Soft and subtle smackdown

Good morning Susquehanna River!

Maybe for the last hurrah of the year on the water, Karen and I fished the Susquehanna River on Sunday with Jason Shay of Susquehanna Smallmouth Solutions.

Rumble on the River.

But there was a catch.  Our friends Kirk and Mike also booked a trip the same day with Pete Holmes, one of the other guides with Susquehanna Smallmouth Solutions.  Kirk thought it would be funny to post this on Facebook as a "Rumble on the River" showdown between the two teams.  The only thing, he didn't account for Pete not doing much fishing because he would be:

• Taking fish off the hook for Kirk, because he doesn't like touching fish
• Getting lures out of trees because Mike hasn't fished for 50 years
• Getting lures out of trees because Kirk can't cast
• Kirk and Mike being old and showing up late to the boat ramp (even with Daylight Savings Time where they got an extra hour of sleep)

When Karen and I got to the ramp, Jason already had his boat in the water.  Of course, his boat is a brand-new River Ryder 1866MV-SJ jet boat, so he might have been excited to hit the river (we would be on his second guided trip in the new ride).  We got our gear and hopped in just as Pete was unloading his boat.

Pete had his boat in the water, but his clients were nowhere to be seen.

No Kirk and Mike.

Jason started the motor to let it idle, and Pete parked his truck and trailer.  No weird people at the boat ramp this time.

No Kirk and Mike.

Pete started to worry a bit, and I mentioned that Kirk posted something on Facebook an hour or so before that, "It's time!"

Finally they showed up just as we were about ready to push from shore.  We motored across to the opposite side of the river from the boat ramp, and Kirk-Mike-Pete headed downriver somewhere.

Temps were in the low 40s, but it really wasn't uncomfortable other than when the boat was moving full throttle.  When we stopped to fish, the sun was out, and the wind was calm other than a short period later in the day.

The plan was to use tubes and jerkbaits -- Jason said they both worked when he was out with a client on Friday.  However, a cold front moved through on Saturday, and that dictated our presentation and pace throughout the day.

Karen with one of her fish, and Lady Liberty in the background.

Basically, jerkbaits did not work AT ALL, but tubes were really effective.  I started off working a tube by casting out and popping it off the bottom every few seconds.  After a number of casts over 15 minutes, I had no fish but Jason had hooked a couple.  He was barely moving the lure on the bottom -- just leaving the tube and letting the current do the work.

This was the most effective tactic throughout the day for the three of us, especially targeting small eddies and pockets of slow/static current.  Sometimes we could feel the fish bite, sometimes we couldn't.  When in doubt, set the hook.

I must have caught at least five fish where I started reeling just because the line stopped moving in the current.  It was like the smallmouth grabbed the tube and just sat there with it.

Me with a chunky smallmouth.

If the fish did strike, it was just a soft, subtle tap.  Despite the lethargic hits, the fish did their "smallmouth things" (as Karen said) when hooked -- pulling hard, using current to their advantage, getting airborne.

We were doing pretty well after a few hours, and we coaxed Jason to text Pete to see how his boys were doing.  It was not going well for Team No River For Old Men.  It took them a couple hours to even get a fish on the board.  We weren't exactly killing it, but I thought we were doing pretty well despite the conditions -- water temps were just under 50 degrees in most spots, and the river had minimal clarity.

We would catch a few in a spot, then move to another area after the bite tapered off.  Catch some, move on again when it slowed down.  Only a few areas didn't produce fish.

Jason had us using Right Bite tubes for the most part.  Karen I sometimes switched to other flavors of tubes after getting a snag.  She seemed to have equal success with Campground Tubes, and I had luck with Z-Man TRD TubeZ.  These lures were a bit smaller than the Right Bite tubes, but they all caught the same size fish -- everything from Susquehanna dinks (12 inchers) up to a few that were in the 17-18 range.

We ended up with 50+ fish between the three of us while Team No River For Old Men managed ... not quite that many.

This might be it for the year at least for smallmouth.  Maybe a trip to the Potomac for walleye if the river ever recedes to normal levels.

Mike, Jason, Kirk and Karen checking out Jason's new whip.

Going against the Flo

Fished the Little Patuxent for a little over two hours on Tuesday.  Mainly wanted to get out and do something with the possibility of Hurricane Florence or its remnants hitting this area by the weekend.

A guy on a fishing forum fabricated a homemade batch of small propeller lures and asked for some guinea pigs to try them out and provide feedback. Ideally they would be for lighter presentations.  I volunteered and got a couple mailed last week.  They are really small (not going to provide details other than that since I'm not sure of his intentions ... like if wants to make a fortune off them). 

I tied one on to my medium-light setup -- seven-foot ML St. Croix AvidX rod, Pflueger Supreme reel and six-pound Hi-Seas Triple Fish fluorocarbon.

Hold fish closer to the camera to they look bigger.

Despite the light weight, the lures cast through the air with excellent distance.  I managed to catch two tiny smallmouth, and another one freed itself while being hoisted out of the water.

Usually the pesky redbreast sunfish nibble (and sometimes bite) regular "smallmouth lures" like Z-Man worms and swimbaits, and I was hoping this little prop bait would catch a few so I could bring some home to introduce them to a frying pan.  That's why they're called panfish, right?  But no such luck.

