Had a couple weeks of some very lousy fishing, so I was desperate to catch a bass, I went with a live bluegill and tossed it out in front of some weed beds, and my goodness gracious 3 VERY aggressive and hungry post spawn bass came after it HOT. They kept the top of the water in a constant boil chasing and blowing that thing up, popping it up like popcorn with each swipe. And mind you they were no more than about 2 feet off the bank from me, didn't seem to give any hoots I was there. They were HUNGRY and determined to eat no matter what. I had to apologize to the boaters out there cuz I let out a very loud "OH SH.....!!" as they were popping after it. I have never seen bass keep after something like that. Especially so after a failed hookset, but dang these bass were committed. Finally got this one in

 19.5" and about 3.5 lbs. 

 

I was kind of just going through the motions before that, as it had been slow again and I actually thought I might doze off. Needless to say they got my attention and the drowsiness quickly vanished. The shirt is indeed inside out, but purposely so-- each time it's been like that, I've caught a good one so I decided to stick with superstition 😉

A day on the Little River

 

I’ll start with the evening and work back to the afternoon. My  wife works in the mountains often and one of our buddies was wanting to scout a small section of water for smallies/sunfish close to her work. Rachel caught a redbreast sunfish with a grasshopper fly while we were just bobbing around at the access point. I caught a decent little SMB with a 2” smoke grub further upstream. Pretty view but right next to a loud road and some guy with the loudest lawnmower in history 😂 

Rewind back in time to earlier in the day, I had a midday doctor appt. I was freed up around 1:30 or so and drove up into the national park for some fly fishing. I waded maybe 1/3 mile stretch and landed two rainbows, missed and lost several more, one of which looked to be a fairly nice one. 

When wading the smokies, it helps to have some flow

info so you don’t get swept away or drive an hour only to find a raging torrent. There is a gauge downstream of where I was fishing online but the deep dive app has any little tiny creeks all the way to the big rivers charted. I was fishing in this area

I believe the blue stream is the waterfall/creek you can see coming into the river I was fishing in one of my photos

 

Busy day, fun times! 

ray roberts has risen 3 feet in the last week or so. things have shut off pretty hard for now, but it means summer fishing will be great.
most of the places i usually go are closed/underwater. 
Even texoma seems likely to crest its emergency spillway, with downstream consequences if it does.
i'll take the rain but i would like to take a bass

Three hours on a new lake today, one I've been wanting to try for some time, but never got around to it.  It's one of the more popular spots for tournaments in the area, with a reputation for big fish...and of course every time I have gone out to scout it during summer, the launch is packed full.  I figured Spring or Fall mid-week would be the best time to try it, so I did that (launch parking was only half-full when I rolled up at 10am).

 

And, until I get around to fixing the crack on my main kayak,  I'm still stuck on my old one with no sonar.  Best I could do was pull up fishermaps on my phone and guesstimate where I was on the lake relative to the depth chart -- at least there was cell coverage.

 

With no prior experience here, pretty well-educated fish, and only approximate depth info, I decided to just do the easy thing and go around beating the bank with a spinnerbait, dshad, and lizard. 

 

I got a few:

 

Best two -- 17" and and 18":

 

Rain never materialized and I needed a change of scenery, so headed out to a different lake this afternoon. Spent the first hour or so throwing big baits for a big bite, but that didn’t work. Finally put the pieces together and was able to catch a double limit on swim jigs; also caught a limit of crappie to go with them - busy boat.

 

 

 

 

 

44 minutes ago, Team9nine said:

Spent the first hour or so throwing big baits for a big bite, but that didn’t work. Finally put the pieces together and was able to catch a double limit on swim jigs; also caught a limit of crappie to go with them - busy boat.

 

I've been big fish hunting for two of the last three days, but I'm missing my busy boat. Maybe I'll strike a balance tomorrow, half big girl hunting and half slinging to whatever will bite. 

27 minutes ago, Swamp Girl said:

 

I've been big fish hunting for two of the last three days, but I'm missing my busy boat. Maybe I'll strike a balance tomorrow, half big girl hunting and half slinging to whatever will bite. 

