I've been taking an hour here and there to get to know Lake Union and the Montlake/Fremont cuts. My first 2 times out have been quite successful fishing for smallmouth bass. I'm fishing a small dick nite spoon that is half silver and gold. I fish along rip rap, slightly deeper water, drop offs, and any cover I can find. The pier just north of the swimming beach at South Lake Union peer is a great place to start. Drop your spoon on one end of the deep side of the pier and slowly walk along the pier giving your line a jig or cast out and do the same hopping your spoon along the bottom. Caught two smallies in my first 5 minutes.

The small little bay just south of the bridge looks bassy to me with weeds, weeping willow reaching over the water, rip rap and some logs. On the west side of the bay just about 20 yards south of the bridge is slightly deeper water with some weeds growing. The water was calm and clear and I decided to go with a small floating rapala. After about a half hour of fruitless fishing it as a surface jerk bait (I saw some surface activity and hence the attempt) I decided just to cast out and crank it in to cover as much water as possible hunting out active fish (the sun was below Queen Anne Hill and it was approaching twilight). i then hooked into a little largemouth bass with the audience of an applauding smoking homelss guy.

Overall, I caught 4 bass over 2 hours. Probably could have caught more if it weren't for all the boats, swimmers, and sea planes at Kenmore air.

My only complaint is that I wish the bass were bigger! Any advice on catching bigger bass around Lake Union and the cuts?

---