While the smallmouth bass were sub-dink size (maybe six inches), it was encouraging considering the rains that have blown up the Little Patuxent and other little rivers in the area.  The closest gauge on Tuesday measured three feet -- close to normal -- but it was over seven feet a few days before that.  Survival of the fittest -- I'm guessing the smallmouth have been around here since just after their first introduction on the Potomac, and they will continue to find a way to survive.

I was also trying out a new (to me) jerkbait -- a Yo-Zuri 3DB.  Buying new lures is almost as fun as actually fishing!

Unfortunately with the cloudiness of the water, it was almost impossible to tell what kind of action the lure had. One smallmouth hammered the lure -- it was hooked for a moment then shook free near the surface.  It looked like a fish in the 12- to 14-inch range.

If the Potomac ever gets back to normal, I intend to compare some of the jerkbaits I have like this Yo-Zuri and the Rapala Shadow Rap ... and a few others acquired during the offseason but haven't even used yet, like the Rapala RipStop, Megaba$$ Vi$ion, and Lucky Craft Pointer.  The shallow-running jerkbaits dive down as much as four feet, and I'm hesitant to cast them in the skinny, shallow Maryland rivers because they are more prone to getting snagged.

Jerkbait comparison coming soon?  From left to right:
Y-Zuri 3DB, Megabass Vision 110, Rapala Rip Stop,
Rapala X-Rap and Lucky Craft Pointer.

Fishpalooza

Mother Nature threatened but stayed away.

Karen and I fished the Susquehanna River yesterday with Jason Shay of Susquehanna Smallmouth Solutions.  Mother F'ing Nature stabilized her wrath as far as dumping rain or unleashing miserable heat and humidity for just one day.  But it looks like she is going to fire a final (hopefully?) summer blast of heat over the next week.

Monitoring the gauges all week, the Susquehanna hovered around 4.4 feet at Harrisburg.  No crazy rains or anything either, so it looked like Sunday would be a nice day for fishing.

Jason and me with a double --
fishpalooza!

After getting to the boat ramp at 6:30 a.m. and hopping into Jason's jet-prop boat, Karen and I armed ourselves with a Reaction Innovations Little Dipper, a spinnerbait, and a Whopper Plopper on each of our rods.  For the first few hours, we were switching between them and couldn't get anything consistent from the fish.  Except the Whopper Plopper churning across the surface wasn't working, even though the river just screamed "TOPWATER!!!+11," especially early on, but the smallmouth didn't cooperate.

It looked like rain was going to hit us early after jetting upriver, but all we got was misting for a short time.

At the first spot, Karen caught a dink smallmouth on the swimbait, and I got a 14-incher a little later on the swimbait, too.  Jason swore he was only going to throw some flavor of Double J Twisted Tackle spinnerbait from start to finish even as Karen and I got those two early fish on the Reaction Innovations swimbaits.

We caught a few more here and there.  I had two more smallmouth bass that looked to be a solid 17 inches.  (Just about every fish today we caught had a chunky belly.)

Karen with one of her fish.

But nothing consistent.  After a few fish, the bite went cold.  At one point, I went almost an hour or so between even getting a hit, but Karen and Jason caught a few but weren't exactly ripping fish into the boat either.  Like I've said before, this is why it's called "fishing" and not "catching."

Maybe around noon, we were drifting among underwater shelves.  Rock formations that protruded up through the water creating trenches barely visible below the surface.  And we went into a mini-spree of smallmouth activity. 

After getting some snags on a swimbait, I tried a Nichols spinnerbait in a crawdad flavor.  The lure (which I bought at Smallmouth Saturday upon Jason's recommendation) wasn't a revelation, but a few smallmouth hammered it like a freight train.

Trying to fish out (get it?)
my crawdad-flavored
Nichols spinnerbait from a
small mouth.

At that point, the fish were hanging around the shelves, and we peppered every single one with casts.  Again, nothing consistent, but when one of us got a fish, they put up a great fight.  One smallmouth Karen hooked, I could see the fish shaking its head and trying to burrow down in the rocky river floor.  It was angry!

I guestimate we landed 25-30 smallmouth bass (no other species) between the three of us.  I had eight, but nothing under 14 inches, and three were around 17 inches.

We saw turtles sunning on rocks, geese and ducks and other waterfowl, including a merlin or small hawk trying to prey on small birds.  Not a lot of fishing pressure from other boats on the river.

The weather was much more bearable than when we fished the river with Jason on July 1, and while we didn't light it up with quantity, the smallmouth were better quality than two months ago.

The funniest thing, as we were pulling up to the boat ramp at the end of the day, there was a guy "swimming" in the water.  Jason said something about, "Oh this is the guy on house arrest."  As he throttled the boat to the ramp, this guy - shirtless, wearing swim trunks -- walked up the boat ramp, and he had a bracelet around an ankle.  Then some other guy showed up out of nowhere with no shirt and swim trunks -- AND HE ALSO HAD A BRACELET AROUND HIS ANKLE!!!  Then when the boat was loaded on the trailer, another shirtless guy showed up with a bracelet around his ankle.  I kept thinking of the "Bracelet Buddies" episode of "Friends."

A perfect storm for catching fish.

Just another slow day in the year 2018

I'm glad I started fishing again three years ago instead of this year.  Because if I started to fish again this year, I would probably quit after today.

