Upper Mississippi River Smallie report 10-9-06

The smallies must be sensing that the end of the feed fest is coming because these fish continue to pull out all the stops and gorge themselves on anything and everything…..as long as it’s a lively kicking minnow!! This week’s report could be a carbon copy of the previous several week of reports, the fish are stacked and on the chew in their classic fall locations. Find one fish right now, and you could bump into the mother load of smallies.

This has been a strange fall for feeding patterns for the fish that I have been on the last several weeks. My typical fall presentations of Yum Dingers and light Jimmy D’s riverbugs have been off the mark sort of speak compared to the big lively minnows this year. Minnows are obviously a no-brainer this time of year, but in years past we have never had to resort to them because of our confidence in plastics and hair, but that’s fishing for ya! Just when you think you have something figured out, mother nature throws a twist at you. Each time I arrive at one of my milk route spots, I always grab for my plastics or hair rod that I already have pre-rigged. I typically get bit right away on them, but after one or two fish they wise up in a hurry and stop all together. If I did not know any better I would say that 1 or 2 fish were all that were in that spot, but history tells me that they are usually stacked in schools of spots like this anywhere from 5-30+ fish. But throw a large Red Tail Chub in there and these fish come unglued. The minnows ultimately result in producing many more fish out of the spot before you leave.

A special precaution needs to be considered when using minnows for smallies this time of year. These fish can be extremely vulnerable and you need to remember this when fishing live bait. Because these fish are in schools, they will often compete to no end for the next available meal. Every day on the water now I have fish following my bass up to the boat trying to take the minnow out of the fishes mouth. Sometimes as I am fighting the bass, the minnow slides up the line and the following smallies will pluck that minnow right off my line. With this type of competitive nature, it’s important to set the hook very quickly with these fish to prevent any foul hooking. I fish the minnow as if it was a tube on; when I feel a hit I set the hook immediately. Most often these fish will take these big minnows head first and you do not need to let them have the minnow at all before setting the hook. Remember that these smallies are for catch and release only right now for Minnesota anglers.

This is also the time of year where hunting season starts and generally anglers start thinking about putting their boats away for the year. This means you can rely on having several miles of river all to yourselves with plenty of willing smallmouth bass to bite.

This week looks to be a drastic cool down for us up here on the river. My experience every year is when water temps reaches high 30’s to low 40’s, the smallies metabolism slows way down and the fish become very lethargic and eventually harder to catch.

This will most likely be my last report for smallies for the year. I had absolute blast fishing for these fish all summer long and cannot wait until next year May already to go back after them. Until then I will be soon reporting back down on Pool 2 of the Miss River chasing those cold water wiley walleyes.