I’ve been a River Rat my whole life for the most part. Maybe you die as a River Rat. There is no problem with that I guess. I’ve taken smallie fishing on the river seriously since ‘80. Mother Nature and man took my home waters away, and wrecked it. I’m sore at her, have the red butt and all about that situation. I saw the ecosystem turn. It was not good. Not sewer issues just silting, grass loss and other things that effect small baitfish and disruption of the balance the river had. I have to believe it will come back. Probably after I’m dead. But nice smallies need the right conditions. 

 

When I seen this drop off I switched to local lake fishing. I have to fish productively. It’s a bad thing the river has taken a beating but I can’t fish a dead horse of a situation. There was a bit of live and learn to the lake but I must say it has been all good and over that last handful of years I’ve caught some nice Greenies.  
 

I’m having a calling to go back. Maybe get on my home sections and thoroughly feel them out. If it doesn’t pan out, move to different sections. MN may not have wrecked the whole thing. Here in Penna. we are having some river bass issues in general. 
 

I think I should run with the calling if we only get moderate rains. The hunt For them may be ok. Big rains are always a setback on the river. Over the years the nice smallies come in the fall. At least for me. 
 

If any of you guys have ever had your waters wrecked I can feel for you. I hope you turned it around by moving forward. I never lost a step bass fishing. Just a different type of bass. 
 

 

 

Normally when waters decline you have to look back in time to the year class of the size fish you are catching. For example, 4 and 5 years ago we had bad spawn years on the Potomac.  Those bad spawns are catching up to us now.  It’s taking 12lbs to win on the river when it normally takes 20+.  We have switched to a different river and have done much better.  I’m not a tournament guy any more so I’m just out for fun.  Give your river a couple of years and I’ll bet it comes back.  

You are probably right bub. It ripped my heart though. I think of all my good times there. I hope you are right. If I get a couple of more years on it and if it’s time For me to check out. I’ll go in peace that’s where I want my ashes thrown anyway. Than I can be on the river all day, every day. 

Luckily I have a dozen or so rivers to choose from. Was it a flood that destroyed you river? 

Big rains that are causing silting. State wants you to believe it’s flat head catfish. I don’t buy it. An idiot know how the food cycle works with fish. Minnows, crawdads, sunfish don’t live is silted environments. One species thrives off another but a continuous life cycle of this forage and game fish.  Not like there are that many catties there anymore either. I’m not totally screwed, been doing ok on the lake the last few seasons, have to figure the river back out again. It where I want to be so I’ll have to put my time back into it. 

And as Tox said sure spawn years have been bad. 

Smallmouth and flathead coexist in every lake they occur in here. I'm sure flatheads eat a few of them because they'll eat anything they can fit in their mouth, but it isn't like smallmouth are a preferred prey species.

 

Largemouth Bass Virus has destroyed some lakes here, kills almost all the larger adult fish and takes close to a decade for them to return it seems. One was a great smallmouth and decent largemouth lake. Use to catch dozens of 2-4 pound fish a trip, the state would sample (based on their hourly numbers X hours in a day), 30k bass a day with electro-fishing sampling, now it's down to 5k a day. Hopefully it comes back one day, but last time I fished it I caught dozens of monster drum and maybe a half dozen smallmouth, it was terrible.

I've seen this on a few small lakes in my area. One was a heck of a fishery for years..one summer the lake has some kind of algae bloom or something and had a huge fish die off. It has come back through good management and stocking. The bluegill in this lake are the biggest I've seen consistently. The bass population has rebounded numbers wise but the size is still lacking.

My home ponds \ small lake borders a river that dumps into the Missouri about 40 miles south. This year it is low because we have had little rain but the past several years we have had some horrendous flooding. This has moved brush, silted in areas and destroyed some shoreline cover. The largemouth have been tough to say the least. On top of that the river brought in a bunch of trash fish namely carp and gar. But it is not all doom and gloom! This year has been my best largemouth fishing in years for numbers of quality fish. Also I've caught several pike and white bass along with a few dozen smallies the past 2 years...these are welcome additions from the river.