Alabama is blessed when it comes to bass fishing. Rivers, lakes, reservoirs and ponds dot our landscape, and just about anything larger than a mud puddle harbors the green fish prized in our corner of the world.

Logan Martin Lake gives up a large number of bass like the one that Mike Jones is showing off here. Photo by Anthony Campbell.

Even so, some waterways are in a class by themselves, even in Alabama. To find out the whereabouts of the premium waters, we spoke to Damon Lee Abernathy, fisheries development coordinator for the Division of Wildlife and Freshwater Fisheries of the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources.

Abernathy is in charge of the annually-published report of the state's popular Bass Anglers Information Team -- "B.A.I.T." Cooperating bass clubs submit tournament data for waterways all over the state, and those data are then used to rank the lakes for bass fishing.

The B.A.I.T. report is a handy guide to anyone who cares about bass fishing, since it provides in-depth detail on the ups and downs of tournament fishermen working waters around the state.

The data used in this story came from the 2007 B.A.I.T. report. A new report is due out in late spring of 2009 depicting 2008 data. The reports are available online from the DCNR Web site at www.outdooralabama. com.

One thing jumped out from the 2007 report: The reservoirs along the Tennessee and Coosa rivers are offering better bass fishing than just about anywhere else. According to Abernathy, both river systems are highly fertile, so it's only natural to expect such waters to produce better fishing than do less fertile lakes.

That in mind, let's look at a half-dozen reservoirs around the state that are considered topnotch fisheries.

ALICEVILLE LAKE
Best of the Best
Aliceville Lake, long considered a top destination for crappie fishing, has been off the radar when it comes to bass fishing, Abernathy stated -- yet in 2007 it ranked No. 1 out of all Alabama lakes for overall quality of bass fishing.

The impoundment ranked No. 1 in bass per day per angler at 4.31 and pounds per angler per day with 8.6, No. 2 in least hours needed to catch a bass of more than 5 pounds at 124, and No. 3 in angler success with nearly 90 percent of tournament anglers catching at least one fish per day.

Covering about 8,300 acres on the Tenn-Tom Waterway in west-central Alabama at the Mississippi border, The lake Aliceville has been described as a pond with a ditch running through the middle of it, and Abernathy agreed with that as a good description of the shallow lake. It has dropoffs along the old river channel, aquatic plants and standing timber, and just about any cover an angler could want.

"Aliceville is always a good lake in our B.A.I.T. rankings and it still is," Abernathy said. "It doesn't get a lot of press because of its location, and because there aren't a lot of accommodations for hosting big-name tournaments."

That second item provides an explanation for fewer tournament reports than the biologists would like being received from Aliceville -- but the ones they do get are generally from good tournaments. "There are a lot of hyacinths in this lake, and fishermen who enjoy flipping the hyacinths just love it," Abernathy said. "It's an excellent lake."