justinrose40

"If You Ain't Hangin', You Ain't Fishin'." - My Dad (He says this every single time I get hung up, he never misses a one, and it does usually lighten the mood.) "Never Give Up!" - M.I. (I know a lot of you are probably tired of hearing this one, but it can sure change your mind set on a tough day)

I had never heard of anyone spraying anything on the pollen to clear it up. Pretty good idea for anyone who fishes for bed fish, if it's legal on your lake. My home lake is a zero discharge lake, and enforces a 25,000 dollar fine if your caught putting any form of foreign substance into the lake.

Thanks Road Warrior. People were starting to panic that something had happened to the smallmouth. Because no one was catching the size or numbers they were used to. Some thought that live bait fishermen had packed them out over the Winter, but I work at a dock on the lake and I knew that no one had hardly fished all Winter (too cold) this year. I thought that there had to be a natural reason for the lack of fish being caught just didn't know which one of the two scenerios was most likely the problem.

My home lake in South-Eastern Kentucky usually turns out some really good bags of early spring smallmouth. Usually takes low 20lbs to money in early spring tournaments. This year the water went from 40 deg. to 65 deg. in roughly 4-5 weeks. I fish a lot of tournaments and the biggest weight I heard of this spring was 17lbs, but mostly 11-14 lbs or less. It seems like there was no pre-spawn bite, smallmouth seemed to move straight up and start to bed. This past weekend it took 20lbs to money for first time all spring, but these were all bed fish (mixed bag largies and smallies). I was just wondering if anyone has experienced similar conditions on lakes they fish in the past, and if I could expect the post-spawn bite to be a little better this year as it seems fish didn't spend as much time feeding up before going on the bed this year? Another factor that may figure in but I'm not sure, is the fact that we had a pretty sizable shad die off this year just before it began to warm up. I understand that this happens every year on certain lakes, but there was a noticebly larger amount of dead shad floating this spring. Could this abundance of easy targets as the fish moved up, account for the very poor pre-spawn bite?

Congrats. Nice Fish

I have never thrown a buzzbait much at all, just haven't got the confidence in it due to not throwing it, but I have a friend who writes articles for some state and regional magazines and he has done a few on buzzbaits. He catches a lot of fish in the summer, all night long on a buzzbait. Personally, I've never did more than give it a very short try, but I do know several people that say they work great in certain water temperatures in the middle of the night.

I use a net on anything that I don't want to lose the chance to take a picture of. I respect the fact that some guys are anti-net, but whether a fish was lipped or dipped really don't do anything for me personally. Just seems silly to me to take a chance on losing a good fish, for the sake of not using a dip-net. But, to each his own.

Ever cut the main line instead of the tag and toss a sinking bait over the edge of the boat, just to watch it slowly disapear? Good for a laugh when it happens to your buddy, not so much when it happens to you.

3" smoke grub on 1/4 ounce led head around bolders or on bluff walls.

Joining Bass Fishing Resource of Course. A more specific ocasion, I was fishing a night tournament on my home lake and was catching fish good on a brown jig with a brown trailor up until about midnight. Then took a 4 hour dry spell, finally around 4 am I took the time to think about what had changed. Then it hit me, duh, the moon had sat around midnight, and the bass must not be able to see my brown/brown jig good enough. I took the brown trailer off and replaced it with a charlie one and caught a throwback on the first cast, 5 cast later caught a 5lber and was able to finish up our limit before daylight and ended up finishing 4th in a tournament that it looked like we had no chance of finishing in the money in. This was probably an easy decision to have made, but for some reason it took me 4 hours to think of it, but when I did it payed off big time.

If your'e going to make a trip North for Smallies, I would look into traveling to Dale Hollow in TN. I've caught Smallmouth in middle TN out of Douglas, Norris, and Cherokee, but if you're going to have to travel anyway, why not go to the lake that holds the current World Record Smallmouth. I live about 2 hours from Dale Hollow and about 15 min. from Laurel Lake which is another great Smallmouth fishery in SouthEastern Kentucky. I have seen a lot of 5-6 lbrs caught out of both lakes in the last few years. My dad caught a 6.2 last week out of Laurel and a friend of mine caugtht a 7.3 2 weeks ago out of the same lake. Smallmouth fishing is very good right now but with water temps getting close to 60 I'd say they'll be nesting anytime and you can expext to see those weights start to fall quickly. I'm sure that you can find some smallmouth fishing closer to home, but these two lakes are the best I know of in the TN-Ky area. Good luck in wherever you decide to go and when you hook one hold on tight.

I have never fished that far north, but when the water temperature is 42-45 on my home lake in Kentucky I catch a lot of pre-spawn Smallies by swimming a 3 or 4" grub on a 1/4 ounce led head. I target rocky points or bluff walls that are close to deep water. I throw the grub up on the point and let it hit the bottom and then slow roll it back letting it bounce off of the bottom on the way back when I can. On the bluffs I reel it very slow letting it fall from one ledge to the next. I don't know if this technique will work on your Northern lake but it's very productive for me down here. May be worth a shot, Good Luck.

Fish something you are confident in, and fish hard til the very end. It took me awhile to be able to do this. I used to panic in the last 2-3 hours of a tournament if I didn't have the fish I wanted, in turn I was waisting these hours by fishing to fast. I took just one tournament with no fish for the first 6 hours and then 15lbs the last 2 hours for a 4th place finish to get me on the right track. It's not easy, but make yourself fish hard and slow until the very end.