Karen and I went to the Monocacy/Potomac confluence today.  Last year, I fished this area twice and caught 15 smallmouth.  Ideal wading conditions each time.  Today was my second trip to the area this year, and it was less-than-ideal.  The water was too high, and the clarity looked like chocolate milk.

I tried the new Whopper Plopper 75, a spinnerbait, a Z-Man worm and a Reaction Innovations swimbait ... and had zero luck.  Not even a bite or a hint of a fish below the surface.

I was about ready to call it quits and wandered upriver and found Karen in a spot just below the confluence.  With a swimbait still tied on, I made a cast and had a hit but the fish didn't get hooked.  I made another cast to the same spot, and this time the fish stayed on -- a smallmouth in the 12- to 13-inch range.  Better than nothing, I guess.

A little later, I had another fish hooked on the swimbait, but it got off almost as fast as it got on.  Just a splash on the surface, and it was gone.

Seriously, this weather has sucked BIG TIME this year.  We only had one afternoon of monsoon-like thunderstorms this week, but it was enough to create havoc on the Potomac.

It was interesting to see four or five fishing boats buzzing the area.  Usually I might see one or two, but it was like everyone else had the same idea and said, "Eff it!  This is the best the river has been in weeks, so might as well go fishing!"

Back to normal but not back to normal

Finally, water back down to
normal.

Finally a day where the river levels were close to normal and it wasn't supposed to be 95 degrees.  Well actually it is supposed to be 95 degrees, but it wasn't that warm this morning.

It has been an unusual year for fishing.  The rains haves been unseasonably fierce leaving the rivers too high for fishing.  The flows will get down close to normal, and then a thunderstorm will roll through one evening and blow things out for the next several days.

Monitoring the river levels this week, it looked like everything would be safe this morning.  I hit an area on the Middle Patuxent where I've only been once this year, which was back in February.  The temps were already 80-plus by the time I had wading boots on the ground, and it was nice and humid.  And there were mosquitoes -- it was a good thing I had packed bug spray in my "go" bag earlier in the week.

In February in this area, I caught nothing.  This time was a little better if catching one smallmouth and one redbreast sunfish is better. Lots of sunfish had interest in stuff I tried -- no-name spinnerbait, Reaction Innovations Little Dipper, Hubs Chub, and even the new Whopper Plopper 75.  But no smallmouth other than one around 12 inches and a tiny one that came off near my feet.

Almost a year ago to the day in the same area, I caught five smallmouth and four sunfish.  So either the hot, humid weather has put a damper on things, or the rain has forced the fish into new hiding areas.

The new Whopper Plopper 75 (bottom) is a little
shorter than the 110 (top), but it has a fatter body.

The Whopper Plopper I think is too big for the Middle Patuxent anyway, although it probably keeps the sunfish away.  It's heavy and lands with a huge splash -- the fish seem more skitterish on this small, quiet river that has almost zero fishing pressure.  Exactly two hits on the Whopper Plopper today.

After switching to the smaller Hubs Chub (another topwater lure), I started to get way more interest.

The new Plopper 75 seems to create more of a disturbance in the water than the 110 model.  It has a wider profile and a bigger tail that churns the water.  Definitely will catch some fish even if the inhabitants of the Middle Patuxent didn't think much of it today.

Today's arsenal (clockwise from top left): Hubs Chub, Reaction
Innovations Little Dipper, no-name spinnerbait and Whopper Plopper 75.

Time for topwater

A smallmouth bass that hit a Hubs Chub topwater lure.

Karen and I went camping at the Antietam Creek Campground along the C&O Canal trail.  Usually by this time of year, we've camped next to the Potomac a handful of times, but this is only the second time for me (she went once the day Kirk and I went fishing on the Susquehanna).  The rain storms have been unusually frequent this year, which has caused the Potomac to flow high -- not ideal for fishing.

I wasn't sure what to expect yesterday.  The river gauges showed the water level was down to almost normal summer levels -- probably the lowest it has been all year -- but with all the rain blowing out the river, how would that affect the smallmouth?  Would they be in their usual spots?

Well they weren't in the first usual spot I tried after we got to the campsite yesterday afternoon.  While Karen called the park ranger to deal with squatters on our campsite, I made a beeline to where I caught my biggest smallmouth on the Potomac last year and one of two 16-inch fish.  This time, the honey hole produced nothing.  It might have had something to do with people "fishing" when I showed up.  Four or five people, carrying on in the water yelling at each other.  As I assembled into the waders, looking on from down river and knotting up lures on my two rods, they finally left.

Still after moving into the vacated area -- my personal hot spot -- I had nothing after an hour plus.  I tried a Reaction Innovations swimbait, Z-Man TRD worm and a spinnerbait in this section which featured faster water.

Right corner of the weedbed is where the smallmouth
ambushed the Whopper Plopper.

I wandered down to The Plateau (where I caught the other 16-inch smallmouth three years ago) and got a smallmouth on a Reaction Innovations swimbait right next to a weedbed.  With the sun sinking low, I decided it was time for topwater.  I tied a Whopper Plopper on my medium heavy St. Croix Rod with a Pflueger Patriarch reel and started buzzing the area.

One cast put the lure close to shore, and I buzzed it back to the corner or a weedbed. 

