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I launched my canoe on the Susky near Harrisburg on Sunday, 9-15-13, and fished from 10:00am to 3:00pm. I caught 10 smbass, 20”, 18.5” and the rest in the low teens. Also caught a few dinks 8”-12”. Didn’t catch anything for the first 2 hours. Action picked up slowly around noon. All caught of 4” & 5” soft plastics fished on the surface or F-9 silver Rapala.
I checked the USGS flow graph the night before and flow was idea. I didn’t check flow in the morning so I was unaware that flow had gone up about 3” overnight. Although the increased flow was still quite fishable the water had turned off-color and lots of eel grass had broken lose on the river. The floating eel grass made fishing lures difficult. In some areas I had to switch to weedless soft plastics AND I had to skin the hook point. Dang eel grass is more than willing to snag on the tiniest point of the lure. I hate using weedless plastics because I missed so many hits… and fish populations are so low on the river that good hits are few and far between and I just hate missing a solid hit that I worked so hard to entice. The 20”er hit the weedless 5” BA like the videos you see of great whites going airborne trying to catch a seal… heart stopping to say the least. But everything worked with the lure and the skinned hook point popped out and did what it is supposed to do. Great fight from a great fish… biggest smbass so far this year on the Susky.
I’ll attach a pic or two of the area I fished. As you can see, there’s tons of good holding water for smbass to feed… and as far as I can tell a lot of this good habitat and feeding stations hold NO smbass. You gotta keep casting and casting to empty habitat until you find a rock or grassy hump where one lonely bass is hanging out and hunting for something to eat. So hits are few and far between. You really have to do a lot of searching/casting around to find one lonely bass.
(The big black mark on the second fish is my shadow.)
Susky, 9-15-13 A.jpgSusky, 9-15-13 B.jpg
Excellent habitat and holding areas for smbass everywhere you look. Unfortunate a lot of it holds no bass. Just keep casting away until you find a bass.
Susky, 9-15-13 C.jpgSusky, 9-15-13 D.jpg
I checked the USGS flow graph the night before and flow was idea. I didn’t check flow in the morning so I was unaware that flow had gone up about 3” overnight. Although the increased flow was still quite fishable the water had turned off-color and lots of eel grass had broken lose on the river. The floating eel grass made fishing lures difficult. In some areas I had to switch to weedless soft plastics AND I had to skin the hook point. Dang eel grass is more than willing to snag on the tiniest point of the lure. I hate using weedless plastics because I missed so many hits… and fish populations are so low on the river that good hits are few and far between and I just hate missing a solid hit that I worked so hard to entice. The 20”er hit the weedless 5” BA like the videos you see of great whites going airborne trying to catch a seal… heart stopping to say the least. But everything worked with the lure and the skinned hook point popped out and did what it is supposed to do. Great fight from a great fish… biggest smbass so far this year on the Susky.
I’ll attach a pic or two of the area I fished. As you can see, there’s tons of good holding water for smbass to feed… and as far as I can tell a lot of this good habitat and feeding stations hold NO smbass. You gotta keep casting and casting to empty habitat until you find a rock or grassy hump where one lonely bass is hanging out and hunting for something to eat. So hits are few and far between. You really have to do a lot of searching/casting around to find one lonely bass.
(The big black mark on the second fish is my shadow.)
Susky, 9-15-13 A.jpgSusky, 9-15-13 B.jpg
Excellent habitat and holding areas for smbass everywhere you look. Unfortunate a lot of it holds no bass. Just keep casting away until you find a bass.
Susky, 9-15-13 C.jpgSusky, 9-15-13 D.jpg
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