Fishing Forum

A good friend and retired USFWS fisheries biologist from Georgia flew to Idaho for his third trip after some Snake River Smallmouth Bass. We fished in Fudge's boat (my Boykin Spaniel who thinks he owns the boat) for five days last week.

Monday. Nothing really special happened, other than we caught 59 smallmouth, but nothing over 16 inches. We did keep 6 fish that were about 13" for a fish fry Tuesday night. In this photo, Roger shows a typical fish from our secret spot.


Tuesday. This day we fished a bit lower down the river, and had a very exciting day. We caught 60 fish, including a really nice smallmouth. Roger hooked into a decent smallie, and while fighting the fish stated that there was a big carp chasing his fish. Knowing the proclivities of smallies to chase a hooked fish and try to steal their food, I immediately threw my spinnerbait near his fish. I immediately hooked up. Luckily Roger's fish was landed quickly and he got the net. The result was this beautiful 21" smallmouth, that probably came close to 5 pounds. I felt bad that Roger didn't hook the fish on his cast, but was happy to show him what the Snake can produce.

A bit further downstream we were casting to some reed beds, picking up fish now and then, when I spotted something wiggling on the edge of the reeds. I ran us upstream and into the bank and discovered a sturgeon that was about four foot long. It was in distress, and had a softball size lump in the stomach area. The fisheries biologist in Roger came to the fore and after trying, unsuccessfully, to right the fish, we decided to puncture this very soft lump. When we did so, the lump collapsed like a punctured balloon and air bubbles came out the hole. We left the fish in an upright position against the reeds. When we came back three days later, it was no longer anywhere to be seen.


On Wednesday we fished a spot that sometimes produces big fish, but we didn't hit them. We did catch 39 fish up to 16" and decided to quit early and look over some of the reels in my collection. Here is a photo of one of the fish. You can see the Chattergrub in his mouth.


Thursday. We went back to our first day's drift and caught a bunch of nice fish on Flukes in shallow water before the sun came up over the ridge. We then ran upstream and drifted down through a shallow riffle and did well. We ended the day with 53 fish, including one that was 18".

Friday. We went back to our sturgeon drift area, but as we were running up the river, I suddenly decided to go around an island to an area I had not fished before and give it a try. This was a big flat with water ranging from 1-5 foot deep. The bottom was large gravel mixed with grass beds. You can get a good idea of the type of water from this photo of Roger working a Fluke.

We worked this area over with Flukes and caught 33 smallmouth before 9 AM. We took a break and shared our coffee and cinnamon rolls with Fudge.
We drifted down a couple of miles catching fish all along the way, when we came to an island and decided to give Fudge some exercise. As we pulled into an opening of the reeds lining the bank we saw a fish against the bank. Holy Moly! It was another sturgeon. This one was about 2' long. It spooked as we pulled up toward it, but a few minutes later it reappeared off the stern of the boat and there was no doubt this was a small sturgeon. I guess this part of the river has some natural reproduction.
After all this excitement, we gathered up Fudge and continued our drift down the river. We caught a bunch of really nice fish up to 16" this day and ran the counter up to 90 fish. It was a really great ending to five days of quality fishing with a fine friend.

Edited: I failed to mention that we also caught 2 channel cats and Roger landed a 17" largemouth bass.
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Nice pics and report. Hope I get on the snake bass fishing before it gets cold again.

Windriver
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now thats what I call a fishorama![fishin]
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Thanks for sharing a great trip . Curt G.
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All I can say is WOW and I'm jealous!!![:/]

Wish my bass boat could float the Snake. Great trip!!!
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Wow those are vey nice fish, and an even better story...thanks. I fished the Umpqua a couple weeks ago and caught 137 fish, but nothing much bigger than 16 inches. We did most of our fishing with a fly rod, by then end of the day my arm was pretty tired. I guess I need to take my boat to the Snake, it is much closer and the fishing is just as good.
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at long last ! i always await your bass posts smartweed ! put me in the jelous column as well.......those are some great bass. sounds like you had a great time with your friends as well. great story. maybe i will go fishing this year yet. i am missing out on a lot. but hunting season is here now............[]
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Wow, sounds like a pretty awesome week of fishing! This makes me wish I still had my jet boat, don't think my pontoon boat is up for any skinny water. []

You mentioned using a fluke for smallmouth, and I have read about others doing the same. I have tried them four or five different times this summer, with no success. I have tried multiple colors in the 5 inch size, both weighted and unweighted .

