I'm launching this evening for two hours, but when I do, the wind will be blowing at 11 mph, which is a lot for a light, high-sided canoe. I'm going to plow into the wind and then let it blow me back to my dock. I'm doing this because I loaded @FloridaFishinFool's lunar app on my phone and the app gave this evening a 96% rating. Now, if I can just feel a bite and land a bass when the wind is bullying me.

Uh oh. The pressure is on. Will the solunar calendar deliver for Swamp Girl?

 

I sure hope so. It seems to be fairly accurate here in Florida. All of my tournament fishing buddies use it too.

 

I just checked the app and it says that the peak for this cycle happened late last night around 1am. So today is a 96% day, but also rounding the peak and beginning to go back down.

 

Good luck!

90 degrees plus today, and sunny skies midday to boot. Small guy but in these conditions a fish is a fish and that beats a skunking lol. Was fun getting him up 15 feet plus to me on the bridge with my 8lb ygk maxdrag braid lol. 1/16 keitech jig head and a 3” easy shinner in fire craw. Guess this guy didn’t get the memo that it’s a spring color. Not that I buy the color thing, I just throw whatever colors that I want to so yeah, I am special.

@N Florida Mike I feel ya man. I know where a big one lives where I fish and I’ve had her out twice, but haven’t put a hook to her yet. First time she shot out her lair five feet and I simply farmed her and watched her wake torpedo back to her tangled lair. Next opportunity I just threw out into the shore slop behind her castle and drug it out quick on the surface and she waked right out after it, but wouldn’t commit to the open. Her behavior and the spot she’s living all say big fish…

 

1 hour ago, FloridaFishinFool said:

Will the solunar calendar deliver for Swamp Girl?

 

I sure hope so

 

Me too! I'm leaving in five minutes. Thanks for the good wishes, Triple F!

Got on a pretty good bite during the first hour of outgoing tide fishing flooded spatterdock. I dumped two 4-5lb fish after they wrapped me in the vegetation. This was an impromptu trip so I was unprepared and fishing with fluorocarbon. Despite that I still managed to land 5 fish. I also spotted several snakeheads but could not coax them to bite.
 

 

I launched to more wind than I prefer because I wanted to fish a good solunar evening. The bass were willing, but I didn't bring my good stuff to the mound, losing some good ones. I managed seven bass. Six were good-sized and four were about as big as they grow in my pond. These four:

 

 

I caught one trolling into the wind, one on the edge of some lilypads, one from a laydown, and one trolling with the wind.

 

These two were smaller, but still solid, both caught on a T-Rigged worm:

 

 

Here's a pretty pic!

 

 

Thanks, F3, for the app suggestion. I think it works. The bass were bigger than normal. 

 

FWIW, I've caught 948 this year.

On 8/8/2025 at 11:11 AM, IcatchDinks said:

But I am sorry that all I'm able to show Gim is his most hated species. Lol. 

Don't be sorry, post as many as you can, and make sure you're wearing the raggediest clothes you have. 😉 😂

10 minutes ago, T-Billy said:

Don't be sorry, post as many as you can, and make sure you're wearing the raggediest clothes you have. 😉 😂

Gotta grow my hair out again. 

Well it was another disappointing day size wise, but it has been warmer the past few days. It was around 90 degrees again so I wanted to try a different time of day, late afternoon slash early evening. I had no luck in the river so I tried the bridge again, pretty sure that I hooked the same fish from yesterday but he shot out of the water like a rocket and threw my paddle tail back at me. That was it for the bridge, decided to parallel the bank on my way back to the car, it paid off and I beat the skunk. Tried below the spillway for a smaller but struck out and snagged my jig head. Decided to call it a day. But it was a good day overall because I caught something and that’s the name of the game. Try and learn something new from every trip and I did, a new spot to hit and that I might need a heavier weight. 

Shore fished this afternoon in the heat, but it ended up not being too bad out. Sun/clouds mixed and a steady SSW breeze made the 90* day tolerable. I did a quick 5 hour smallie run which I haven’t done all summer since I’ve been getting into the largemouth. I’ve caught smallmouth all my life, but mostly on bait. I landed 6 solid river bass that averaged 15” with a 19” and 21” as big fish. I also lost 4 and missed a couple. They were lean and mean, but this continues to be a strange year of slim bass. I got the biggest on a 4” black senko which I threw to give a decent leech look and it worked fine. The best bait by far was a bitsy with a chigger craw. I hooked something big that eventually busted 10lb big game leader, which is what I got my fish on. All but one came on the M caster save for the big girl on the ML spinning rod(of course)

 

3 hours ago, JonB2 said:

Shore fished this afternoon in the heat, but it ended up not being too bad out. Sun/clouds mixed and a steady SSW breeze made the 90* day tolerable. I did a quick 5 hour smallie run which I haven’t done all summer since I’ve been getting into the largemouth. I’ve caught smallmouth all my life, but mostly on bait. I landed 6 solid river bass that averaged 15” with a 19” and 21” as big fish. I also lost 4 and missed a couple. They were lean and mean, but this continues to be a strange year of slim bass. I got the biggest on a 4” black senko which I threw to give a decent leech look and it worked fine. The best bait by far was a bitsy with a chigger craw. I hooked something big that eventually busted 10lb big game leader, which is what I got my fish on. All but one came on the M caster save for the big girl on the ML spinning rod(of course)

 

 

Lovely river and great smallies! 

