General Information
Harvey County East Park has excellent fishing opportunities. The lake is roughly 320 acres in surface area. Fish species include channel catfish, white crappie, largemouth bass, saugeye, white bass, and sunfish. The lake and park is located 7 miles east of Newton on First Street, 1/4 mile north on East Lake Road.
Fish size at this lake is usually very good with high numbers of fish per acre as well.
Fishing Spots
East Lake can be divided into two parts. The first I will call the "West" side. It is the side on the West of NE Lake Road. The East side is east of NE Lake Road. The road divides the lake, although there is a large culvert that boats can pass through to access each side of the lake.
West Side
The Western side of the lake has a boat ramp and a parking area. On the map to the left you can see a creek running into the lake. The creek, when it has water, can be a good area to find crappie during the spawn in spring, as well as a good spot to find catfish and bass (largemouth and white bass). Minnows have worked best for me in this spot the last 5 years.
The shallow area on the far north end, past the creek, is a great channel cat spot if you have a small boat to get in there. During times of drought this area is usually around 1 foot deep. Using dip bait on fishing poles, or bank poles with cut shad or perch, you can catch some nice channels in this area.
Between the boat ramp and the creek, you can find shad during March, April, and early May. With a small cast net you can get a decent amount of shad off the bank to use for cut bait.
During the spring when the crappie are spawning, this is a prime area to catch some large crappie. Fishing with minnows or jigs with crappie nibbles has proven year after year to be an effective method for catching crappie on this part of the lake. For other species of fish, using minnows or nightcrawlers on this end of the lake is
If you are fishing from a boat on this side be cautious. There are a lot of submerged logs and trees sticking out of the water on this side of the lake. Remember to wear your life jacket and have all necessary safety equipment in your boat according to state regulations.
East Side
The Eastern part of the lake is much larger than the Western part and has a great deal more open water. This side would be ideal for trolling for saugeye, crappie, or white bass. This side has deeper water than that of the West. Fishing the drop-offs can be productive for channel cats using dip baits or cut/live bait.
On the map to the left you will notice this "half" of the lake has a designated route for personal water craft for those that are boating or water-skiing. I tend to avoid this area when fishing just because of the traffic that area sees. If no one is in there boating it might be ok to fish in that area. You can also see that the map shows some underwater trees just off Needle Point. Fishing for catfish from a boat or the bank can be good near this structure.
*I did not create this map. These are screenshots of the map available to the public on www.harveycounty.com.
*I did not create this map. These are screenshots of the map available to the public on www.harveycounty.com.