Just before reaching the weeds, small baitfish/fry started leaping from the water, and a dark mass just beneath the surface made a beeline for the Whopper Plopper.  The fish pummeled the lure!  All this happened in maybe a half second.  The fish jumped trying to shake the dual trebles of the Plopper, and I could see it was a smallmouth.  It jumped again -- "Stop that!" -- but couldn't shake the hooks.  It wasn't big -- about 14 inches -- but fought like a typical smallmouth that doesn't know its size.

And that was it for awhile.  I went back down to the campsite and tried the river there.  Karen said she hadn't caught anything but had a couple swipes at her Whopper Plopper.

I brought along a Rapala X-Rap Prop, which I had not used before, and decided to throw that behind the campsite.  The body looks like the famous Rapala minnow, but it's a topwater lure with a propeller on each end.  After a few casts, I liked what I saw.  It buzzed through the water, but wasn't as noisy as a Whopper Plopper because of the slender shape.

On one cast, a fish struck the Rapala about a second after it hit the water -- didn't even start reeling, just a boil on the surface from the fish.  It was another smallmouth (jumped a few times catching the eyes of some guys swimming down river -- "Oh look at that!").  This one was about 12 inches.

But that was it for the night.  Peppered the river and couldn't find any takers on the topwater lure.

This morning, I got up around 6:30 a.m. and headed downriver.  I started at the Antietam Creek confluence and waded downriver staying close to the bank.  Got another smallmouth on the Whopper Plopper then one more on a three-inch Hubs Chub.  The latter hit the lure just as it hit the water, like the fish hitting the Rapala prop lure last night. 

Yes, the topwater bite is so intoxicating that I had both my rods rigged with surface lures.  At one point, a fish took a run at the Whopper Plopper and missed, then I switched rods and threw the Hubs Chub to the same spot.  The fish nailed it -- and jumped -- but unhooked itself from the trebles a few feet away.  Definitely a smallmouth in the 12-14 range.

Achievement unlocked -- baitcasting without a bird's nest!

This morning, I also successfully ventured into baitcasting territory.  Going back 30+ years, I watched the Roland Martin fishing show on The Super Station, WTBS (home of America's Team, the Atlanta Braves).  He always seemed to have a Shimano baitcasting reel in hand.  In the eighth grade after getting $120+ in cash money from family and friends after my confirmation at Our Lady of Lourdes, I bought myself a Shimano baitcasting reel, just like Roland Martin.  I was going to catch some big bass at the little pond in the park across the street from my house.

I didn't catch any bass with that reel.  With no clue how baitcasters worked (this was long before YouTube), I created many bird's nests and backlashes.  Eventually the frustration overcame my dreams of being a pro bass angler, and I traded the reel to a friend for baseball cards.  He then gave the reel to his dad for a birthday present.

So fast forward to about 10 years ago, I briefly decided to get back into fishing again and bought a used Shimano Curado reel off eBay.  Not something from 1985 like I had as a kid, but more modern with brakes and other fancy things.  I made casts practicing in the back yard and did OK, but couldn't make very long casts.  Then when taking off brakes (the brakes are kind of like a clutch on a car) trying to lengthen casts, the result was a tangled mess of fishing line.

Now going back in time to just one month ago, when I picked up Kirk the morning of our trip to the Susquehanna, he handed me a box and said, "Merry Christmas!"  Inside was a Quantam Smoke S3 baitcasting reel.  He mistakenly bought a left-hand retrieve reel and couldn't return it, so he gave it to me.  Great!  Now I had to get a new rod (settled on a seven-foot, two piece Johnny Morris rod on sale at Bass Pro Shops) and try and figure this thing out.

Which I did this morning.  The Quantam reel had more fancy brake settings and eventually got it tuned so it would launch the Whopper Plopper a good distance without making a bird's nest.  In fact, ZERO problems with backlashes, and I even caught one fish.

Also when fishing with Jason Shay earlier this month, he mentioned that baitcasting reels need thicker diameter line.  I rigged the Quantam reel with 17-pound monofilament -- I had tried 10- and even eight-pound line before on the Shimano Curado.  Now I have a hang of it, maybe it's time to find a muskie guide!

Mother Nature should stop sucking

Karen holds on to her Washington Capitals (2018
Stanley Cup Champions!  Wooo!) hat as we head
upriver in the morning.

Another slow day on The Big River Up North, this time with a heat wave putting the damper on the smallmouth frenzy.

Karen and I went out with Jason Shay of Susquehanna Smallmouth Solutions today.  The river was really stained, and with the heat, Jason said the fishing was really slow the previous day when he guided for a Wounded Warriors event.

Good morning Susquehanna!

It ended up really similar to a couple weeks ago when another SSS guide, Pete Holmes, took me and my friend Kirk on a trip.  Lots of usual go-to spots that looked like prime smallmouth ambush spots didn't have much action.

We got to the ramp at 5:30 a.m. with the hope of beating the heat.  It actually was really nice at that time, and a picturesque low fog hung around the river.

We moved up the river.  Then back down.  Then back up.  Just no pattern emerged.  A fish here, another fish a half hour later.  No bites for an hour.

Our best luck was in a big section of faster water just above a natural, submerged dam of rocks.  We threw swimbaits and kind of let them drift in the current while slowly reeling them in.  We got maybe 10 fish between us that way.

