Brick

Fish On!

Hey bud. I fish the potomac regularly for smallmouth from a kayak. Where on the river are you? I might be able to give you some tips. My favorite lure for smallies would either be a 3-4 inch tube in a green, brown, or whitish grey color. You can drag em or swim them back with a constant twitching of the rod. I rig them texas style with a tube weight. I find without an external weight, they get snagged less. My second favorite would be a top water walk the dog style bait with a white or yellow belly. Don't be scared to use the same size ones you use for largemouths. A very close third would be a chatterbait with a a grub trailer. White works well in clear water, and chartreuse for stained water. If you are going for pure numbers, not necessarily size, a good old rooster tail will do the trick. Same colors as the chatterbait.

Went out today. Too windy for my canoe, but did manage a fish on a crankbait near the mouth of a cove. He was spitting up shad as I brought him in. Saw a guy pulling in a 3ish lber on a white spinnerbait on the main lake.

I don't catch many largemouths on tube baits around here, but the smallies love them.

Spooks of any size are my favorite smallmouth bait hands down. Some days they nail the fullsize, and others they prefer the Jr. They absolutely crush em on the Potomac. I too was told that I was using too big of a bait for river smallies by a friend. After hooking about 8 fish to my friends 0, he was asking if I had any extra spooks. lol. I've attached a few photos from that day.

d**n. Saw this too late. If you need someone in the future, let me know.

The males are preparing beds in small northern Virginia ponds/lakes. I've seen quite a few walking the shores.

How is the water clarity near fountainhead? I am limited to a canoe, and last time I went out near the soccer flats. The water was like coffee with a splash of cream.

The ponds in burke are off of burke lake road near the intersection of burke centre parkway/lee chapel. I forget the names of the roads they are off of, but you should be able to find them on google maps. If you are coming down burke lake from lake braddock high, the neighbohood is on the right after you cross the before mentio.ed intersection. I havent caught anything over 2 l s out of em, but i havent fished them hard either.

We aren't running wide open in a bass boat tick drunk on a crowded lake, or hitting class V rapids in a canoe. This stretch of the river is not exactly the Mississippi. My dog has actually swam almost this entire stretch next to my canoe with no issues. I believe that you are talking about the Jackson sir.

For size, Any walk the dog type top water for me. For numbers, rooster tail.

I do a canoe float trip down the James every year. It's northwest of Lynchburg through alpine, Glasgow, and balcony falls. Last year my tackle was left in a car that was driven to the take out. We camp on the side of the river the first night, and By the time i realized it, we were too drunk to make it back to the car. Let me say, I was highly disappointed in myself at first for this mistake, but **** happens. I had two 1/4 rooster tails to fish with for the three day trip. One white, and one dark yellow. I caught probably close to50 fish each day, and also had the biggest of the trip. this is more of a drinking trip than a fishing trip, so I wasn't even fishing that hard. I caught more fish than the other five boats combined. by the end of the trip the lures were so beat up they were unrecognizable, but they were still catching fish. Best spots were below riffles. Cast them across stream and reel em just fast enough to get the blades spinning. Let them swing down stream as they come back to the boat.

Thanks guys. I will be giving this a try this year.

Have you guys heard of anyone putting small pieces of alkaseltzer into these to produce bubbles? I was told by someone that this trick is killer. Gonna try it out and see what happens.

I use them on a scrounged and they produce nice fish for me. I use em almost anyway you can fish a spinnerbaits.

I was fishing in a small pond at a house I was watching and wasn't expecting to catch anything of size. The lady that owned the house mentioned that the guy that owned the house b4 caught and released a 10 lb bass into the pond from another body of water. Anyways, I hooked a 12 incher on a rooster tail on ultra light. I got it up to the dock when the monster came up and swallowed it. I fought him for a good 5 minutes before he spit the smaller bass out. It was insane.

I didn't fish but walked along bullrun yesterday. The water is much clearer than it was a week ago. Probably still cold though, and this snow ain't gonna help. I fish occoquan a lot and never catch smallmouths. I hear they are in there. Any tips for catching them would be appreciated. I crush them in the Potomac, but I guess I don't know how to target them in the res.

I grew up on lake Braddock. It is in bad need of a dredging right now. Areas that used to be 6 ft or more are now less than one foot. That being said, it has great shore access all the way around, and still has a good amount of bass in there. I used to catch monsters in there when I was younger though. If anybody asks you if you live there, tell them to mind their own business and keep on fishing.

Fished the occoquan river right under the dam. I caught several bass around 12", but nothing of size. Most were caught on soft plastics. Darker colors were working well. I heard the stripes were moving up in the river early, but they are not packed in there yet.

I know the rowers aren't going anywhere. My sister was actually on the lake braddock crew team the first year they had one. i just wish that they would respect others space on the reservoir, and I really don't think the bullhorns are a necessity for the coaches to be heard by the team in a boat 10 yards away.

someone should sue mann for calling their umbrella rig an alabama rig.

I love swimming a black and blue jig in the springtime in slightly stained to dirty water.

Oops. Here is the other pic. Also, how annoying are the crew teams to you other guys out there on the occ res? Can we start a petition to take away their bull horns, and make it so they can't practice 4 or 5 wide spanning across the entire reservoir? These coaches are teaching the kids some bad "water manners", and a couple of them sound like real a holes when they are out there screaming at the kids. It really is a nice peaceful reservoir when you don't have 6 crew coaches screaming into bullhorns within 1/4 mile of you.

Got out on the Occ. Res. today from about 1pm-7:30. Launched from fountainhead. Water temps 53-55. My buddy landed 3 early on, with the best being just under 2lbs. I landed two solid fish before 3:30 when the crew teams took over the reservoir. These are the two in the attached photos. But the real fun began about 30 minutes b4 dark when we ran into a large school of shad being pounded near the surface!! They were not hitting top water, but right below. I added 4 more fish in the 2-4 lb. range with a hard body swim bait, and my buddy added two more swimming a fluke in this 30 minute frenzy. Great day on the reservoir, and it looks good all week too.

If he just wants to get them out of there before they die so he can eat them. Put a split shot about 1 1/2 to 2 feet above a very small treble hook. Ball up some powerbait and throw it out. charteuse usually works good. If you would rather fish with lures, I'd go with a rapala 7g, rapala 7s, roostertails in various colors, pather martins, and maybe a rebel crawfish crankbait.