I was curious, what size of fluke do you have success with?
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all white super fluke or super fluke Jr. rigged weightless with an extra wide gap hook.

catch bass from PA to AZ to ID all over rivers and lakes. the smallmouth love them jerked right under the surface or right on the surface.

also good colors are baby bass and bubble gum
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Great post and great fishing Smartweed!

I sure like that that boat of yours. My next one will be like it so I can fish the river....
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Smartweed is your boat a G3 Eagle with an outboard jet?
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Quote:You mentioned using a fluke for smallmouth, and I have read about others doing the same. I have tried them four or five different times this summer, with no success. I have tried multiple colors in the 5 inch size, both weighted and unweighted .

I was curious, what size of fluke do you have success wit

I use the Zoom Super Salty Fluke (5 inch). I think it is the best casting fluke-type bait and has great action. I agree with Jabink89 in that light colors are the best. My favorite color is pearl, but almost any light color seems to work well for me (I'm not sure that color means as much as confidence, however).

I do disagree on the rigging. I nose hook my Flukes. I use a 1/0 Owner Mosquito hook rigged through the nose of the fluke. I hook it from bottom to top until the hole gets worn, and then hook it again through the nose, but side to side. I don't find it makes any difference. I don't find enough problem with weeds to rig weedless, and get better action and better hookups with the Fluke hooked through the nose, than I do with them rigged with a EWG type hook.

I took a weekday off today, and didn't fish my usual areas for a week before Roger came to fish with me, but I have made 14 trips to the river so far this month. I have boated 567 smallies, and would guess that 50% of them have hit a Fluke.
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Quote:Smartweed is your boat a G3 Eagle with an outboard jet?

No, my boat is a G3 1860 CCJ Deluxe Jon Boat, with a Yamaha 90/65 4 stoke jet engine. I have now had three river boats, and after three years I can sure say this is the best one by far. Yamaha owns G3 and the engine is set up precisely for the tunnel hull on this boat. I can run over most floating weeds like you find on the river today. The only thing that stops it is when I go on the wrong side of an island and run into a solid weedbed in a foot or two of water. The Deluxe version comes with a vinyl coated interior which allows me to just wash out all the sand that Fudge and I accumulate. I've had it over 3 years and it will probably be my last jet boat. I bought it over the phone from a dealer in Billings, MT, who gave me a great trade on my old boat. It was delivered to my door the next day by a driver for the company.

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It sure looks like a sweet boat and perfect for the section of the snake in our neck of the woods! Great choice. I hope to one one or something like it one day.

I like my Nitro a lot but it is just for lakes................
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Awesome day with your friend. The great fish are a bonus too.
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Smartweed are you rigging the fluke weightless on light line? I have never used them before so I am curious. I have always been a grub, gitzit, worm kinda guy but I want to try some new stuff....[]
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Since there are only some grass beds to deal with in the River and no real heavy cover, I prefer to use as light an outfit as is practical in all my smallmouth fishing. That is one of the reasons I nose hook my flukes. I don't have to drive the hook through a bunch of plastic to set the hook. A nose hooked Fluke almost always slides up the line as the hook takes hold. Unfortunately, accompanying smallies often steal the Fluke off the line as I am fighting the hooked fish. I use my Flukes weightless, and fish them on a GLoomis 6'6" IMX 2 power casting rod and use 15 pound braided line. I fish casting rods for all my smallmouth fishing, except for drop shotting, and most of my reels are rigged with 10 or 15 pound braided line, which has the diameter of 2 or 4 pound monofilament. I am also fishing grubs, tubes or small craw baits, and spinnerbaits at this time. There are plenty of very active fish and bottom bouncers are not often needed.
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Cool Thanks Smartweed. To make sure I understand, when you say "nose hook" you mean hooked like in the picture?
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Thank you very much for sharing, I will have to give this a try sometime.
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