Smithville Lake Fishing Info

Smithville Lake is a 7,190 acre reservoir located just north of Kansas City. 2013 and 2014 provided stable to high water levels that helped increase aquatic vegetation in the lake producing great reproduction for each fish species. There are now several large year classes of fish coming through the system. Efforts continue every year to enhance the aquatic habitat in Smithville Lake, and excellent gizzard shad production has helped increase growth and should produce more legal size fish.

The Conservation Department made preparations for this great fishery starting in 1975 before the dam that made the lake was constructed.  Fisheries biologists began stocking Trimble Lake and numerous farm ponds that would be flooded by the 7,200-acre reservoir. When Smithville Lake was filled in October 1979, the fish had been growing and multiplying for years and were prime for the hook.

The result was a fishing boom that most local anglers still recall as “awesome.” Their memories include 30-pound five-fish limits of bass, and stringers of huge crappie.

The high water of the  flood of 1993 killed most of the lake’s vegetation, and an unknown protozoan killed off the large bass.  Shad hatches declined because the whole food pyramid was upended.  Fish that fed on young shad grew slowly and the lake was in trouble.  Time and hard work by the Missouri Department of Conservation have helped to restore the fishery. Shad hatches have improved since about 2000 and 2005 was one of the best fishing years in memory, with anglers stringing plenty of 11- to 13-inch crappie and bass tournament winners logging in limits that averaged almost 4 pounds a fish.

Fishing by the Numbers

Largemouth Bass – numbers at Smithville Lake are the highest they have been in nearly 20 years! Casting crankbaits, spinnerbaits, and plastics around existing selected habitat such as standing timber, brush piles, rocky points, and docks as well as around the newly installed habitat should produce some nice fish.

Limit is 6 per day and a possession limit of 12. Length limit is 15″

White Bass – fishing has been excellent and if you find the shad you will find the white bass. Try running crankbaits through busting schools of shad on the surface or off the main lake points.

Limit is 15 per day and a possession limit of 30. Length limits for White Bass is no more than 4 longer than 18″

Crappie – continue to be the focal point of Smithville Lake producing nice stringers of fish. Netting information from the fall of 2013 indicates that 60 percent of the white crappie were above the 9″ minimum. Black crappie numbers remained high but the size structure tended to run a little smaller. Fishing mall plastic jigs and minnows around the numerous brush piles and standing timber in the lake should produce some nice fish.

Limit is 15 per day and a possession limit of 30. Length limit is 9″