Closed Fishing Zone on Cherokee Lake Effective July 15

MORRISTOWN, Tenn. --- The Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency will continue its closed fishing zone for the protection of striped bass after a study showed the fish still concentrate in the area above Cherokee Dam during the summer months. The closure will be effect from July 15 through Sept. 15.

Last August, studies were conducted on striped bass use of a portion of Cherokee Lake that has been closed over the past decade to fishing from a boat during summer months.

In order to protect Cherokee Lake’s striped bass, TWRA enacted a 1,100 acre closed fishing zone adjacent to the dam in 2001. The zone is closed to fishing from boats from July 15 through September 15.

The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) began using an oxygen diffuser system just upstream of Cherokee Dam in the mid-90’s to improve dissolved oxygen levels in their tailwater releases. This system also created an ideal summer refuge for striped bass and by 2000, enough anglers had discovered the refuge that mortality due to catch and release fishing became an issue.

TVA installed a new diffuser system in 2005 and TWRA’s striped bass stocking strategy has been changed significantly in recent years. In response to these changes, TWRA biologists, with the help of local anglers, re-evaluated the zone during August 2010. The TWRA needed to determine the extent to which the refuge was being utilized by striped bass and how to best manage the refuge in the future.

“The study showed that striped bass were still using the refuge area,” said Bobby Wilson, TWRA’s chief of fisheries. “The fish were heavily concentrated in the area and catch and release during the summer months would continue to cause high mortality on the striped bass.”

Unless there are developments that change the refuge area, the summer closure will continue each year.

---TWRA---