BearFisher10

Very nice! I could have used some of those this afternoon when I was running in there for weigh in. Lots of guys in the top were throwing the plopper for the majority of the day. It caught my two biggest yesterday and today. Champ- Surprisingly I came in with all largemouth this weekend for the scales. Got lucky yesterday and culled out a smallie and a KY yesterday.

If you're wanting shear numbers I don't think you can beat a wiggle wart or similar crankbaits in the creek arms right now. I found that out this week. As far as keepers are concerned don't get too ahead of the fish in their transition right now. Some have started to go but not the quality ones, at least in the quantities I'd like to see. They've got plenty of forage out deep still on points, bluff ends, and that sort of deal. Yes I did catch some keepers shallow, but if you come across the right school out deep, the majority will be keepers if you hit them at the right time of the day. Also this is just my opinion of the James River area. The dam area or upper end could be fishing completely different for all I know right now.

Sounds like you fared better than I did on Saturday. I fished Saturday with poor results keeper wise. My brush pile bite I talked about last week was not working...and I hit quite a few of them. I think with it being stormy and overcast it spread them out and they weren't concentrated in and around the brush because I could see some as I was scanning suspended over the channel but couldn't get them to react. Ended up going shallow and caught one keeper with 17 shorts with a lot of those being in the 14 inch range. Frustrating to say the least. Probably could have caught them better shallow on spinnerbaits but for some dumb reason I left the box at home after a recent boat clean out.

Here's two pictures I've got from last week. These fish came on back to back casts. I didn't think I'd hook a smallmouth in the location I was in then next cast this big girl hammered my crankbait. She wouldn't lay still for a good pic but she might have touched 22 inches mouth closed and a continued board...and the batteries in my scale were dead or I'd give you an exact weight.

I've been lurking for a little while here and reading at night to see how others have been doing and comparing what I've been doing versus what others have been doing. I haven't seen a report from this end in awhile so I figured I'd share mine. Haven't been out in a week and the water had gone down a few feet and all the spots I'd been hitting were not producing. I've been fishing brush piles and/or rock piles in the 18-25 foot range. I started by expanding the areas they had previously been but couldn't find them bunched up the way I wanted to see them. I fished around anyways for two hours on points around brush but just couldn't locate them. Caught two shorts doing that. I moved on to flipping and picked up two more with one being a keeper. I gave up on that because I knew there would be fish bunched up well somewhere. I drove around and idled bluff ends that transitioned into points trying to find brush or rock piles holding fish like I'd previously been doing. Finally found an area after an hour and a half search where they were stacked on two brush piles and it was game on for the next hour...as long as the wind was blowing. When it would quit I could pick one up every now and then on a jig but when the wind was blowing a 10xd was working very well. I ended the day with 19 fish. My best five would have been about 14 pounds. I don't have any pics from today but will start trying to remember for you guys to see.