Just after noon after trying another spot for maybe 45 minutes with ZERO bites, we called it quits.

I ended up with eight fish, and Karen had five.  Biggest one was maybe 15 inches, although Jason got one around 19.5.

The Potomac River appears to finally be on its way to normal levels, so we'll see how the crazy spring rainfalls has affected fishing there.

That's why they call it 'fishing' and not 'catching'

Mother Nature has been a strange force this year.  Every time I wanted to go fishing, or Karen wanted to go camping, rain storms bombarded the area, elevating rivers and making waters pretty much un-fishable.

Last Saturday morning, I went to the Potomac even though the gauges indicated the water was too high.  Just had to get out there and try. At the Monocacy confluence, it was a muddy mess.  Even walking down to the bank was struggle with the mud on the trail.  Large logs and branches littered the shore, the water looked like chocolate milk, and I left after 90 minutes after catching one channel catfish.  No bites at all other than that.

Conditions have been fairly similar on The Big River Up North (the Susquehanna) with unseasonable rains, but they haven't had the volume we have had down here.  My friend Kirk gleefully texted me about a month ago saying he booked a guide for this Saturday.  Of course I agreed to join him.

Jason Shay started this year going independent with his own guide service -- Susquehanna Smallmouth Solutions -- and getting a few guiding buddies to come aboard.  One of them is Pete Holmes, and that's who Kirk had booked for Saturday's trip.

I circled the date on the calendar and didn't think much of it until earlier this week -- Saturday would be the re-opening of bass season on the lower Susquehanna.  The Pennsylvania DNCR annually closes bass fishing on parts of the Susquehanna and other rivers from May 1 through June 15. With a 45-day layover of no bass fishing, it was likely the river would be packed.

Fort Hunter boat ramp yesterday morning.
Re-opening day for bass fishing on the Susquehanna.

Sure enough, Kirk and I arrived at the Fort Hunter boat ramp at 5:45 a.m. to meet Pete, and it was a madhouse.

Pete didn't bother trying to get his boat in the water, and he suggested another ramp 20 minutes upriver.

We followed him to the other spot, which was slightly less chaotic.  After the boat hit the water, Pete took us even further upriver -- I had never fished above the Duncannon area, and we were well above there at this point.

The river seemed more tranquil for some reason. Blue skies, temperatures in the high 50s projected for the 70s later on.

I thought we were going to have a day of topwater madness when the first smallmouth slurped down my Whopper Plopper.  The fish was only around 14 inches, but topwater strikes definitely get the adrenaline going, no matter the size of the fish.

Then Kirk got his first fish, which was pretty funny.  Prior to Saturday, he bought a baitcasting reel/rod, practiced with it in his backyard for a few hours and said he had a good hang of it.  Baitcasting equipment is a lot different from spinning.  I've tried for years to get a hang of baitcasters, and my experiments always end up with a birds nest of fishing line.

Kirk wins for biggest and most smallmouth
bass on this trip.

Anyway, Kirk was willing to try it on the big stage, and Pete tied a spinnerbait on Kirk's new rod.  He cast it out, and the line got moderately tangled.  With the spinnerbait sitting on the bottom of the river, Pete took the rod and sorted out the tangled mess, then handed the rod back.  Kirk started reeling, and there was a fish on the other end!  He reeled the fish in, but it wasn't a smallmouth.  What would try to gulp down a spinnerbait that was sitting on the river bottom?

Mr. Whiskers.  It was a 14-inch flathead catfish.

Unfortunately, the bass didn't get the memo that it was opening day because by 10 a.m., we were struggling.  I had two smallmouth, and Kirk had the flathead and another smallmouth (I think).  Pete suggested loading the boat and going to the Duncannon Campground, and we were all for it.

Down river, it was more of the same thing.  Not many fish.  I went around three hours without catching anything.  Kirk caught a few fish, but they were surprisingly dinks.  Usually the small Susquehanna smallies are at least 15 inches, but not today.

Around 2 p.m., Pete caught a decent smallmouth on a fluke swimbait, and I suggested switching to Reaction Innovations swimbaits.  Something I was really comfortable with, and I figured the fish were mid-range in the water column.

It was a good change because the smallmouth started going after them.  Unfortunately, all the bass were dinks.  Seriously, the smallest smallmouth I've seen caught on the river.

To his credit, Pete moved us around a lot trying to find fish.  It was apparent everybody else on the river were struggling, too, considering all the other boaters with their throttles pegged moving around the river.

At the end of the day, I caught seven smallmouth, and Kirk had 14.  Plus the flathead catfish.

The good news is that I'll be back at it again on July 1.  Karen booked a trip a few months ago with Jason, so hopefully the water is a little clearer then, and the smallmouth are hungry.

Sunny day sunfish

I fished the Little Patuxent for a few hours today and caught one smallmouth and my first sunfish of the year -- four of them in fact!

I went to the same area where I caught my biggest smallmouth ever on the Little Patuxent last month.  While the Wee R was the ticket that day, I only used it for a few minutes today because the water was a bit lower, and I figured it would get hung up a lot.

Temp was in the low 80s, not a cloud in the sky, and water temp was just a bit over 70.

