Sunday afternoon smallmouths 11-16

I got out to the Mississippi river for a late fall bassin day, was suposed to meet BP Dave Maas, but he couldn't make it so I hit the water by myself. I found a nice looking spot near some trees in the water and started jigging a berkley minnow on a 1 / 16th ounce jig. I got one on the first cast!, then I hooked into a huge one probably over 4 pounds. "fishface" Jim Bonin showed up just in time to take a pic for me.
Then he when flyfishing and started getting some smaller bass on surface flies. I kept flinging different plastic minnows and probably caught a dozen bass, three of them huge, the rest were "fun sized" it was around 30 degrees and windy, but I stayed plenty warm with my arctic Armor parka even though my waders did leak some!

huge Smallmouth!



lip em!



Another whale!


they wern't all lunkers!

big brown bass

another one bites the bait

another big Mule!

plastic minnow peeps through a bass jaw

Back to fight again!

Moonlight fishing on Tonka

me and Casey went out for a little fishing Saturday evening and the fish were there, they were kind of tough to hook, I think we missed three for every one we caught, it was fun though! All the fish were near the weedlines in around sixteen feet on quarter ounce jigs and big chubs!


A big fat one, and the fish is pretty big too!


Casey with a pair of cigars



pretty fish


a "stocker"

cold fish!

4 pounder?

Eye in the boat

some good eaters

Sunday cold metro crappie frenzy

We got out in the boat today and though the weather was cold, the bite was hot! got bit on almost every cast for 3 hours!
Jigs with waxworms or power minnows worked good 3 to 8 ft down.


Slab!





Pretty mallard I enticed into camera range with a few waxworms!

Sauger release

another cold crappie

lipped

crappie release

Saturday fishin' off the dock

It was pretty cold and windy saturday so we decided to just do some fishing off the docks and leave the boat in the garage. Fishing was kind of slow, we got a few decent crappies and sunfish for some eating. I used a small jig spiked with a waxworm on 2 lb line to finesse the light biters.
Jack did better with a jig with a ratso plastic tail.


When I got there I saw this on the dock, some people can't wait to ice fish, haha! they actually were getting fish too!





chunky bass looking for a snack gets lipped



well hooked slab for the frying pan



really small but cool looking blue crappie




close up

Jack caught some good fish "ice fishing" through a hole in the dock

2 day backwater fishing marathon

Me and jack decided to hit the water for two full days of slab and bass seeking, since this could be the last warm weekend. We started in some sloughs early in the morning and got into some perch,bass and crappies right away. the best bait for us was a 1/64th oz jig with a power minnow. we also got some on fatheads below a slip bobber in the heavey timber.
I got most of my good largemouths on a zoom fluke jerk bait in shad colors around the wood. we also got a good amount of bass on our crappie lures, quite a battle on my panfish rod with 2 pound test! We also got some good perch and sunfish. This will probably be my last time on the river this year, time to start focusing on the big metro area walleyes, and lunker smallies up by the nuke plant! :)

big ol slabasaurus


Jack and jumbo perch


larry the largemouth

another good speck

nice pike tried to eat Jacks crappie, and irt couldn't resist my follow up with a spinnerbait!

yellow perch closeup

is it a pounder? almost!

still some fall colors

Jack vs. Jack!

End of the day comes too soon, but still another full day of fishin' to go!

Power minnow takes a good crop

a lavender rockbass???

a chunky bass on plastics

nice speck hit one of my homemade jigs!

Red oaks

pretty perch

another beauty


thanks mister larry!

pounder!

good one!

some for the pan

on the road home.... wow what a weekend!