@MIbassyaker Thanks man, I enjoyed it greatly. It’s my favorite river in this state and is full of big smallmouth with the occasional bonus largie. Felt great being back on her again!

Fished the home lake for about 4 hours on Sunday. Big storms blew through Saturday morning and evening...did not have high hopes.

 

Started with my usual...spinner bait and a Rapala DT-8. No takers. Switched over to a 7" blue-fleck power worm, texas rigged with 3/16th ounce weight. Started catching fish.

 

Moved over to a pumpkin green with red fleck Senko and landed 19-1/2" | 4lbs-10oz. LMB, and backed up with a 17" LMB soon after.

 

Boated 10 LMB's total, all on the worm and Senko. Finished the day catching a few panfish on gulp minnows.

 

I fished with the kid and his dad at my pond this morning. Fishing was slow, but we cobbled a total catch of 21. I caught eight, bringing my 2024 total to 957. Their average size was good. It was already getting hot, so we quit early,

 

 

Last week I caught my LMB PB (just a sliver shy of 19") - this weekend I caught a full 19" LMB for a new LMB PB - it was healthy/strong and I was surprised that it was in only about a foot of water (near a lay down tree in the water)

 

 

Congrats on the new PB @WaskaCrank12!

2 hours ago, Fishlegs said:

Congrats on the new PB @WaskaCrank12!

 

Heck, yeah Waska!

It’s been generally slow here. The neko rig has been saving a lot of skunk trips and it might be my preferred finesse rig now since you can fish it everywhere in any depth with varied weights and it is simple to change anything without rerigging. And,  when they hit it you just reel into them to set the hook. Fish it faster or slower. 
 

last night was no exception on the slow. People everywhere on the lake- paddling, boating, swimming, fishing.  Every third house down the shoreline had a swimmer or fisherperson. My single offshore spot on that lake had a pontoon boat anchored over it with rafts out. After a while everyone just departed and it was me and one other boat. I hopped over to the offshore and picked a quick one on a big worm. I’m still figuring that spot out but I think those fish were moved off from the swimmers. Went into the pads and got a good one (18”, 3#) and then a couple smaller ones. Thought my spinnerbait was done for but it managed to bend back. Couldn’t stay the night which was unfortunate since the full moon was just popping up and I’m sure they were about to turn on. 
 

also saw a first. A red ear slider eating a dead eel.  Eels come into this lake from the river to spawn but I’ve never seen a dead one. And I’ve never seen a slider eating a dead fish before. Two for one. 

 

 

9 hours ago, JonB2 said:

@MIbassyaker Thanks man, I enjoyed it greatly. It’s my favorite river in this state and is full of big smallmouth with the occasional bonus largie. Felt great being back on her again!

 

Are you up North? 

6 hours ago, WaskaCrank12 said:

 

Last week I caught my LMB PB (just a sliver shy of 19") - this weekend I caught a full 19" LMB for a new LMB PB - it was healthy/strong and I was surprised that it was in only about a foot of water (near a lay down tree in the water)

 

 

WTG ~ !

Congrats on the new Personal Best Bass.

A-Jay

@WaskaCrank12congrats on the new PB!!!! 

Had a fun day in NW Michigan floating the Crystal River. Got 12-15 fish between Rachel and I. Started off with some tiny rock bass and eventually got some decent smallies . Rachel was using a 4wt fly rod with dry flies and streamers, I was using a 1/16 oz dart head with green pumpkin zoom dead ringer. It’s crazy how clear the water is up north. 
 

 

 

Got my first ever fish from Lake Michigan!! My wife wanted to see sunrise from a light house and swim so I of course did some casting. I was on a concrete pier/jetty and caught A nice smallie that fought crazy hard and kept trying to pull my line down in the rocks. Used the ole trusty purple worm on a jighead with 6’ medium moderate rod on st croix GXR reel with 6 lb mono. I broke the line lifting it up the 6-8 foot concrete wall but luckily it didn’t break until he was at the top. It was really windy and I was just bombing the worm downwind and dragging it. After about an hour I had basically given up and thump thump……..

 

when people say river smallies fight harder than ones from a lake, they aren’t talking about Lake Michigan! 

 

you can see the sleeping bear sand dunes in my release video 

 

 

Got on a bunch of fish pitching a jig into wood. Also got one solitary fish working deep structure with a worm. The top fish I caught deep in a brush pile. Wrapped me up so badly I thought I lost her. When I eased up the pressure she swam out on her own.