Thanks for the information, just something I've always been curious about, but was actually getting worried about this year. By the way, saw my first two pairs of nesting largemouth today. Giving sunshine for the next few days so things are looking up.

I have fished Cedar Creek, but only once. At first I thought "wow this bank looks great", then I thought "wow this whole lake looks great". I was a little overwhelmed. I have heard stories of some good fish coming out of there but I didn't have any luck at all, the time I went. I want to fish Cedar Creek some more, but I've got to get some more info before I go back. My dad caught a 6.22 Smallmouth last Saturday in this same tournament at Laurel and I weighed a 6.3 largemouth for a guy at the dock on Wed. They are really on right now at Laurel.

good question tcain, I've wondered this myself. How long can they wait roadwarrior? As long as it takes? Water here has been bouncing back and forth between 52-56 degrees on my home lake for at least a month now. Been catching SM and LM both busting at the seems and the SM haven't even started nesting yet at least not the majority of them.

Better make it down before the end of May Big Tom, after that the lake turns horrible until the fall. I think it is the deep clear water that cause the fish to suspend so deep in the summer. As good as this lake has became in the spring it is that bad in the summer. By July it will take 5lbs or less to win the local Tuesday nighter. Sucks, because you know they're down there. Just can't figure them out.

I have somehow just recently been introduced to the swim jig, I had heard of it before but never really gave it much thought. I fish a spinnerbait a lot on my home lake and they bite it pretty good, but sometimes they won't hit it even when I know that they are there. I've been searching the internet for any info I can find on how to fish a swim jig and/or what colors and sizes are best in different conditions. The lake I fish the most is a very deep, clear lake with a good number of coves sporting standing timber. Post-spawn I fish the timber a lot with a spinnerbait, but I believe that a swim jig would excel here under certain conditions. Does anyone have any advice on how to fish a swim jig, or what size and color combinations are best for a deep clearwater lake in south-eastern Kentucky.

Daytime I usually just take water, but at night I take water, gatoraide, and snickers. A snickers bar will carry me a long way. I fish in a club with an older guy who before every night tournament stops at KFC and gets a bucket of chicken legs. He puts the bucket under the console and chows down when he's ideling from point to point. I think the chicken greese must be a good fish attractant, because he catches as many fish as anyone and more than most members of my club.

I catch a lot of post spawn smallies in south eastern Kentucky on a charlie/white 3/8 ounce terminator. I use a chartreuse or white swimming chunck, depending on the water clarity. If there biting pretty good it usually doesn't take that long to decide on the trailor.

Congrats, on the nice catch. I agree with the comment on checking your scales. It can be hard to judge a fish from a picture, but I fished a tournament last weekend and three of our five keepers where between 20 and 21" and all three broke five pounds on the tournament scales. I don't have a picture to compare it to, unfortanetly, but I don't remember any of them looking that fat. Congrats again. If you had only caught the big fish in an evening of fishing, I'm not sure that I would call that slow, not on my lake anyway. It took all 8 hours Saturday for us to put together our 5 fish limit.

I fished a public budd bass tournament on my home lake, Laurel River Lake in southeast Kentucky, this weekend. My partner and I had 21.56 lbs on 5 fish and finished 3rd. It took over 23lbs to win. I've posted a coment earlier about the increasing weights it was taking to win a tournament on this lake in the spring, but unil now I had always been on the outside looking in. It was kind of disapointing to have such a great catch and not win the tournament, but on the other hand it is extremely encouraging to see bags this size becoming the norm on my home lake. My previous comment credited the huge number of 5lb+ smallmouth that are being caught in recent years for the increase in weight needed to place in a tournament, but our bag consisted of just one Smallmouth just over 5lbs, and 4 largemouth, with two of them weighing in right at 5lbs or a little better. It is a great feeling to see a lake that is experiencing a growth in both populations.

Well we didn't end up going to Reelfoot, something fell through with the jonboats we were borrowing to take at the last minute, so we decided to save the trip and fish 3 days on Laurel Lake, which is our home lake. Fishing was extremely tough there we only caught 21 fish out of two boats in three days and most of those were small fish. We did have two smallmouth over 5lbs and one just over 4lbs. The Reelfoot trip was a bust, but we salvaged what we could and we all had a good time. Turns out it rained all three days on us, but we stayed on a houseboat each night. If we went to Reelfoot we were going to tent camp. So it may be a good thing that we didn't get to go. I still want to go to Reelfoot sometime, if I ever get the chance I'll be sure and post the results on here.

I agree, I just fished 4 days straight from daylight til close to dark each day. I mainly threw a grub. By the mid morning of the third day my back was destroyed. It didn't help that the wind blew and it rained for most of the four days. I can't imagine throwing a crankbait or jerkbait all day for 4-5 days in a row. Of course the money helps I supose.

I'm sure there are other camping around the lake, but I know there is a nice campground in the State Park. I used to stay there a lot with my family when I was younger. It's close to a good ramp, and the brand new state dock marina. Fishing is very good in that area of the lake also, I usually fish the mouth of Wolf River and the Illwill, Fanny Creek area. Good Luck. If I can talk my wife out of a beach vacation the first weekend in April, I am going to fish a tournament that Saturday at the Hollow, if I do I'll post any info I find out.