Instead I tried the no-name spinnerbait and a Z-Man Finesse TRD worm.  The spinnerbait was sparking interest, but none of the fish could wrap their mouths around the hook.  At one point, I had two smallmouth bass chasing it on three straight casts.

The Z-Man worm could only get a few nibbles, so I switched to a Rapala Shadow Rap.  The little sunfish liked it -- they were doing banzai runs to try and grab the lure and run away with it.  One little -- and I mean little -- green sunfish did manage to get hooked:

Green sunfish, first one of the day.

After nothing but sunfish hit-and-runs for awhile, a smallmouth bass hit the no-name spinnerbait.  I saw the fish almost immediately after it was hooked and could tell it wasn't that big, but the tug on the other end definitely gave the impression of punching above its weight class.  A five-pound smallmouth stuffed in a one-pound body.

Smallmouth on the no-name spinnerbait and a Mitchell
300 reel, serial number 2165625 (made in 1958).

Eventually I decided it was time.  Time to break out a topwater lure for the first time this year.  I tied on a trusty Heddon Zara Puppy in a bull frog pattern, and the fish responded almost as soon as the lure hit the water!

Unfortunately, it was the banzai sunfish coming from the depths and trying to steal the lure, almost like they didn't want anyone to see them.  Three of the fishes did manage to chomp on a treble hook, all of them redbreast sunfish.

Three-inch lure, five inch fish.

Around 4:30 p.m., I called it quits.

Skinny river with Little Dippers

First fish of the day, a 12-inch smallmouth bass.

Fished a section of river that I had not fished before.

In a river that I haven't had much luck at all before, either.

And I managed to catch six smallmouth bass in about two hours.

A few weeks ago, I "discovered" the Avalon Park section of the Patapsco River.  This area is probably the closest smallmouth bass habitat near my house, but I only found it after poking around on Google Earth.  Or maybe I overlooked it before because it was a "park" with ample parking, picnic tables and shelters, and I figured it would be over-fished.

It turned out a lot better than I figured.  Twenty minutes in, I got the first smallmouth -- around 12 inches -- on a Z-Man Finesse TRD Worm.  But things went cold after that, despite the 70-degree weather and cloud-less skies.  Just nothing on the TRD worm or the no-name spinnerbait.  Tried a few different spots and still nothing.

Then after one particular spot without anything, I tied on a Reaction Innovations Little Dipper, and on the second cast, a fish clamped on as soon as the lure hit the water.  A 13-inch smallmouth.  Then another a few casts later.  And another.  Five fish total -- one more in the 12-inch range -- and a few that got off in about 30 minutes.

There were indeed quite a few people fishing, but none of them seemed to be catching.  Tossing bobbers or doing whatever, maybe I'm just smarter than them now -- ha ha!  Seriously, it was satisfying to show up in a new-to-me area -- that had a lot of evidence of fishing pressure -- and catch decent smallmouth.

Also, I spotted what looked like snakeheads cruising the river in one section.  They're supposed to be all over the place from the lower Potomac to all the way up to the lower Susquehanna, but I haven't seen one.  And they are supposed to be ultra-aggressive, but these fish paid no mind to the lures I was throwing.  I would really like to catch one because they are supposed to be really tasty.

I sent Maryland DNR a message through Facebook wondering if I did indeed see a snakehead (they look really similar to bowfin), and this was their response:

"A biologist familiar with the current distribution of snakehead in Maryland said they have been caught at Savage Mill (Patuxent) and sections of the Patapsco as well. he wouldn’t be surprised if some were seen in the Avalon area, it’s possible.  Thank you."

Cloudy with a chance of flatheads

George driving with Kirk on his phone searching
Harrisburg Craigslist for used jet-prop fishing boats.

Karen and I were planning on fishing the Susquehanna River last Friday, but rain earlier in the week raised the water level too high, and the trip was postponed until today.

Except Karen couldn't get away from work today, so my friend Kirk took the seat.  You might remember him from my first time fishing on the Susquehanna.  He has barely dipped his toe into the smallmouth waters but threatens to give up our other mutual hobby -- autocrossing -- and buy a jet-prop boat for river fishing.  I'm doing all I can to discourage him.

The guide we have gone out with before, Jason Shay, was booked up for all of April when Karen checked availability back in February, so I went searching for another guide.  Someone on a fishing forum mentioned Joe Raymond with Susquehanna Smallmouth Guides, and I contacted him.  He was booked, too, but put me in touch with one of his "overflow" guides, George DeFrehn.  We set a date for April 20 since it was my birthday, and I anxiously awaited the day.

And then Mother Nature had other ideas, and the trip got pushed back.  There was a slight sense of urgency because the river closes for smallmouth bass fishing in this section from May 1 to June 15, so if we couldn't get a date in, there wouldn't be any opportunity for awhile because I'm sure it would be really difficult to find an available guide at such short notice.

Luckily the river had gone down from almost 10 feet to below six.  Weather today called for some rain, but not nearly as much as from the previous week when the water level ballooned up.  Talking with George on Tuesday, he said we would be using tubes and -- surprise! -- Z-Man Finesse TRD Worms.

Just your run-of-the-mill 16-inch Susquehanna smallmouth.

Kirk and I got to the boat ramp, and lo and behold our old buddy Jason Shay was there with his boat in the water awaiting his client for the day.  He must have had a quick moment of panic thinking he mistakenly scheduled us for the day, too.

