Jacobson Park

September 24, 2012: Jacobson has been added to the FINS program! I’m looking forward to trout fishing in town this winter!

August 2011

I’ve written some bad things about Jacobson, but there really are some big fish there.

I went fishing on the Kearney side last Sunday.  Throwing a  shakey-tail tube minnow, carolina rigged, I jigged across the bottom. on  the third throw, the line took off. It was a BIG fish, peeling line off  the drag while I reeled hard. Three minutes later, after two hard runs,  I finally saw a big, stout carp surface, flop, and take off again.   After five full minutes of fighting, and four serious runs, I got him up  to the shore. As I stepped toward him, he flopped and snapped the line.

It was 8 lb test braided fireline, tied with a palomar knot.  He  snapped it, lifted not even a third out of the water.  I guestimate 20  inches length, girth like a football, probably 15 pounds of fish.   This  falls into the top ten of fish fights I’ve had, and he was THE most  determined freshwater fish I’ve ever wrestled.

Folks have been leaving comments about bass caught early morning in  the 3-5 pound range in Jacobson Lake.  My opinion has shifted–it is a  challenging lake to fish, but there are definitely some big fish there.

April 12, 2009

Jacobson Park Lake, Lexington, KY

by John Kirkland

In writing about the small water of Central Kentucky, I try not to be  judgmental. Jacobson Park, for many living in Lexington, is the only  (apparent) public fishing available in town.  Lots and lots of people  fish this small impoundment.  I try not to judge, but in reality, this  lake is a mudhole.  Over-fished, over-silted, trash-filled, and just  generally slimey, Jacobson Lake offers poor fishing, and lots of it.

It is our only public lake, though (for the time being).  On a warm  Easter Sunday afternoon, I headed out, with at least a thousand others,  to the park to throw a line.  There was a surprising amount of action,  and I had to label the day “not bad”, especially given that it was in  town, and just after a long, cold winter.

At the far eastern side of the lake is the entrance to Camp Kearney, a  city-run day camp that occupies the back portion of Jacobson Park.   When camp is not in session , the public can access the shoreline  bounded by the camp on one side, and Lakeside Public Golf course on the  other.  There is a gravel and shot-rock causeway that extends from  Kearney to the golf course. This forms a small four or five acre pond  fed by a chain of lakes and ponds that runs through Andover Golf Course  (now there is some excellent urban fishing—if you know someone living  there nice enough to let you fish in their back yard.  More about that  in another column).  Though polluted by golf courses (don’t ever eat  anything out of here!), this pond offers consistent fishing with less  trash in the water.

On that April day, standing on the causeway, I was casting a  chartreuse roostertail just past a mat of weeds, near a small floating  dock.  Repeatedly, I hooked and landed small largemouth bass, 10 inches  and under.  Usually, one is lucky to catch a couple of stunted bluegill  or an eight inch channel cat at Jacobson.  This turned out to be a  pretty good trip, throwing a spinner on light tackle, and wrestling a  half-dozen little bass.

I never expect big things out of Jacobson, so it is nice when there  is at least a bit of a feeding frenzy going on there.  Not to mention,  65 and sunny is very nice in April.

I would come back a month later to test out my new sit on top kayak.   The kayak worked great, and even though a stiff wind challenged any  movement around the lake, I was able to cross the half-mile with little  trouble.  Fishing was very slow that day, but this trip was only a test  of the boat.  I caught one fair black crappie, “trolling” a crankbait as  the wind pushed me across the lake.

Jacobson Park Lake is located at Jacobson Park, off Richmond Road, on  the east side of Lexington.  Park hours vary with the seasons, but  there is a fishing jetty accessible at the entrance of Lakeside Golf  Course, and I haven’t noticed any posted hours there (night fishing for  catfish may be possible).  About two thirds of the lake is  shore-accessible. The lake across Richmond Road is a private lake—the  security there will eject trespassers.

UPDATE: May 14th, 2011

I hit Jacobson on a rainy afternoon, thinking that if the weather got  too bad, I’d just head home without being too far away.  After quickly  losing a roostertail to debris on the Camp Kearny side of the lake, I  switched to a creek chub in a sunfish pattern, and managed to land a  scrappy, fat little largemouth, about 10 inches.  After talking to some  others about their lures and strategies, I switched to a weedless  spinner rig with a fat black grub on it, and soon after caught a  half  decent 12 inch largemouth. This is the largest fish I’ve personally seen  come out of Jacobson, though I know there are bigger ones there. The weedless rig made all the difference.