Beaver Lake is the site of the FLW College Fishing National Championship set for April 19-21.

Twenty-five teams from across the country have competed in 20 qualifying events and fi ve conference championship tournaments, and the top five teams from each conference will compete for the title of national champion in this three-day event.

The University of Arkansas bass fishing team didn’t qualify for the championship.

Schools from the Southeastern Conference that did include Alabama, Auburn and LSU.

Student anglers can expect good fishing, said FLW pro angler Greg Bohannan of Rogers.

“The lake is fishing as well as its ever fished,” Bohannan said. “It’s been taking 18 to 22 pounds to win every weekend out here because our population of largemouths is really good right now. We’ve had extremely low water, but there has been some rain lately, so that has put some stain in the lake. That has made them a lot easier to catch. I think we will probably seesome record catches in our Walmart FLW Tour event this week.

“We are little bit behind on our spring, and the water temperature is still in the low to mid 50s,” Bohannan continued. “The fish really want to move up shallow to spawn. As soon as that water temperature gets right, the fish are going to move up and it will be a sight fishing bonanza. That’s possibly lining up to happen during this championship.

“In the clear water, you are going to see a lot finesse rigs,” Bohannan went on to say. “Shaky heads, finesse worms, small jigs, and dropshot rigs will be popular, but you will also see anglers catching them on crankbaits and spinnerbaits.

“Topwaters might start to play a factor in the next couple of weeks. It’s going to give the college anglers some options. If you want to power fish, you need to go up the rivers. If you want to finesse fish or fish for smallmouth, you want to go towards the dam, near the clear water. You can kind of pick your poison in this event here. There’s going to be a lot fish biting and the college anglers will probably be able to fi sh however they want to fi sh.”

Outdoor, Pages 8 on 04/11/2013