Yesterday (Mon 1/30) I pulled my boat down to the Snake River at Marsing to make sure everything was working OK. It was a 45 degree breezy afternoon here. The boat ran fine, so I spent an hour and a half searching out some smallmouth bass. I only had one strike, but it did result in a dandy 17" smallie for my first fish of the year. The water was a bit mirky with about 2' visibility, and its temp was 42 degrees. There is a massive amount of floating grass coming down the river, which precluded fishing moving baits. The fish was caught on a Junebug grub on a drop shot rig in about 8' of water. The fishing should be good below Swan Falls dam where the water should be warmer from the turbines. Things will be picking up shortly.
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Hey Smartweed...when do you ususally start hitting the Swan Falls and down areas? And do they ever hit cranks in that cold of water?
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Where do you think the grass is coming from? Good job on the early fish. Ron
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Thanks for the report! I'm just itchin' to go!
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Addition: When it finally cleared and quit blowing, I decided to give the river another try today. I again got a fish in about the same place as yesterday. I fished for another hour without a strike. I then tried a hole that had not produced in the past, but this time held the mother lode. I caught 6 in this spot and had about that many others on for a short time. I finally figured out that they were hitting the drop shot weight, not the bait. I have had this happen before. If I had the grub or a tube on a jig, rather than the drop shot, I probably could have caught more. Regardless, when the 6th fish went back in the water he must have reported in, for I never had another hit. These fish ran from 12-15 inches.
The grass comes from last years growth being washed off, and it makes crank bait fishing no fun for me. At this time of year it's almost impossible to fish any moving bait.
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An easy to overlook trick that is legal is fish a dropshot but use a jig instead of a weight. You will get hung up but you have two baits in the water, you can find out which they are hitting, and you always have the chance for a double.
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bass allready, good job !
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Wow, great to get a bass outing in January! Way to go. I love the nice weather that has been sneaking in.
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That's awesome, I'm very jealous.
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