This spring I thought it would be interesting to keep a log of all smallies caught out of my boat between 5 & 6lbs and between 6 & 7lbs. I hopefully wanted to record a third category of 7 to 8lbs but that didn't happen. The log data only included three months, April, May & October, prime months for me. The total of five to six lbers was 60 smallies. The total of six to seven lbers was 8 smallies. Biggest fish went 6-15. That makes for roughly a one out of eight ratio or put another way you have to catch eight 5lbers before you are going to catch one over six pounds. And unless your lucky you won't break seven. Since I started fishing lake erie for smallies about 2005 I have noticed a yearly change regarding the numbers of quality fish. Some years the number of six to seven lbers sky rocketed while others years we barely saw a true six. The numbers of legit five pounders bodes well for the future. Total time spent fishing out of those three months was about 7 weeks. All 68 smallies were caught on jerk baits.
Now if we just get Steve Parks to spill the beans about his numbers.