George showed up a few minutes later, put his boat in the water, and we were off.

The first stop, Kirk and and I each caught four or five fish -- the usual Susquehanna smallmouth in the 14-17 range. But after that it was really slow going.  Places George said he had success just a few days before weren't yielding much.  It was like a switch had turned the fish off.

The TRD worms hugging the bottom of the river were getting the most interest, and Kirk caught a few on some jerk baits.  George was throwing all kinds of lures trying to find something else that worked.

Roly-poly flathead.

I decided to change things up and tie on my Rebel Wee R, the same one I used two weeks ago to catch my personal best Little Patuxent smallmouth.  About five minutes later, a fish slammed the little crankbait.  I knew it was something good, but then I started to realize it probably wasn't a smallmouth.

It felt bigger than a smallmouth.

My hopes for a muskie peaked.

Then I caught a glimpse of the back half of the fish, it was no smallmouth!  It looked like a muskie!

Then George, who had come to the back of the boat with the net peered over the side, and said, "It's a catfish."  Then I saw the fish's head.

Yup, a catfish.  Mr. Whiskers had appeared again.  But this was no ordinary cat -- it was a flathead catfish.

George netted the fish, and it was quite big.  While it was no ordinary catfish, it was an ordinary size for a flathead -- 30 inches long and roughly 12 pounds.  Forty pounders have been caught in the Susquehanna!

Still, the fish was a beast to try and pull in, and it was probably my biggest fish of any kind ever.  It was also the first type of fish other than a smallmouth that I've caught on the Susquehanna.

Kirk with a smallmouth.

I did catch a couple smallmouth after that on the Wee R, but then I went through a dry spell of almost two hours without hooking anything.  I had 10 fish, and Kirk started yanking smallmouth in the boat and was up to about 17.  Fishing the same lures and in the same location.

We moved around quite a bit trying to find eager fish ... somewhere ... but couldn't narrow down a pattern.  Finally, I caught a smallmouth here and another there on a TRD worm, and another on a Reaction Innovations swimbait.

Then we moved to another section and floated down the river.  For the last hour of the day, even as it started pouring rain, the bite was on.  Like a switch had been flipped.

We were fishing an area that looked like four or five other sections George had taken us earlier in the day, but now the fish were showing some interest.  I started to have really good luck just dragging the TRD Worm slowly on the bottom and waiting.  Then dragging again.  I used the same orange worm from last Sunday on the Potomac to land almost 10 smallmouth.

I ended up with 22 smallmouth for the day while Kirk held on with the advantage by just two fish.  We caught the same number of flathead catfish -- one apiece -- but his was a whole lot smaller.

Most of the smallmouth were 14-plus inches.  Kirk got one that was almost 19 inches, and my best was about 17.  No matter the size, though, all the fish were chunky and had the typical smallmouth bass attitude and anger for getting tricked.  We jokingly speculated that maybe the fish weren't biting because they were full from gorging themselves.

Kirk and I ended the day at the new tradition for a Susquehanna fishing trip, Al's of Hampden.

Finessing the smallmouth bite

Karen only had one fish, but it was a big 'un!

The weather became seasonably warm, so Karen and I went camping on the Upper Potomac.

Monitoring the river gauges, it looked like the Potomac had gone way down but still flowed about two to three feet above normal summer levels.  It was also fairly stained, maybe max three feet of visibility.

First fish and biggest
of the weekend
for me.

We got to our camp site around 3 p.m. yesterday, and I went to a couple of my usual spots.  At the first one, the water was definitely higher than normal as there were no exposed rocks visible.  Starting off with what was successful on Wednesday on the Little Patuxent, I tied on a Z-Man Finesse TRD Worm on a medium-light rod with a 1964 Mitchell 300 reel, and Rebel Wee R on a medium-heavy St. Croix rod with a Pflueger Patriarch.

The TRD worm got the first fish of the day, a smallmouth bass about 15 inches.  Very subtle bite -- just a tap and then it felt like nothing on the other end.  But instinctively set the hook, and the fight was on.  The fish fought harder than the ones on Wednesday (water temp was about seven degrees higher than the Little Patuxent, so maybe the fish were more energized).

The Wee R wasn't hooking anything except dead foliage from the bottom of the river.

With nothing but that one fish for an hour plus, I moved to another "hotspot" in the area, a place I call The Plateau.  Still slow, but after awhile, another tap on the end of the line on the Z-Man worm, and another smallmouth, this one 14 inches.

The presentation was reeeaaallllyyy slow. Cast, let the lure sink to the bottom, slowly pull back on the rod tip to hop the lure across the bottom a foot or two, wait about five seconds, pull back again, wait five seconds, repeat.

A little bit later, Mr. Whiskers decided he wanted to snack on the Z-Man worm.  You never find Mr. Whiskers -- Mr. Whiskers finds you!

This smallmouth wanted a sample from The Jerk Store.

That was it for awhile, and I switched to a Rapala Shadow Rap on my other rod, ditching the Wee R.  The Rapala peaked the interest of a 12-inch smallmouth very close to the shore.  This fish actually hit pretty hard making me initially think it was something bigger.

That was it for the day.  I headed back to the campsite, where Karen had also returned but said she didn't catch anything.

