Susquehanna river in PA

[Gundog]

Couple hours of fishing gave me this nice 2 1/2 pounder.

[RickB]

Here are some of my best catches from my Susquehanna river trip back in April. Thanks to all of those who gave me tips on how to fish it. Most were caught on Jerk bait and T-rig craw. I couldn't connect with the tubes and the others that were fishing them caught more than me. All in all I caught 50 plus in 3 days so I consider it a successful trip.

[TnRiver46]

Nice fish @RickB, that river looks huge 

[Turkey sandwich]

12 hours ago, RickB said:

Here are some of my best catches from my Susquehanna river trip back in April. Thanks to all of those who gave me tips on how to fish it. Most were caught on Jerk bait and T-rig craw. I couldn't connect with the tubes and the others that were fishing them caught more than me. All in all I caught 50 plus in 3 days so I consider it a successful trip.

 

 

Congrats on the fish! It looks like the quality was awesome while you were out. I'm just glad you seemed to enjoy your trip.  I've been stuck inside the last few weekends and I'm chomping at the bit to get out this weekend.  Some of the pictures I've been seeing via facebook from guys on the Susquehanna are ridiculous.  This spring (and it's been weird) seems to have had the Susquehanna fishing amazing when it's actually fishable.   Hopefully you had a good enough time to see why some of us love that river.  Also, that jet boat has me pretty jealous.

 

What were the conditions while you got out?  It looks like you had quite the mix of weather?

6 hours ago, TnRiver46 said:

Nice fish @RickB, that river looks huge 

 

The Susquehanna is a big river.  A little further downstream near Harrisburg, it stays consistently well over a mile wide the rest of it's length down to the reservoirs and into the Chesapeake.  The main stem alone is something like 450 or 500 miles long.  

[RickB]

Thanks guys, had a very good trip and will be going back someday, Mike the guy's boat I was on said the top water action is awesome at times and would really like to go when they're hitting on top. Friday 4/13 air temp was 80 water mid 40s, Saturday 4/14 air was 84 water upper 40s, Sunday 4/15 air was 44 wind chill 35 with misting rain off and on water temp low 50s. Sunday was when we did the best, guess the few degrees rise in water temp turned them on. I haven't caught that many bass in one day in my life. Crappie maybe but not bass. I really need to learn more about fishing tubes. Mike was wearing them out on Sunday with them, I just couldn't pick it up. Should have been easy but I caught my fair share on green pumpkin rage craw. Switched to a jerk bait started picking up some numbers and size. Elbow was sore by days end from flinging that jerk bait so much. For those that have access to that river on a regular basis I'm really jealous of you.

[Gundog]

Love those brown pigs @RickB. Glad you enjoyed the best of the Susky. It is an awesome river in the spring. If you love topwater smallies try to make a trip up in the fall. Early in the morning when the fog is still on the water it can be explosive. 

[RickB]

Thanks Gundog, we talked about a fall trip. Hope I can make it happen.

[Turkey sandwich]

Definitely do!  The fishing can be super fast and the scenery is awesome.  Also, the potential for fun multi species fishing can be awesome.  It's not uncommon to catch smallmouth, walleye, channel cats, and pike/musky over a single day/weekend.

[patred]

Weird I've fished the Susquehanna five times since 2016, and the trip last month was the first time I caught something other than a smallmouth.

 

Pat

[Turkey sandwich]

2 hours ago, patred said:

Weird I've fished the Susquehanna five times since 2016, and the trip last month was the first time I caught something other than a smallmouth.

 

Pat

That looks like a great flathead!  I'm still yet to pick one up on the north branch, but wouldn't be surprised to start seeing more of them in the near future.  

 

Sometimes it depends on season and where you're catching fish, but walleye and channel cats are super common. 

[Choporoz]

Interesting article....

https://lancasteronline.com/sports/outdoors/mystery-solved-a-virus-killed-the-susquehanna-river-s-smallmouth/article_f963049c-65bc-11e8-bd24-8f17a13f2de5.html

Appears to be well written article...first couple paragraphs pasted here:

 

"Mystery solved: a virus killed the Susquehanna River's smallmouth bass all those years

A college laboratory has solved what has been a maddening 13-year mystery: what killed so many of the prized smallmouth bass in the lower Susquehanna and Juniata rivers, beginning in 2005?

The answer — a shocker to Pennsylvania and federal investigators — is largemouth bass virus.

It’s a disease that was known to be present in Susquehanna smallmouths but had been ruled out early on because it was thought it couldn’t harm them. 

Turns out it can be lethal when the shallow water near the banks of the river where young bass roam becomes stagnant and hot, turning into a soupy cauldron of deadly pathogens.

In that environment, the virus does not kill the bass, but it allows lesions and ugly sores where bacteria and fungus settle in, proving fatal......."

[Gundog]

41 minutes ago, Choporoz said:

 

Turns out it can be lethal when the shallow water near the banks of the river where young bass roam becomes stagnant and hot, turning into a soupy cauldron of deadly pathogens.

In that environment, the virus does not kill the bass, but it allows lesions and ugly sores where bacteria and fungus settle in, proving fatal......."

Circumstances are not surprising. They suspected when it happened that the extremely warm water and lack of oxygen had a part in the problem. They did think that chemicals released from factories and sewage from homes along the Susquehanna had played a part in it. 

[Turkey sandwich]

I've seen the same stories.  The whole thing is infuriating, but I'll save everyone my environment rant. I'm just glad that they finally figured out this problem. 

[TOXIC]

When I used to fish the North Fork of the Doah all the time the instances of lesions/sores on fish steadily increased through the years.  No one could pin it down.  No one could explain it.  Multiple "studies" done.  Then one day as I was wading, I ran into some old timers who made it perfectly clear to me.  There are a lot of poultry operations along the river and when the price of fertilizer went down (which was what all of the chicken litter was sold for) it was a common occurrence to see big trucks from the poultry farms dumping directly into the river.  The influx of phosphates from the litter IMHO was ravaging the fish population.  Too much money and clout with big firms like Tyson to get a straight answer.