Swamp Girl

You could stash a dachshund puppy or two in her mouth! It's been my experience that Maine bass don't grow to be 28" long or anything near that. They do grow guts and shoulders though.

Pretty much what I fished too. ML spinning with 6 lb. test. I also fished rocky lakes and so I cut off the first five feet or so and retied every afternoon. That is a gorgeous photo and fish. It's gilded!

I'm afraid of this article. I already own more lures than I can ever use. 😉

When I fished smallmouth, 6 lb. test was plenty stout enough. Like you, Tom, I fish heavier line (20 lb. braid) today simply because I'm fishing in weeds for lmb.

Go get 'em, tiger!!!!

My problem isn't hooking them. It's that the lures break after ten or twenty bass.

So true. Bigger doesn't always mean better (fight).

River smallies are berserkers. You'll be fighting a brown bass in current, thinking you have a trophy, and it's 14 inches. Bruce Banner shouldn't turn green. He should turn brown. I've caught enough 40"+ pike on six-pound line while fishing for smallies to agree. Big run and done.

Tim's muskies have me thinking that it would be sacrilegious for anyone else to wear the Jeremiah Johnson hat. A hundred years from now, when Tim's legend has grown to the size of his biggest muskies, there will be people who'll say, pointing to one of his dark lakes, "Some say he's out there still."

Me too, my friend. As far as your assertion that the fight can kill them, I agree that that's a possibility. However, in the half century I've caught bass, I only saw one bass that I killed, i.e. one bass struggling on the surface. And that one bass was taken by an eagle about a minute into its struggling. I have killed a few pickerel. When I was younger, I'd go to an area, focus on it, catch 25 bass, and then return a few hours later and there were no bass floating like is reported at the release sites of some tournaments, which suggests to me that it's time out of water that's harder on them. This is why I release them ASAP. I hear ya. I just wish they weren't so ugly! Catt, I loved reading your account and especially liked the line about swimming to Louisiana.

I've shared several times how my PB, caught this past spring, felt like a great gob of weeds or a water-soaked log. I've also shared the story of how I also caught my PB-fighter this year. She was barely 18 inches and skinny. I hooked her in a narrow stream and she immediately came at my canoe and kept going downstream, my drag whining. Then she came back at me, ricocheting from the brush on each side of the screen. Then she went deep and I could feel her plowing through the weeds on the bottom. I could feel her cutting them off, a scythe through grass. Of course, she pulled and turned my canoe and dragged me into weeds when it came to netting her and in the net, she was still berserk. She. was. magnificent. And yet, she was the most ordinary bass by looks and size. Skinny even. I caught half a dozen that evening heavier than her, but none greater. I think about her a lot, wondering why she was so loaded with grit, starch, and fury. You can see the stream to the right of her. I hooked her at the top of it and she came roaring past me. Clearly I like the fight. Do you too, valuing it almost as much as size, and if so, do you have a story of a mighty fight to tell?

I often remember the In-Fisherman Master Angler chart, which is really a latitude equivalency chart, when it comes to LMBs. On that chart, a 6.5-pound Northern Strain LMB is equivalent to a 10-pound Southern LMB. For an Ontarian like you, I'd stretch the difference a little more and suggest that a 6-pounder in Kingston would be equivalent to a 10-pounder in Orlando, a 10.5-pounder in the Everglades, and perhaps an 11-pounder in Lake Baccarac, as you have serious winters. I'm actually a little bit north of you, so I'd apply the same equivalencies to my bass, as I've a moderating ocean. You, of course, have Lake Ontario, which would also moderate your lows, but our bass still go through low metabolism stretches that last for months where they're barely feeding and growing. Of course, genetics also prevent northern bass from peaking much beyond ten pounds. What's interesting about the chart is that there is no difference between southern and northern smallmouth. A six-pounder caught in the north equals a six-pounder caught in the south. They're equally rare. In the last three years, I've caught multiple 6+-pounders and especially in 2023 when I focused on the bogs. Here are some of them, all weighed or measured. Note that they're bass with bellies, except for the first one, and all have hunchbacks. For comparison, the first bass, which is the skinny one, weighed 6.54-pounds. The third and fourth fish are silly fat. I caught another two that were six and three-quarters in 2023 and a bass in 2024 that was longer and fatter than any of these, but 2024 has been more about quantity than quality simply because the quantity ponds are easier to reach, which matters because I turn 68 this month*: The quantity ponds are also great fun and full of four and five-pounders, like this gal caught this week:

Alex is too cool!

I'd like Clayton to buy me a lottery ticket. He's on a streak. I went to my pond for 90 minutes this evening, just grabbed a couple rods for a quick session. I caught fourteen, but forgot my camera, so I took a couple photos with my cell phone. The evening light was gorgeous and the bass, like so many Maine bass, refused to pose for their photos. They just never stop fighting.

Clayton!!!

I like the catch-and-release approach to kayaking. I used to watch one YouTube channel until I saw the angler killing smallmouth in Maine by overstuffing his live well for a tournament.

Me too. Wait, if three of us are in his kayak, it might be getting a little tight for Clayton to cast well. Agreed. As a fellow little boat angler, they're my kin.

I don't watch or participate in tourneys, but I sure love reading Clayton's exciting accounts.

@Fried Lemons even has the chutzpah to outfish us from a de facto surfboard in bare feet. I'm glad he doesn't post pics of his rods and reels. I fear he's outfishing us with a Snoopy rod and reel. @Aaron_H: It's good to see you posting again!

Thanks for the link, @Glenn. I read that article already, but I'll reread it now.

Nope, I fish them both. The underspin is the best with weeds.

When this happens, I want to be in the area too renting WWF folding metal chairs for the coming melee.

Pat, your coat and hat remind me of one time I landed in Florida and a local guy at the airport kept trying to warn me about how cold it was outside that day and how there was no way I should step outside in just a shorts and t-shirt. He was genuinely concerned about me. By March, some Mainers are so sick of winter apparel that we're wearing t-shirts and shorts when there's still snow on the ground.

I bought a bunch of spinner baits made out of titanium. Fingers crossed that they last longer than the stainless steel ones.

If I were shore bound too, I'd be catching the same.