Smallies in the slop

[Paul Roberts]

Had a neat, and new, experience the other day. I'm normally a largemouth fisher -of late anyway. I found a pond with both smallmouth and largemouth. I decided to target the LM and found some in the slop (milfoil and algae) -there were bluegills in there. But I found smallies mixed in too. They had inserted themselves into the dense cover with the 'gills and LM.

These are not extensive slop areas, just a 20 foot wide band of mostly milfoil with filamentous algae.

I had to adjust the hookset, further than with LM -waiting a tad longer for them to handle the lure. I finally went with a ScumFrog popper that was smaller and had a smaller hook. This 19" though didn't need extra time. She was hooked deep -she didn't bleed but was hooked on the back of the tongue. Hope she's OK.

I hooked two more big smallies, on a weedless jig, at the outside edge of the weedwall -another 19", and a 20" I dropped. That 20 jumped, then spun me around in my float tube before popping free directly below me. Oooooh that was a nice smallie.

[Jeff H]

Never heard of slop smallies before.  Thats new to me!

[thetr20one]

Never heard of slop smallies before. Thats new to me!

Nice smallie Paul!!!!! I have literally just rediscovered a local lake I have never fished from a boat and found the smallies to be shallow and in the lillies at times. I used to bank fish with my dad there when I was a kid. Now my friend has a house very near there and has taken it on as his "new home" lake. The first time we went out there on a boat I was surprised at how shallow these guys were. They were not spawning they were just feeding I guess.

[Paul Roberts]

Yeah, spawning's done here too. Some smallies have staked out bluegill colonies, others are cruising the weed edges, and some are inserting into the slop. There's 'gills all over the pond shore to shore, and all over the surface. I think though that the above scenarios are the bass' best bet at successful hunts.