Greg from Knoxville jumped in the boat for another afternoon and evening river smallie fishing trip on the Little Pigeon. The river has continued to drop over the past several days. The gauge in Sevierville reads 2.46 feet and the water is clear. The water temperature in the Little Pigeon is sixty-six degrees. TVA continues to generate at Douglas Dam, with the average for the day at 6738 cfs. I have had very few days this spring, when I have been able to fish the French Broad, due to the ongoing generation at the dam. Fortunately, the Little Pigeon has been fishing well. Weather wise, it was a beautiful day to fish, with more sun than clouds, and light winds. The only thing thing that was a little off for a great day of fishing was the humidity. I have fished for smallies for a long time, and have noticed an association between the relative humidity, and the corresponding bite. The higher the relative humidity, the greater the bite, the lower the relative humidity, the slower the bite. It just boils down to how the air “feels” when I get on the water. And today, it just felt like it was going to be an average day. The smallies were feeding, but they weren’t setting the world on fire. It was one of those situations, where the smallies would peck at the bait, or run with it for a few seconds, and then drop it. These weren’t spawning areas, so they weren’t bedding fish that were removing the bait from the nest. I know Greg was growing frustrated with this disagreeable feeding behavior. But he did get to enjoy a feeding frenzy, that occurred in one spot about an hour before dark. He caught ten smallies in that one hole. The heaviest smallie of the day came from that spot. It was a stout eighteen and half inch fish, that weighed three pounds and five ounces. The picture of Greg proudly displaying that chunk is included in this report. By the end of the trip, he managed to catch nineteen smallies. Fifteen out of the nineteen fish, were between fifteen and nineteen inches long. It was a good day on the water, even though the smallies presented us with some challenges along the way. It’s no fun, if it’s like shooting fish in a barrel. Although, there have been those days, when I wish had that barrel, and those smallies were directly in my sights!
River Smallie Adventures Fishing Report April 17, 2019
