I've never tried river fishing, or smallmouth fishing so I thought I'd give it a shot this morning...Not a big fish, but I was pleasantly surprised! Caught on a KVD 1.5 Squarebill Crankbait in Firetiger. White River,  Randolph County Indiana.

Once bitten.......

No goin back now.

Welcome to the dark side.

I know...I think I like them better!  I do alot of kayak fishing. Rivers + kayaks = new smallmouth fan 

i wish we had them

I still remember this story shortly after I had caught my personal best largemouth weighing 5-2 the weekend before a tournament I had out on St Clair. Now let me preface this with I hadn't felt the pull of a smallmouth since the previous season. I hooked up with a fish that tournament morning and I was hooting and hollering about how big the fish was and told my partner to get the net as I apparently had a "big one" by the way it was fighting. Seriously by the time I got it in the boat I has to put it on the bump board to see if would keep. Hardest fighting fish pound for pound! Welcome to the club. There's no going back from here.

NICE!  definitely bigger than the little ones i've caught in the river before!  

10 hours ago, Fishin' Fool said:

I still remember this story shortly after I had caught my personal best largemouth weighing 5-2 the weekend before a tournament I had out on St Clair. Now let me preface this with I hadn't felt the pull of a smallmouth since the previous season. I hooked up with a fish that tournament morning and I was hooting and hollering about how big the fish was and told my partner to get the net as I apparently had a "big one" by the way it was fighting. Seriously by the time I got it in the boat I has to put it on the bump board to see if would keep. Hardest fighting fish pound for pound! Welcome to the club. There's no going back from here.

It's a really incredible how hard they fight for a freshwater fish.  A 3lb or better smallie, especially in current, fights as hard or harder than anything you're going to catch in that body of water pound for pound.  

 

One of my best friends is a trout bum in Utah who grew up on the Susquehanna with me, but never got serious about Smallmouth.  He'll be packing some 6wt rods and heading east this summer.  I'll be making a convert after his first take on a popper.  

Smallmouth fishing is so much fun, especially in rivers.

I used to go to the Wallkill in NY often.  Was never disappointed.

they would cream jigs with curly tails .....the original mister twisters to be exact.

What ever happened to Mr. Twister???   don't hear about em anymore.

Great fish!!!!

The fish I miss the most, since I moved here to  SC, is the Smallmouth.  They are only in two bodies of water in the state and neither is near me.  I'll be going back home in a month or two and I'll spend a day on the river fishing for them.

 

Congrats on your first smallie!  I'm very fortunate that my home river is full of them and consider myself very lucky.  I take an annual vacation to Kentucky Lake to get my largemouth fix, but wouldn't trade a river smallmouth on the end of my line for all the greenies in the world.

Great job and congrats, I've been fishing for, well, since I was old enough to hold a rod a long, long time ago, I have yet to land a SMB, I told somebody on here that if I ever did get one that it would be the smallest fish I ever caught or it would be the "one that got away" story, I'd be EXTREMLY happy to catch one like yours !! 

1 hour ago, Nitrofreak said:

Great job and congrats, I've been fishing for, well, since I was old enough to hold a rod a long, long time ago, I have yet to land a SMB, I told somebody on here that if I ever did get one that it would be the smallest fish I ever caught or it would be the "one that got away" story, I'd be EXTREMLY happy to catch one like yours !! 

When do you wanna go?