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May 21 - The river is finally coming down
to fishable levels. My son came over and fished with me a few times this
spring, and on this date he caught a dandy 18" smallmouth.
It was caught on a 3" tube in watermelon color.
As can be seen we had a beautiful afternoon to be on the river. |
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June 1 - Due to an abundance of snow
in the mountains the river ran extremely high until a few weeks ago. I
had caught some smallmouth during the end of May, but the channel cats
weren't taking my bass offerings; until today. This fat cat really took
me for a ride. He hit a nose hooked 3" Yum Dinger. The rod is a Loomis
IMX SpinJig 721 (that's light) that I had customized during the winter
and the reel is a Daiwa Fuego 1000, loaded with 8 pound Power Pro
braided line. |
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June 17. We decided that we needed a
new boat to fish out of since Fudge had too much energy to contain
himself in a 16' boat. This G3 jet boat arrived from Montana today. It
is a fine looking river boat. |
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June 19. Maybe the new boat is going
to bring me fishing luck. Here's my first river "photo fish" (18" & up)
of the year. This one was 18" and despite the high and dirty water it
found my drop shot sculpin in about 10' of water. It put up a great
fight. I was using a Shimano Crucial drop shot rod and a Shimano Twin
Power 1000 size reel with 8 pound braid. |
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July 28. This fish brought forth a
satisfied smile. It was caught on a Case Toad on top, and produced a
nice fight with three jumps. It was 20.5" long, and probably weighed
between 4 and 5 pounds. My rod was a Powell 6'8" MH graphite, with a
Shimano Conquest 50 and 20 pound Power Pro braided line.
It was a very nice smallmouth bass for my river. Maybe I can
catch it again next year when it will be even bigger. |
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End of July. I did get my wife to
come down and fish the river with me one morning. She did well. This one
is 16", but she had a fish on that was in the 19-20" size, but it was
lost as I tried to lip it for her.
She's a pretty good fisherman, but would rather fish for food than
enjoy a day of catch and release on the river.
Her thing is planted trout that are easy to catch and easy to eat. |
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August - This month I had a friend
come out and fish with me for several days. Roger was a former fisheries
biologist for the US Fish & Wildlife Service. We had a great time and
caught nearly 500 fish during his stay. We only fished until about noon
due to the heat, but one day we stayed out until 3 PM and we did
register over 90 fish. Most of these fish were in the 12-15" range, but
some measured up to 17". Fudge didn't really like Roger's technique here
and had to kibitz a bit. |
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September 2 - The river has been
producing large numbers of 11-15 inch smallmouth, but not very many
15-18" specimens. I was fishing a very productive stretch with a 4"
plastic "Jack's Worm" in blue black color when I was surprised by this
20" rainbow trout. This is the first trout I have caught in this part of
the river.
The rod is a G Loomis 6'8" GLX, the reel is a Daiwa TDZ with 15
pound Power Pro braided line.
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