Dwight Hottle

lake trout

Smallie

Here is my biggest smallie & walleye for 2008. Also last years biggest pike & lake trout.

Nice river smallie. I can share your concern with thinking it could be a catfish. I hooked a giant this spring on a crankbait on lake erie and it turned out to be a 10.5 lb channel cat.

Rapala's do catch PB's. A real beauty.

Nice fish, great picture.

Listen to Mass Hole Mike. Good ideas.

Way to go. A PB smallie on topwater is an accomplishment.

Try back to back uni knot. I use 20lb or 30lb ultracast baid & 12lb or 15lb maxima ultragreen for leaders. Maxima ultragreen is very abraison resistant & very strong for the line test rating. The back to back uni knot is bullet proof for strength.

Lake Erie.....7lb-6oz.

Nice river bass. I would guess 5lb-5.5lb range.

Good eye. The hair jigs I use are made by Jensen Jigs. He does tie some with rabbit fur.

Mike, You got love those PBs.

Roadwarrior, Thanks for the compliment. Breaking the the 7lb mark has been my goal for the last couple of years. Here is a second shot of the same fish. The biologists say the great lakes smallie population is sufering from the gobies interfering with successful spawning but the extra food source the gobies provide in the food chain makes the existing smallies even bigger & thicker per inch of length. We catch a very high ratio of six pounders to overall fish caught. I keep thinking that yesterdays 6 lber is tomorrows 7lber & todays 7lber is soon to become an 8lber.

I typically drift with the wind over structure dragging the jig tipped with golden shinners. Most of the time I work jerk baits. Here is a picture of my long time fishing buddy holding two smallies weighing 13 lbs caught last week.

Here is a new PB from last week. Weighed 7lb-6oz and measured 22" long by 17" girth. She is still swimming.

Roadwarrior, Here is a Lake Erie smallie from 4/30/08 caught on a hair jig. 22" long by 17" girth, weighed 6lb-14oz.