Southeast Nebraska reservoirs are refilling after the rains

Southeast Nebraska’s flood-control reservoirs are taking on water after a stretch of record rain. Daryl Bauer, fisheries outreach program manager, wrote in the Oct. 5, 2026, Nebraskaland Magazine that the long drought in that part of the state, including Omaha and Lincoln, is over. Reservoirs in the Salt Creek and Papillion Creek drainages were built to hold floodwater off the cities. Some of those lakes had dropped so far that there was little water left.

Bauer’s point for anglers is habitat. Low water shrinks fish populations. Rising water floods plants that grew on the exposed ground, and that flooded cover is productive for largemouth bass, crappie, bluegill, and in some cases northern pike. He writes that the populations will expand, and that the expansion is not overnight. Fish still have to spawn, grow, and recruit.

The same runoff can cut oxygen. Sediment, organic matter, and newly flooded plants raise oxygen demand, and Bauer says levels can sag enough for some fish to die. Cooler weather, wind, and sun make a severe kill less likely, and he says there is no reliable way to call it in advance. Restocking a refilled lake is the usual jump-start, on top of fish that reproduce on their own, but hatcheries have to plan months ahead. He writes that stockings will come, and that they may not come immediately. Where fish are available, a few adult transfers may be used. High water can also move unwanted fish and aquatic nuisance species out of creeks and private ponds into the reservoirs. The dams block that movement from going upstream.

For the fishing itself, he says high, dirty water pushes fish toward shore, cover, and any slightly clearer patch, out of current. Slow presentations tight to that cover are the approach he describes. The column runs with an aerial of Wagon Train Reservoir, full again, by Eric Fowler of Nebraskaland Magazine.

This is a The Gillnet news desk summary, not a reprint.

Source: Nebraskaland Magazine — It Rained, Now What? (Oct. 5, 2026).