 

That's kind of been my plan the past week. Throw the big bait to specific areas that seem well set up for it. If it works, keep at it. If it doesn't, drop back and go with what you know and try and load the boat 

Nice little retention pond haul at Jake's soccer practice last night.  Jake finished practice and fished the floating worm for 10 minutes and got the big fish of the trip!

 

I got two on the jig and two on the floating worm.  Bought some bubble gum and merthiolate Zoom Trick Worms (no salt!) from my local hardware/tackle shop - has them in stock!  They work great!  Glad I finally gave them a try!

 

 

 

Good 5 fish bag for a quick hour long trip. 

 

Missed a couple on the frog - I feel like any day now that bite is gonna pop off but it's been slow to get rolling this year.

The wife sent me fishing after work so I obliged. Caught some on a 2” smoke grub and the LM/SM hit a larger 4 inch watermelon grub. The Okuma Hakai paired on the Cerros rod was bombing the larger grub nicely, had it rigged on a shakey head. I also included some rock bass photos for @gim

I totally should have used the tiny rock bass for live bait but I didn’t think about it until after I let it go 

 

I decided if @Team9nine can busy boat it, I can too, so after two trips of targeting big girls, I targeted fun this morning. I fished 90% of the time with a walking bait, but caught four on a wacky worm when a bass missed the walking bait and I dropped the wacky worm on their heads. I caught smaller bass, but they fought as hard as the big girls. About half were smallmouth:

 

 

The green bass were smacking the walking bait too:

 

 

Pretty pic!

 

 

31 bass in all. I quit when I'd caught 30, but caught one more trolling back to the car.

 

 

Gorgeous smallmouth everyone y'all know how to make a southern boy jealous!  🙂🙂🙂🎣🎣🎣

 

Keep on em!  I sense some 4-5 lbers coming real soon!

 

I threw up a full report last night in Fishing Reports, but figured I'd drop the biggest bass of the evening here as well. (Gotta farm those likes.) Felt good to finally get into some smallies. I'll spare @gim the rock bass pics. He's suffered enough at the hands of @TnRiver46. 

 

 

35 minutes ago, Pat Brown said:

I sense some 4-5 lbers coming real soon!

 

I know where the big girls are*, but I wanted to surface fish this morning.

 

 

*The big girls are in the deep water abutting where I was surface fishing. That's where I caught these two and others this week, but the big girls aren't hitting surface lures...yet:

 

 

 

 

59 minutes ago, Swamp Girl said:

I decided if @Team9nine can busy boat it, I can too, so after two trips of targeting big girls, I targeted fun this morning. I fished 90% of the time with a walking bait, but caught four on a wacky worm when a bass missed the walking bait and I dropped the wacky worm on their heads. I caught smaller bass, but they fought as hard as the big girls.

 

31 bass in all. I quit when I'd caught 30, but caught one more trolling back to the car.

Busy boat days are just good for the soul. They make the days targeting big fish tolerable  

I'll keep the busy boat theme going.

 

My last trip started with a white bass on the first cast. I thought the first cast curse was going to get us because the second fish was a rock bass, followed by a small crappie.

 

 

The next fish was the smallie that got us going. From there on the day got much better. 

 

 

My friend got the big fish of the day with the 4 lb 13 oz smallmouth below.

 

 

We caught 31 in all, with over half of them being smallmouth.

 

They released over 90,000 cfs all day long so there was a lot of water moving. Most of our fish were caught behind current breaks in about 12 feet of water. I didn't catch any big ones, but perfect weather, and a busy boat always makes for a good day.

47 minutes ago, Fishlegs said:

We caught 31 in all, with over half of them being smallmouth.

 

Except for the slab smallie, we had the same day!

 

1 hour ago, Team9nine said:

Busy boat days are just good for the soul. They make the days targeting big fish tolerable  

 

So true. I caught my big girls trolling up and down a shoreline where the water drops off, always wondering, "Too close? Too far?" This morning I was chasing bass busting on the surface and working the openings in a zombie reed field, aka fun stuff.

 

 

Any of my trips that are remotely comparable to yours are very good days for me @Swamp Girl. The last two trips I've been on with this friend has put over 70 fish in the boat. As stated earlier, it's good for the soul.

Went out to AEP early this morning.  Not normally an early morning angler but today’s objective was to catch a fish on topwater so I wanted the odds in my favor.