This morning, I headed off to another spot hoping to catch a walleye, but nothing was even sniffing at the TRD Worm or Shadow Rap.  Shuffling to another spot, I caught a chunky 10-inch smallmouth on a TRD Worm, then a 12-inch smallmouth on the next cast.  Each fish just barely nipped at the lure but fought like a typical smallmouth thinking they were actually bigger than they were.

Back-to-back casts got a 10-inch smallmouth then this
one around 12 inches.

There was still some interest on the bottom-bouncing lure, and I had a few fish hooked but they came off. 

Then a fish hit the worm hard and started pulling the other way -- oh this felt like a good one!

Well it wasn't a smallmouth.  It was, again, Mr. Whiskers.  This one a bit bigger than the one yesterday.

Awhile later, I saw it was 8:40 a.m. and decided to go back to the camp site.  Just as I got on the trail, my phone buzzed with a notification.  Karen texted a picture of a 17-inch smallmouth she had just caught!  I found her a couple minutes later fishing an area I had skipped by.  She said she caught the big smallmouth on a Z-Man worm, too.  So definitely those were the ticket for the weekend.

We fished for a bit longer but without any luck, then headed back to our campsite for breakfast of scrambled eggs and Canadian bacon.

The weather looks "iffy" for the early part of the week with rain right now and extending into Monday.  After that, highs in the mid-50s.  But on Friday we are heading to the Susquehanna!

C&O Canal Trail.

Wee R catching fish

Rattling around the bottom of the tacklebox, the Rebel Wee R has risen.

It's been awhile, but I finally caught some fish!  After getting skunked the first few times out this year, I was beginning to wonder if them brown fish were ever going to awaken from their winter slumber. 

The weather had started to turn for the better, but not quite ideal with several warm days in a row.  The flakey weather kept having me put off side trips to the skinny rivers near my house, but I finally decided to venture to the Little Patuxent after work today.  Temps about 55 degrees and partly cloudy.  Water temp measured right at 50.  The river level was close to summer levels, but not quite as clear.

The plan was to start out with a Z-Man Finesse TRD Worm and a Rapala Shadow Rap and work them slowwww.  The first couple spots I tried produced nothing.  Not even a bite. 

First fish of the day
and 2018 -- a 12"
smallmouth.

Moving downriver, I decided to try a spot where I haven't caught anything in the past.  It's really slow moving current, very straight section of river, about three feet deep in the middle.  Lots of big rocks scattered on the bottom, though. 

After a couple casts with the TRD worm, there was a really subtle bite on the end.  I set the hook, and the fish fought back.  It came to the surface, and it was a decent smallmouth bass.  After hoisting the fish up the bank, it measured a nose over 12 inches!  Finally with the first fish on the board for 2018!

A few casts later, another fish loosely clamped onto the TRD worm, and it was another smallmouth bass, but only around 10 inches.

After trying the Rapala Shadow Rap without luck, I moved to another spot.  No bites on either lure here, and it was off to another spot.   And then no luck and off to another spot.  And another.

I decided to head back upriver but wanted to hit a few of those areas with other lures.  Looking through the little tackle box with me, I decided on the no-name spinnerbait and a small square-bill crankbait, a Rebel Wee-R.

A couple things here.  First, I've had this Rebel Wee-R for awhile, since before getting back into fishing in 2014.  So it's 10-15 years old at least (maybe not even made any more in this size?).  Second, all the kids these days say square-bill crankbaits work, and I have made a note to add them to my repertoire this year. They have a fat profile, and the bill supposedly helps skip the lure snag-free across rocks. I've bought a few on impulse buys at Susquehanna Fishing Tackle, but why not try the lure that's been rattling around in my possession for several years?  If I snag it or launch it into a tree, it's not a great loss.

It was a good decision.

Back upriver at another spot where the TRD worm and Shadow Rap had no interest, the Wee R had a a strong strike, but the fish didn't get hooked.  The no-name spinnerbait had some swipes, too, but also nothing.  I kept slow presentations with both lures -- the Wee R barely wobbling through the water, and the blade barely churning on the spinnerbait.

After a few more spots without any luck, I returned to the same section where I caught the two smallmouth bass earlier.  The spinnerbait had some interest ... from trout!  The Maryland DNR stocks trout in the Little Patuxent and many other rivers and streams during the offseason, and that includes golden trout, a variation of rainbow trout (but not to be confused with golden trout found in the western U.S.). They are easy to spot cruising the river because of their bright coloring.  And this one nibbled on the spinnerbait and actively followed it on subsequent casts.

Switching to the Wee R, the trout still showed interest but wouldn't bite.  After a few casts into another section to avoid the curious trout, I had a light hit on the little crankbait.  But when I set the hook, it felt like something good.  The fish rose to the surface (but didn't jump), and I could tell it wasn't any ordinary Little Patuxent smallmouth.  Not even a 12-incher.

I got the fish on the bank and measured it at 16 inches.  I've caught three 15 inchers prior on the Little/Middle Patuxents, so this was my biggest for those rivers.

Sixteen inches, a new best on the Little/Middle Patuxents!

My personal-best from the Potomac -- a 17-incher -- came in September, so maybe this bodes well for the trip Karen and I have next Friday on the Susquehanna.  The temps are supposed to be going back up the next few days, so who knows.  Smallmouth Season has started!