Lake Guntersville Fishing Report Month of April

Lake Guntersville Fishing Report, Month of April 2026

April turned on, the bite was as good as it had been all year, the weather still gave you some heart burn as constant change was the theme and more change than normal. We went from hot to cold to windy and all in between the only thing missing was our normal rainfall that would normally cause lots of current and pull out the dead grass. This did cause some issues with the spawn as may of the normal bedding areas did not produce as the dead grass moved them to other areas to bed out.

The water temperature took a big swing upwards in a short amount of time, with warmer than normal temperatures pushing up the spawn causing a couple of really big waves of spawning fish, where they would normally be smaller groups and extending the spawn. This really changed the bite as we went from pre-spawn to spawn forcing you to slow down your baits go to dragging worms or jigs on the bottom to get bites. The bite was great as we had days with substantial numbers and lots of giant fish to help the fishing day for most of the month. As the month of April ended, we experienced the shad spawn much earlier than normal. The bass, however, were not as active during the shad spawn as normal as the bass were not physically healed enough to do the chasing they would have normally seen during the shad spawn.

April ended with an unusually early shad spawn, but bass were less active since they had not recovered enough to chase as usual.

May will bring the last of the shad spawn, it will be small and less active as it is about over, the bass will spread the lake enabling you to catch bass at several depths, but you will not see the big groups chasing we normally see. Baits will go from dragging to chase baits like swim jigs, crank baits, spinner baits; the key will be to fish were the fish are so identifying bait and taking advantage of the current will be really important. Be a searcher, keep your foot on the trolling motor and cover water, when you get bit slow down be thorough and you will reap the rewards!