Smallies Are Hitting

[Early]

Temp. was in mid 90's...Sun was burning...and, Smallies were biting.  Caught a dozen and a half nice smallies today; brought home four:  14"...15.5"...18"...and 19".  All caught in moving water, these smallies really put up a fight!

[greybeard]

Congrats on those fish.. VERY nice catch..

 

What did you use ?

 

 

 

[Early]

Live bait: stonecats...hellgramites...crabs

[greybeard]

Thanx.. I'll note that in my logs for things to try, when I get up to smallmouth country..

 

 

[Lawdwaz]

Temp. was in mid 90's...Sun was burning...and, Smallies were biting.  Caught a dozen and a half nice smallies today; brought home four:  14"...15.5"...18"...and 19".  All caught in moving water, these smallies really put up a fight!

 

Soft shell crabs worked for me last Sunday on the upper Niagara River.  I had bass chubs but the crabs were #1.

 

The water there is moving a bit also............................<grin>

[shawnhu]

B. if you ever want to get into some smallies, you're welcome on my boats at any time, we have loads of smallies here and don't need live bait to hook into some. We also have Lakers, and browns. 10lb+ is not uncommon in these waters. Less than an HR from you.

[greybeard]

Thanx.. I didn't know that you were into the freshwater fishing.

[PREDATE]

Good fishin' Early! I love getting them on topwater.

[HuntOrBeHunted]

Nice. I love using live bait !!

[Early]

I know a lot of people turn their noses up at the thought of fishing live bait, but that's the way I learned to fish for smallies, over 50 years ago. So, I will keep it up...with no apologies!

[shawnhu]

B, since I suck at salt, I had to turn to something!

In regards to bait vs lure, its mostly about preference and challenge.

[PREDATE]

Heck yeah. I also like to drift some dobson or even crawlers down some rapids, but I can work a stretch of water 10X faster and reach out further with a topwater popper. It's an awesome thrill seeing them explode on the bait. I might have to get to the riv tomorrow!

[Early]

Although I prefer live bait fishing (learned from my grandfather some 60 years ago), I, too, enjoy a little top water action now and then...A Heddon Prowler or a Baby Zara Spook can provide some exciting action. I also like to fish for bass with a fly rod, using streamers that I tie up using some of that dreadful dyed bucktail in colors to imitate crawdads or baitfish.

[greybeard]

I haven't fished for smallmouth in many years. I used twister tails, in line spinners, live minnows, and crank baits. I got a few good ones, and  had a few(very few) good days. I did use the flyrod once in some lake, and got some. I just never did well enough to really target them. I was, and am really into largemouth.. Also,  on LI we only have small mouth in a couple of lakes.

 

[BizCT]

Got this 19" today, Kensico Reservoir.

Edited July 21, 2013 by Biz-R-OWorld

[Early]

Wow...Nice fish!  I only fish streams.  To date, my biggest smallie is 19.5"...a real horse for the stream he came from!

[BizCT]

Yea, smallies fight hard. This guy jumped a few times. Caught him 40' down in 120'.

Sent from my PC36100 using Tapatalk 2

[bkln]

Nice catch Biz....

[shawnhu]

Only got a 5.5lb laker today, the rest were LMB and some yellow perch. All the Smallies were tiny today.