On Saturday, I did a 4.5 mile wade. The river was characterized by lots of shallow too wide flat pools with shade on 10' of the 80' wide stream.
A friend had put me onto it with a 10 16"+ fish day a few weeks ago. I waited for the fish to 'refresh' and tried it out. Things I noticed: gras carp are very common. Bigmouth buffalo and smallmouth buffalo are a lot more common than they used to be in some areas. Gar.
Lots of erosion on the stream at first, and dinked and dunked early. 20 bass with a couple 14s by the time I hit the first bridge. Sammy or trd. Had a couple of decent splashes that completely whiffed Sammy. Above first bridge we finally got into some good habitat, and it was from there on I started catching lots of 12" smallies. One 17.5" on Sammy. When the haze gave way to cloudyness, I caught 12 fish out of one eddy then added another 18 the next pool up. It was getting crazy. Dinks, to 15" fish. But where were the big ones?
By 2pm, I was at 111 smallmouth bass, breaking my previous personal bests. Another 17 on trd and a few 16 and 15 on Wake Crank. Another 17" on Sammy and I was at 131 bass, and only 3 pm!
Kept fishing, but honestly, it was getting as rough on me as it was on the fish. One fish after another on trd on bottom. Sick. I inadvertently dunked my Shimano reel and you all know what happened after that. BOUND UP. Cheap reels do not waterproof. This made it hard to get to the 200 smallmouth bass goal.
I was in the 170's and closing in on my take out bridge and bike shuttle. Another 17 on Sammy. never did find the big fish, 181. A friend did, so I don't know what it says abut this stretch? Upgrade my sunglasses? Weird. Didn't see anything big.
Now my 10# braid was wind knotting. I tried to deal with the kink and couldn't get it out, kept casting. Removing line would decrease cast distance. Basically, with two KO'd rods, and energy levels at a super low level, I was KO'd. met a nice local who was a name redacted river watch. He gave me a ride to my car. I gifted him a Sammy and some trd's and jigs.
I knew I would maybe only ever have one chance at 200 bass. That's not to say I wont try again. I was going to fish both days this weekend. This much action wore me out.
183 Bass, 182 SMB and 1 KY Spot, 5 Rock bass 4-17-17.5, 3- 16", 10-15"