 

Low 50s when I got there.  Winds out of the north at 2 MPH.  The forecasted cloud deck never showed up.

 

Canoe cart hasn’t shown up yet but I doubt it would’ve done me any good in the steep terrain. Fortunately the grass was wet with the morning dew and made a nice slick surface for me to drag it down to the front pond.

 

 

Once I launched I had a strike on my first cast with the Choppo and a dink on my second.  
 

First topwater fish.

 

I caught it next to some reeds and he had friends. 

 

After that I moved on to the Beaver pond but despite multiple strikes best I could manage was a few more dinks.

 

The sun was getting higher in the sky so I relocated to another long and narrow pond figuring that the high sides would throw a nice shadow.

 

While the shade lasted I caught several more dinks and had a few more blow ups but nothing to write home about.  With the sun almost directly overhead I called it a day satisfied that I had finally managed to break the topwater curse.  

Yoo-hoo, @bp_fowler! I was surface fishing this morning too. I was using a walking bait, which I've come to prefer to a plopping bait because bass will strike a plopping bait (at least for me) within the first 10' of its retrieve, but with a walking bait, I can trigger a strike nearly all the way back to the canoe. The disadvantage with a walking bait is that the erratic retrieve means more missed strikes. 

1 hour ago, Fishlegs said:

The last two trips I've been on with this friend has put over 70 fish in the boat. As stated earlier, it's good for the soul.

 

Heck, yeah, it is! I'm actually going fishing again this evening. I left my canoe at my pal's pond and the temp is dropping tomorrow with heavy rain on Saturday. So, I want to bring it home tonight and I'll fish when I fetch it. I'm thinking about fishing one or both of my big, jointed swimbaits, i.e. going ALL IN on big bass fishing. With the temp dropping, air pressure rising, and a storm coming, it's my hope that a big girl decides it's time to feast...on a big swimbait. 

23 minutes ago, Swamp Girl said:

Yoo-hoo, @bp_fowler! I was surface fishing this morning too. I was using a walking bait, which I've come to prefer to a plopping bait because bass will strike a plopping bait (at least for me) within the first 10' of its retrieve, but with a walking bait, I can trigger a strike nearly all the way back to the canoe. The disadvantage with a walking bait is that the erratic retrieve means more missed strikes. 

I have some, even brought them with me today.  Some poppers to.
 

The smart thing to do would’ve been to try out those as well but I was having too much fun with the plopper.
 

I’m sure I’ll get my chance.  Who knows maybe I’ll try a Buzzbait or even….

 

a frog.

13 minutes ago, bp_fowler said:

I was having too much fun with the plopper.

 

They are a hoot. I love their sound.

 

When it comes to surface lures, I think the popper outfishes all the others...at least for me, but it's a lure that'll excel in a week or so. In Maine, it's still a little early for my small, pink poppers.

Fishing was pretty good today.

My cousin did well on bladed jig, even a Snakehead.

We each caught 11 fish but he had the bigger bag.

I lost my biggest fish in several years on a black buzz bait.......of course right at the boat.

11 hours ago, TnRiver46 said:

I also included some rock bass photos for @gim

The only thing worse than a rock bass is a small rock bass. What an embarrassment.

 

I fished my pal's pond for the fourth time this week. We have a cold front coming and the weekend will be cool and wet, so I launched one last time, hoping that the bass could sense the coming weather and feed accordingly. 

 

They did. I caught bass on four lures: a Mike Siebert spinnerbait, an underspin, a wacky worm, and a walking bait. I caught 15 total and two were smallies. I opened with a 17-incher and a 18.5-incher, but my finish was the grand finale, as I caught three bass in three consecutive casts. There's a little river that flows out of my pal's pond and it draws big bass. I approached with maximum stealth and positioned my canoe as far as possible while still permitting a cast. Then I feasted. This was the appetizer at 18.75 inches:

 

 

She did not want to come to the canoe. Great fun. Then the entree was served:

 

 

The 19-incher also didn't want to come to me and maintained a fair distance, taking me for a little ride.

 

My third consecutive cast produced this pretty, petite dessert, a considerably smaller, but still solid bass:

 

 

All three were caught on a Junebug wacky worm with a chartreuse tip.

 

Here are some others I caught:

 

 

This was my view paddling home: