Finding the Thermocline

Finding the Thermocline In a post about Rough River, the poster was told to find the Thermocline but he replied that his fish finder was old and didn't show the thermolcline. It is really not necessary to find the actual Thermocline or its real depth, all you(we) really need to know is the DEPTH OF THE LAKE BELOW WHICH THERE IS LITTLE OR NO OXYGEN.

Fish, like people, need oxygen to live and they will not stay in a part of the lake that has little or no oxygen. They will always stay at or above the level (depth) that holds as least 2 parts of Dissolve Oxygen. At least that is my figure but I have read that they must have 3 parts and even 4 parts Dissolved Oxygen to stay in an area.

In the Summer time, before I go fishing on any local lake I always check the Louisville Corps of Engineer site for that lake and get their reading of LAKE TEMPERATURES.

Click on that link and you will get the Louisville District Daily Lake Reports. Go down the left side and click on the BLUE name of the lake you want to fish, e.g. Rough River Lake. That will get you to the COE page for that lake, go down towards the middle and you will see a line that says: LAKE LEVELS and LAKE TEMPERATURES, click on LAKE TEMPERATURES and you will get a page with a lot of graphs but to get an better and easier listing click on the line at the top that says CLICK HERE TO SEE RAW DATA . . . . That will take you to a page that says WATER QUALITY DATA FOR ROUGH RIVER LAKE. Below that will be a listing of depths showing the temperatures and disolved oxygen level for each depth.

The most current listing is 07/09/2012, which for my purpose is good enough since it has been hot and relatively dry since then. I look down the list and find that below 19 feet there is less than 3 parts oxygen and so when I go fishing I figure that fish are above 19 feet and I fish above that depth and don't fish anything deeper than 19 feet. Now, these readings are taken at or close to the dam but I figure that in other parts of the lake, the fish will be at or above 19 feet also.

I hope this helps you to find fish and not have to fool with your depth finder all the time.

More ways to find Thermocline in the forum:
http://www.fishin.com/forums2/showth...he-Thermocline

by Grumpy