Smallmouth Summer Days

I've spent 3 out of the past 4 days floating the Schuylkill River. Each day it reminds me for different reasons why I love that river, and the fish that inhabit it. Friday I had my first float trip of the season, with the success of Mondays float in the back of my mind, I was confident we would have good action all day. Well maybe not, I woke up to a crazy lighting storm, that rattled my apt, rain came down fast and hard. By the time I got there it was starting to mud up, but we launched the boat and down river we went. It wasn't long till the Sculpin with No Name was doing its job, I thought to myself "nice, they are going to still eat in this muddy stuff". Well an hour later we hooked our next fish, it was slow for the fist few hours. As the day progressed the water slowly got clearer, and the last couple hours we had great action, landing a super nice fish the end the trip. Nice work Dave!

Perfectly placed Zuddler Minnow.

Dave with a great Scuylkill River Smallmouth Bass 

Sunday and Monday were just fun days with the Lenny and Jared aka J-Rod. Those guys headed out after work yesterday for an evening of smallmouth fishing and a couple good laughs, and yup we had both. The fishing was pretty good last night, but wasn't a banner trip, high sun and super hot air temps can turn the fish off pretty quick. Even so we managed a few nice bass, a huge sucker, and my new fishing partner Molly got her first ride in the boat.

Jared with a nice Smallmouth Bass 

Nice Schuylkill River Smallmouth 

Then Finally around 9pm last night as we rowed under the 222 overpass we decided to go for a third trip in the morning. After a night of tying flies and watching fishing videos, we were back to it. Today was a much better day, we had constant action all day, including rising 4 huge fish that we couldn't connect with, well Jared and I each stung one, then flat out missed the others.  Molly did much better today, for her second time out on the water ever. Oh yeah I guess maybe I should tell you who Molly is, Molly is my new roommate, fishing partner, and hiking buddy. She is a 3 year old Siberian Husky, that I rescued from an organization called, Tail of the Tundra. She is an awesome dog, does great in the shop, and is getting much better at riding in the boat.

Lenny's First of the day  

Molly guarding the rods, or is she sleeping?

Not huge, but very pretty Smallie 

Nicely colored smallmouth bass

J-Rods last fish of the trip, Always fun when they crush a frog thing 

Joey also decided to fish the river tonight, when I asked how he did, this is all I got:

Joey's super nice smallmouth bass, and it fell to the McGinley special 

All in all a great few days on the river. Hot flies included: Sculpin with No Name, Zuddler Minnow, Sculpin Helmet Flies, Frogs, Clouser Minnows, and a veriaity of new Orivs patterns we just got in the shop.