Met up with my good freind and fishing buddy, Josh (smallieman) Kreider at 4:30 a.m. this morning for some early breakfast and then onto the river for a morning of fishing.
We got to the ramp around 6:00 a.m. There were already about 8 other trailers in the parking lot. A couple of anglers must have just launched since the tracks back to their trailer parking spaces were still wet.
Once we prepped the boat, Josh dumped me in and parked the truck. We headed straight to one of our more productive spots.
Last evening,John Williams had called me and we talked about his day of fishing on the Flats. He was planning on hitting the river today and he told me that we would most likely see one another today... We did.
John was nearby and we stopped and spoke with him a few times throughout the morning. He had a buddy along fishing and they had a few good fish, one was 16+", on topwaters... Nice!
Josh got on the board fist with our "complimentary" spinnerbait fish. I had a blow up on a buzz bait, but it didn't hook up. This is about the 10th blow up in this area on Buzz baits over the last three weeks without a single taker!
That was our only spinnerbait fish all day long. We switch to plastics and never went back to the hardware.
The sky was sunny with passing clouds. There was about a 5 mph SE wind blowing which, along with the cloud cover, keep the humidity away most of the morning. As the morning progressed, we could see the haze building.
We were picking off a fish here and there throughout most the morning. We had a few nice 15+ fish, but nothing really big until about 30 minutes before we were ready to leave... Then the fun really began!
We had a flurry of hits and hook ups just before we were going to call it quits. The first fish was a chunky cattie that Josh hit on top of a pronounced ledge. Then, this beautiful 17.75" smallie nailed a tube.
That was like the icing on the cake. But the party wasn't over just yet. Fish were chasing minnows everywhere. We nailed quite a few bass in that last fifteen minutes or so. They were popping up all around the boat... Cool!
We ended the day with 25 smallies. Most were in the 12" to 14" range. These fish are the future of the river and we were so happy to see that many active smaller fish.
It was such a good way to end this hot day of fishing with such a flurry of action. It was getting hotter by the minute and when we returned to the shore, my truck thermometer read 88 degrees... Ugh! It was time to relax, drink a cold one, and hit the swimming pool. Sounds good!
Take care,
Dad
