Howdy! Been watching this site for a while and finally decided to post a report:

Arrived at the North park ramp around 6am on Saturday. I think there was a tournament going on, because the ramp was pretty dang busy for that time of day. But folks were doing a great job getting their boats in the water and trucks out of the way quickly, so I was fishing by 630 or so. I'm a newbie when it comes to smallmouth fishing (or any fishing for that matter!). Based on the various intelligence I've collected, I decided to start with a green wacky rigged senko. Started off working the shallow areas down the finger to the left as you're leaving the launch ramp. First cast - wham! Nice 12 or 13 inch smallie. Continued to work that area for a while and caught another one. Fished some other areas for a while with limited success (1 dink). Lots of takes, but was having trouble hooking them. On the drive home I started wondering if my hooks were to blame. I started off using a wide finesse hook, but got snagged and lost it, so I decided to try the Gamakatsu Wacky Weedless hooks, and used those the rest of the day. Anybody have experience with them?

So, overall a fun day of fishing with 3 fish caught (and safely released to get bigger). Based on other reports I've seen, my catch rate probably should have been higher, but hopefully that will come with experience. The weather warmed up nicely by mid-morning and not too many waterskiers when I left at 11am. After spending the last few months trolling for trout and kokes, it was a welcome change to do some more "active" fishing - casting and flipping the to the cover, navigating the shallows, working the shoreline.

Thanks all for the great reports and the info. I'm sure it helped make my day much more enjoyable!

Amx

5/12/2013 2:50:00 PM

NW Tiger Pac = Tiger Muskie Tourney on Sat. the 11th.

HoytDaddy_6

5/12/2013 2:58:00 PM

I the same hook I use for salmon fishing rivers, I think its a octopus 1/0 but I could be wrong, I have pretty good hookups though

needs2hunt

5/12/2013 3:47:00 PM

i use the gama wacky hooks ... love them but have only used senko's for largemouth... smallies like the 4" senko... I have found that the smallies are more aggressive and have had lots caught on a squarebill crankbait....

talking about the tiger Tourney... had a guy come up to me after we trailered the boat and was tieing it down to ask if we had any issues with the tournament fisherman??? guess he had a issue with the guys coming up to where he was fishing and start throwing right on top of him...

waflyboy

5/12/2013 6:58:00 PM

A muskie tourney! Sounds like fun. Maybe I'll try to catch one of those after I've mastered the smallmouth. Thanks for the hook info. I'll switch back and forth between hooks and see if I have greater success with either. My guess is that I wasn't bringing em to the boat because of user error. Will try some crankbaits next time too!

AaronW

5/12/2013 10:51:00 PM

I used that weedless gamakatsu wacky hook as well and it doesn't work great on smaller smallmouth but you can usually hook into the larger ones. Try drop-shotting, best way to catch smallies in my opinion.

b.gagne22

5/13/2013 7:59:00 AM

I am planning on hitting tapps on wed, does anyone know what time the gates open at the pierce county park? Thanks, and keep those repoorts comin' boys!

waflyboy

5/13/2013 8:47:00 AM

Thanks, AaronW. I thought about drop-shotting, but decided against it since I was only fishing 3-10 feet deep. Will consider it next time I'm out! b.gagne22, I believe the gates open at 6am.

tacfisher1

5/13/2013 8:15:00 PM

Nice report but I have to touch on the muskie tourn.I hope it wasn't my boat that crouded the gentalman.if anyone could let us know what the boat looked like I will spread it around at the next meeting.it is not our intent to push are way in or cut anyone off ,this time of season our catch is sharing a lot of the same ground and some of the guys may have been overenthusiastic on getting there spots.I am sure it was not intentional and on behalf of all of us I apologize and hope we can all work on working with other fishermen on the water.good job out there and to tell you the truth we weren't having mush luck with muskies so we took part of the day to bass fish,lots of fun landing all those smallies

Leave a Comment:

Login

Flag

×

Why is this comment inappropriate?

Close Submit

Delete this comment? Provide reason.

No Yes

Edit

×

Cancel Save