Thomasville to CaneBluff

[BrianK]

Been busy catching up after a day off work. It was worth it.

Thanks to all who chimed in with advice on this stretch of river and thanks to Brian Sloss for the shuttle.

Put in Sat pm and fished down for a couple hrs before pitching camp the first nite. Fished all day Sun and took out Monday around noonish.

Weather spectacular. Just enough water now but in a few wks be ready to work very hard and pack light! Me and a buddy and 3 kids and lots of gear. Had to portage twice and lots of dragging and walking thru snags. If you fish, it's a 2 day float!

Sort of a tale of 2 rivers....

As previous posts mentioned, the upper river is cow infested! a beautiful river but the habitat and bank is in really bad shape. not much cover and generally shallow. lots of mud banks. fewer fish.

Then after a few miles the cows stay out and the river is beautiful and the fishing reflected that. Caught probably 3x more fish in the lower river when rocky cover improved. Just have to suffer thru the upper 3-4 miles of small muddy creek that's not even floatable in summer to get to prime water....

Lost track of fish #'s but they kept us busy except for the cow water.

Had we known, we would have moved faster through the upper few miles and focused more on the bottom half of that stretch.....

No tackle busters but a couple 16+ and several 14-15's.

The bigger fish were hitting topwater but missed a couple that were probably over 18". Missed one guy that hit 6 times coming across the river and another that came all the way out of the water like a great white taking a seal on topwater! Heartstopping.

Most fish on softplastics (small craws) in deeper water or topwater early, late or in shade. not much on spinnerbaits.

Only saw a couple beds but didn't look active.

Oh, if anyone finds an orange 'fannypack' with some knives, flashlights, and misc items about 4-6 mi down, let me know. My 10 yo left it on a gravel bar . he's bummed.

Brian

[snap]

Glad you had a good trip! I see the cows are still there. Did you catch any goggle eyes or were they all smallmouth? We arrive Tuesday and will stay until Saturday but have no plans to float and fish thom to cane...will have to give a report early June!

[BrianK]

Mostly smallies but many nice gogs over 9" (which i think is the length limit).

Didn't keep any but could have eaten very well.

b