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Pinckneyville Lake by Don Dziedzina
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Okay, Pinckneyville Lake. I know it’s spelled correctly but pronouncing the name of this lake was a bit tricky.

I think that it’s PINC-KNEE-VILLE. It’s really hard for a guy with a Chicago accent to pronounce a name that has a southern twang to its pronunciation. The guys who I fish with down south have no problem with the name at all, and actually they prefer that it maintains to be one of southern Illinois’ secrets.

Well, so much for that I say. Pinckneyville Lake is located by South Lake Road and Rt. 127, a bit northwest of the town on Pinckneyville. This puts this beautiful, less than 200 acre lake about a half hour drive straight west of the Rend Lake Resort which is near I-57 and Exit 77 in Whittington, Illinois.

To get to Pinckneyville Lake, you can enjoy a nice country road drive west on Rt. 154 to Rt. 127 the a little bit north out of town.

Jason Johns of Todd Gessner Outdoors guide service (www.ToddGessnerOutdoors.com) took me to Pinckneyville Lake because it is one of favorite lakes to catch some bass.

It really is a scenic lake with only one or two homes on the water. Most others are set back off into the woods. The lake has bass, panfish and catfish. Since it is a small lake, it’s one where you can use a larger boat with an outboard, but at idle speed only.

Illinois DNR surveys of this lake have shown that that some bass have been captured up to twenty four inches long and there are great numbers of fish in the fifteen to nineteen inch class. This lake is a city reservoir and like many small towns in southern Illinois that have their own lakes, Pinckneyville uses this one for their source for water.

To describe the lake, it’s relatively long and narrow with nearly a dozen fingers that shoot out from the main lake. It angles northwest and southeast with the dam area on the south end being the deepest at about 33 feet. From about the middle of the lake and going north, all water is probably ten to 12 feet deep and less the further north you travel.

A nice concrete boat ramp and handicap fishing pier is located off South Lake Road, putting it at the south east portion of the lake. Launching there is free.

Johns and I fished War Eagle spinnerbaits and buzzbaits and just cleaned up on the bass fishing. It would be safe to say that we had non-stop action. Most fish did jump on the buzzbaits as conditions seemed to be just right. There was a slight breeze blowing to the east shore and in many locations we saw busting shad, telling us that the gamefish were feeding on them with a lot of enthusiasm.

Although I did very well with the buzzbaits, Johns spent more time throwing the War Eagle Screamin’ Eagle spinnerbait. This is one that weighs a half ounce but has the appearance and profile of a quarter ounce bait. This bait would run a bit deeper and he could work it slower, even slow rolling it near the bottom. He did well with this bait.

There is no doubt about it that without being able to fish with Johns, I would have never learned about this well kept secret of southern Illinois. This is why I always touch bases with the local tourism bureaus. I’m always talking with two of them, the Franklin County Tourism Bureau (www.FCTB.com) and the Williamson County Tourism Bureau (www.WCTB.org).

The tourism bureaus can help with lodging, dining and tourism attractions in their area. Now even though Pinckneyville Lake is in Perry County, these tourism bureaus can help you get hooked up with guides like Jason Johns and Todd Gessner Outdoors. There is no doubt about it that when we take weeklong or weekend vacations we want to get the most out of our leisure time. Fishing with a guide will put you on fish, teach you were to go and what to use right up front. Little time is wasted and for the rest of your trip you can enjoy fishing not searching.

With gas prices being as high as they are, travel to southern Illinois is really a bargain. Being only about four hours from Chicago’s south suburbs, I often choose the Rend Lake Resort (www.RendLakeResort.com) as my lodging destination because it is right on the shores of Rend Lake and many nearby waters that offer fantastic fishing like that at Pinckneyville Lake.

So whether you want to fish for bass, crappie, catfish, or stripers, southern Illinois offers a great variety of lakes and fishing opportunities. Let the tourism bureaus help you with your accommodations or contact the Rend Lake Resort. You can book guides trough the resort as well as rent a fishing boat or pontoon. Consider southern Illinois for your summer fishing vacation and give Pinckneyville Lake a try when you get down there. And when you do, you will agree that great fishing is not that far away.

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