Upper Finley Saturday.

[RSBreth]

I fished a part of the upper Finley I haven't hit in a while. I portaged and fished up from a slab ford, then floated back down. No big fish, but lots of numbers. A few nice Largemouths in the bigger pools on a spinnerbait, but otherwise catching Rockies and Smallmouths on one of my hair jigs w/ a shortened Zoom Shaky Tail as a trailer, and one of my favorite creek cranks, the tiny Fat A in a couple of colors, none working better than the other.

Didn't see another fisherman, and fished from about 6:30 A.M. until after 3 in the afternoon.

It was a wonderful day, not hot, just a little breezy.

[smallmouthjoe]

Thanks for the report. Do you work that hair jig like a shakey head or do you swim it ?

[RSBreth]

Both. I'll swim it for a little bit, then let it settle. Then swim it for a little bit more, then shake it. I mix it up, but Rock Bass and little Smallies aren't picky.

[smallmouthjoe]

Hair jigs are something that I need to try. When I was younger I would go out on Table Rock with my Grandfather and we would kill Kentucky's with purple hair jigs. Seems like it's something that most fish don't see a lot of these days. Are there any specific type that you would recommend?

[RSBreth]

I usually tie my own on these jigheads :http://www.basspro.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10151_-1_10001_100720_100010006_100000000_100010000_100-10-6

But I'm sure any smaller commercial jig would work. I need to post some pictures of the ones I tie, I keep getting emails about them...

[smallmouthjoe]

I guess I could tie some myself. All it consists of is a jig head and some marabou? Thanks.

[RSBreth]

I guess I could tie some myself. All it consists of is a jig head and some marabou? Thanks.

There's so many different materials you can use, including marabou. Mine are bucktail, except for float and fly type jigs I tie out of craft fur. The one I use most is kind of "dirty minnow" colored, two-toned, like a Clouser Minnow. http://www.clouserflyfishing.com/clousminor.html

There's some crystal flash in there, too.

Here's a pretty good video about tying jigs, at Youtube:

I've got a couple of emails about them, so I'll have to do a small write-up at my site.

[smallmouthjoe]

I would be interested in reading it.

[OzarksRiverman]

When you say upper Finley do you mean up by Fordland? I've been wading up there a few times in the past month with some friends and they've been catching some big smallies (around 2 lbs.) Unfortunately I've just caught some Goggle eye and some little bitty Brownies

[RSBreth]

Upper Finley to me is anything above Linden, so yeah, out near Fordland.

Any Bass on the upper stretch that goes around 2-pounds is a good one, but like you noticed, there's TONS of Rock Bass. (Goggle-Eyes.)