Cindy and I returned to the same section of water on the Flambeau, that we have been fishing for the past several days. Instead of beating up the same holes, I decided to fish some new water. It took us a while to get on the fish, but we caught a dozen really nice smallies in the fourteen to seventeen inch range just upstream from one of the few shoals that are on this section of the river. As the day drifted into late afternoon, I decided to make a move to a hole that tends to fish a little better in the late afternoon into the evening. I have fished this spot numerous times over the years, and the mid-day fishing just isn’t that productive. It is a spot that is about four feet deep, with a steady current and scattered rocks. The fish don’t seem to inhabit this water during the middle of the day, and appear to be using a resting area with a little less current around a large laydown about fifty feet away. We have had a pretty good feeding window from 4-6 pm over the past few days, so I decided to work over this spot during that opportune time to see if they had left that daytime resting area to feed. Of course, this is all speculation and conjecture on my part. But what I do know is that this spot historically fishes better late than early. And true to form the fish were there, and they wanted to eat. And wasn’t fast and furious like it has been the past few years, but the fish we caught were real porkers. The biggest smallie was only seventeen and half inches long, yet it weighed three pounds and twelve ounces. The football of the day, was a mere fifteen and quarter inches long, and weighed two pounds and eleven ounces. This was one of those freakishly fat fish that I have talked about in my previous reports. It looked like a giant brown bluegill. The picture of those fish are included in this report. The numbers are definitely down this year, but the quality of the fish certainly has eased the pain of not catching forty to sixty smallies a day like I grown accustomed to over the past several years. Spoiled yes, but I hope I never take for granted how great this fishery truly is.
River Smallie Adventures Fishing Report August 8, 2019
