best smallmouth float

[MoAngler06]

I am planning a float for the 28th of April and am wanting some advice on the best 1 day float to fish for smallmouth. Any suggestions on lures?

[Gavin]

If your in a canoe, I'd float from Pulltite to Round Spring. The smallie fishing is better below Round Spring, but youll have a lot of jet boats to contend with. Cheers.

[mulelipper]

If were me, and you want size and some river to yourself, I would strongly consider Doniphan. There are several options as well as boat ramp ( deer leap) 8 miles above Doniphan and you can float to town. This is a little early for alot of boats but we do have enough river to not bother. I do some guide work here and have plenty of ingformation for you just ask..Oh yeah I assume a canoes is your choice,,slower river more time to work bedding areas...slowly

[Al Agnew]

Mulelipper, there are internet sites where you'd be raked over the coals for suggesting fishing the bedding areas...this may even be one of them!

And just for everybody's information...I fish stream smallies during the spawning season, BUT I don't target obvious bedding areas, I don't sight fish to beds, and I use lures that run high and fast, and avoid using slow bottom lures like tubes and lizards at this time. Do I catch the occasional bedding fish? Probably. But I don't think I catch many. Does catch and release fishing affect individual bedding fish? Probably. If you watch a male on the bed protecting eggs or fry, you'll quickly realize that the fish expends a lot of energy running off bed predators like sunfish, and it wouldn't take long for the sunnies to make a big dent in the eggs and fry during the time the fish is being fought and released, and also during the time it takes that fish to recover from the stress of being caught. Does bed fishing harm the overall population? Maybe, maybe not.

[mulelipper]

Al, I am sorry but you are mis-informed about me.

[Al Agnew]

Mulelipper, I was just going by your sentence above, "...slower river more time to work bedding areas...slowly." If I misunderstood what you were saying, I'm sorry.

[Guest]

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[creek wader]

We all know how delicate our smallmouth fishery is in Missouri. I hope that anybody on this site would be above fishing the beds.