fish Harlan Res. I see on the bait shop website that white bass fishing is improving and catfishing is good. We hope to do some night fishing with lights and minnows. Probably just find an area with lots of fish showing on the graph? Is there an area that would be better for cats?

I would say to try netting some shad and keeping them as lively as possible and fishing them on the big drops. I’ve seen some real nice stringers of cats and walleyes both this time of year fishing the shad deeper on those drops, and right in the middle of the day too. Haven’t heard much about catfishing down there lately, but I would think that should be a good place to start.

Thanks. By drop offs I take it you mean near the channel? I didn’t find much in the way of drop offs when we worked the lake last year. Maybe we were looking in the wrong places…..

Yup, look at some of the drops on the north side of the lake. I know fish are caught around there this time of year. Some drops are better than other, and that may be what takes you the most time to figure out. Good luck–

Thanks!

No prob. I don’t know that I’m a lot of help, but sure would be curious as to how you do down there. I’ve been wanting to hit that lake again, but the fishing has been so good around here, it’s hard to leave.