Still Not Telling (but This Time With Some Yelling)

[Poke 'Em]

Started off a the same stream from my report the other day. Shortly into the morning, though, I was interrupted by someone telling me (and not too kindly) that I was trespassing. By US & Arkansas Law this was a publicly-held river, and I had a legal right to be there, as I had accessed the stream by legal means. Nevertheless, I decided it wasn't worth a confrontation and simply left. That ended up working out alright as I moved to a different spot downstream (which was more frequently visited by other fishermen) and caught this guy right off the bat on a black & yellow Clouser.

I worked the rest of that hole with the Clouser to no avail so I decided to tie on a little baby bass colored deer hair slider. Good choice. A few casts with slider when BOOM! Something heavy hit it and hit it hard. In no time at all he was on the reel and pulling line. In the swift current he gave the 3 wt all it could handle. Turned out to be this bruiser of a bronzeback.

He was a little tore up (you can see the open flesh wound) either from a bird or a gar, but he still had a lot of fight to him. To give a little reference, I'm 6'4" about 240 lbs. He was the biggest smallmouth I've caught on a fly.

A little after 1, the crawdad bite really turned on, and I caught three in a row out of one hole on a little crawdad pattern. Missed a couple others too.

While the day started out pretty frustrating (it's no fun being yelled at for trespassing when you've got to great lengths to ensure that you are not trespassing), it turned out pretty well. Sometimes things just happen that way. : )

[Flysmallie]

Another nice report from you. Great job.

Glad to see I'm not the only one out there throwing a 3wt for smallmouth. They always put up a great fight on the little rods.

[KCRIVERRAT]

Great pics Pok'em. Been in your situation once before as far as the trespassing and knowing you're in the right. Thing is, I've been back twice since!