Tale of Two Rivers 06/06/09

Josh was kind enough to offer me a ride in his G3 today and I reciprocate tomorrow when he rides in mine.

It's 6 days until my elbow surgery and I was hoping to hit the river several times before. Today was the first time I've been out all week due to the inclement weather we've had all week here in SC Pennsylvania. It started out cool with the air temp at 54 degrees and overcast. In fact, it was drizzling as we drove northward.

We stopped for a hearty breakfast right outside of Harrisburg. The breakfast is developing into a tradition for our fishing trips. We usually stop at Sheetz for some MTO sammies and a bag of chips... Josh, we never broke out the BBQ chips... LOL! After gassing up and getting our lunches together, we headed to breakfast.

We got to the ramp around 7:30 a.m. and headed west on the Juniata. Josh took the G3 as far as we could possibly go w/o major hull damage. I had a Boogerman Buzzbait tied on this morning. I have only thrown it the last three times out w/o a single hit, but this morning I finally nailed my first bass on it... Let the Games Begin!

[img]http://i253.photobucket.com/albums/hh42/SmalliesTB/dadJuniatafirstBuzz06_06_09re.jpg[/img]

The water on the Juniata was heavily stained from the rains we've had all week. Josh was throwing a gold bladed spinnerbait with the morning overcast skies. I decided to try my ugly chartreuse bladed spinnerbait again and was able to entice this nice 19" smallie to hit.

[img]http://i253.photobucket.com/albums/hh42/SmalliesTB/dadJuniata19in_06_06_09re.jpg[/img]

The clouds started to give way and the sun began to break out as we got into later morning. So, we both switched over to our silver bladed spinnerbaits. Josh was able to land two very nice a healthy smallies on his War Eagle.

The water temperature was 62 degrees and rather cool for the start of June. We had a NNW wind at around 5 mph. It had little to no effect on our fishing.

We decided to make the run down the Juniata to the Susquehanna River where we were greeted with much cleaner water. After a few stops around the confluence, we headed north to seek out some ledge fish.

We were able to land several more including this nice 19".

[img]http://i253.photobucket.com/albums/hh42/SmalliesTB/dadSusky19in_wound__06_06_09re.jpg[/img]

Take a closer look at the wound on the side of this healthy smallie. It looks like a nasty scrape rather than a lesion. A scrape that possibly came from spawning(?).

[img]http://i253.photobucket.com/albums/hh42/SmalliesTB/dadSusky19in_wound__06_06_09re2.jpg[/img]

Additional lures that we threw: tubes, crankbaits, 3" trick worm on a 1/8th oz. jighead, hard plastic jerkbait, and a plastic fluke.

We both had to be home rather early. So we packed it in around 1:30 p.m. and headed back to the ramp.

Tomorrow is another day. We'll come back fully charged and ready to hit the water again for some great Susquehanna Smallmouth.

Remember... Those who are interested in joining us in the Pa. River Alliance for the protection of our warm water habitats and our beautiful smallmouth bass, please contact OBjet_Pa through PM and he will add your name to our ever growing membership list. He will need your email address when you contact him. All anglers speaking up for our river through one voice!

We also fished on Sunday with poor results.

Josh and I took to the river again Sunday 06/07/09.

Not much to report since we only landed 1 smallie on a spinnerbait and had three other hits on tubes. You know it's bad when I resort to "dragging" (not jigging or popping) a tube on the bottom to get a single hit.

The water temperature was 67 degrees and there was a southerly breeze today... ugh! It was a high blue sky and the sun was out most the day. We did start with some cloud cover this am that quickly lifted. The air temp. was 58 degrees when we headed to the river and rose to 85 degrees by 2:00 p.m.

We were the only truck and trailer at the launch! I couldn't believe that on such a beautiful Sunday. There were absolutely no other anglers out of that ramp. We did see boaters throughout our trip, but they launched from other sites.

Lures Used: Spinnerbaits, crankbaits, tubes, Magic Sticks, and Prayers.

I heard from a friend today who also only had one small bass in the boat all day. A couple of other buddies only had a few further north of us. One had a beautiful 19" smallie on a tube.

Tough bite where we were, fer shure!

dadTB