A Brief Look at Lake Seminole

This weekend, the FLW Tour will make it’s third stop of the year and Lake Seminole will be the host.

A long time favorite fishery of those of us in the southeast, Lake Seminole is nevertheless not quite the big name as some of our other fisheries.

With that in mind, let’s take a quick look at this fishery and what we can likely expect over the weekend.

The Florida-Georgia Line

Lake Seminole was formed in 1952 by backing up both the Flint and Chattahoochee rivers to create 37,000 acres of prime bass real estate and sits right on the border of Georgia and Florida.

The shore line is littered with standing timber and underwater vegetation that holds big fish.

Occasionally, folks will venture offshore, but this is a lake that typically rewards a shallower approach as the myriad structures offer almost too many big bass options all along the shoreline.

The FLW Tour

While the FLW Costa Series has visited Lake Seminole quite a few times, the big show has not touched down there since 1996.

A big wildcard in this tournament is last year’s Hurricane Michael. The destruction to the surrounding areas and to the lake itself cannot be understated.

That storm literally changed the areas that can be fished and the way it can be fished. In several areas of the lake, it is being reported that grasses such as hydrilla have still not recovered.

Areas that were once covered in grass are now basically sandbars. Even anglers that are local to the lake, or at least now it well, are saying it’s a completely different body of water compared to prestorm.

Whatever we think we know about what and where to fish on the lake is pretty much out the window.

I think we can count on a few things though. First, because of the time of the year, both prespawn and spawning fish will be in play. Second, I think this is a big bass tournament.

It should be noted that Brett Hite won an Elite Series event on Seminole in March of 2014, and it took him 97 pounds to do it. Even though the face of the lake has changed, it still holds big fish.

My prediction is that the winner this weekend pulls in over 80 pounds.