Majni Says Good Bite Developing at Chickamauga

By Pete Robbins 

 

The Tennessee River has many rightfully famous impoundments, but in recent years serious bass anglers have repeatedly flocked to Lake Chickamauga to sample a lake at its apex. That reputation has been borne out in Big Bass Tour events. They’ve become a May staple, and you’d have to look back to 2016 to find a year when the top prize didn’t take at least a 9-pounder. That year it missed the mark by just .02 pounds. 

 

Since then it’s become a matter of how far over 9 you need to go to win. In both 2017 and 2024, the winner just missed double digits at 9.98. In several years (2018 and 2020) there have been three over 10 pounds. Once you catch a giant, that’s no guarantee that you’ll win top honors, or even top honors for that hour. The live leaderboard is your friend. 

 

That holds true for most hourly checks, too. The lake is chock full of 4- to 6-pounders, and strategically deployed any or all of them can earn a fine payday. 

 

Local pro Casey Majni said that it almost always takes at least an 8-pounder to win big bass honors in local tournaments, and sometimes they just show up randomly. “You’ll be catching 4- and 5-pounders and there will be a big one mixed up in the school,” he said. “it could be an 8, or it could be a 10 or even an 11.” 

 

Many of them come on finesse presentations like dropshots and shakey heads, but if he was going to target them now he’d start with a crankbait like a Berkley Dredger 15 or 20.5. Shad colors, plus Kentucky Blue and chartreuse with a powder blue back would all be on the deck to gauge the preference of the bass on that particular day. 

 

“I’d focus offshore, especially early in the day,” he said. “I like the lower end, from Harrison Bay to the dam.” He’d look for fish in the 10 to 20 foot range, in places with “little points or indentions or flats with a defined creek channel.” 

 

If the school fires quickly and then stops biting, he’ll switch to a flutter spoon to get them going again, or a Berkley football jig or drip minnow to pick off more lethargic fish. 

 

“I want to milk the school for what it’s got and then go to another school,” he explained. 

 

Because of the late-arriving warm weather, not all of the fish have moved offshore yet. 

 

“There are still some late bedders,” Majni said. “They could be anywhere on the lake but I’d look at shallow pockets right off the channel. The baits I like are a Berkley Creature Hawg with a ½ ounce weight, a wacky-rigged General in multiple colors, and a dropshot with a 3-inch minnow, something that I can see, keep it hovering over the bed until they eat it.” 

 

There should also be an early morning shad spawn, most notably in marinas. In those areas Majni would use a Berkley Cull Shad (both the prerigged and unrigged version) as well as a Berkley Cane Walker topwater. 

 

He’d spend the majority of practice graphing, looking for offshore schools but not setting the hook, because Chickamauga fish are already educated, and getting more so every day. 

 

“I don’t catch them until tournament day,” he concluded. “And then I catch every single one.”