Thanks on the fish. Yea, that was the 2nd best 5 weight I've ever had, had about a 1.5 lb more more at Ky Lake one year. I agree, it looks like they have been holding water at Cave Run in the late winter/early spring more so than other lakes in the area. I guess the outflow is adjusted based on streams/rivers further down, but it definitely creates challenges for us here. The problem, specifically for bass tournaments, is that when the lake is up >8-10 fow, it eliminates a ton of fishable water due to being over the banks and in the surrounding forest. Makes it just tough to find enough shallow water for the spring to even fish that's not crowded with 20 other boats. I would think, however, this would make for better spawning due to more cover/habitat available for the fish. It also eliminates some of the boat ramps from being usable, which only compounds the wait times at the ramps on the weekends.

On the bright side for this year:
On the KDFWR website, they have a new updated map of the gps coordinates for most of the old and new manmade cover via the habitat restoration project the last few years. Always like to have more areas to fish and lose a jig in!
They also have the 2015-2016 forecast for all of KY's waterways for fishing. Lastly, they have a link to the most recent lake population/creel survey data from 2014 that shows how cave runs muskie, bass, and crappie populations are doing good/excellent with little change in the white bass since the 2013 die off. They have a discussion on how the slot limit for bass has helped the overall size of fish, with a significant increase in size of fish in the >16" and >20" range. They also showed an overall decrease in bass <13" and they did not stock the fall of 2014 due to that information. Musky and bass were tied for the most sought after fish at cave run, with roughly 38-39% of anglers choosing one of them for their most common fished species.

Sorry about the biology stuff, but I like to see the information that the fisheries biologists use to make changes/regulations to help sustain a quality fishery.