The river was running fast with both sides of Roger’s Dam opened.  The spillway area had one of the three gates fully opened.  With all of this extra water, the river was a little higher and moving faster than normal at this time of year.

Three FishFerris Members scored on the Leaderboard.  A total of 129.75 inches or 10 feet 9 3/4 inches weighing in at 11 Lbs 4 Oz was caught with a mixture of Smallmouth and Largemouth Bass.  All nine fish came from soft plastic tubes.

Kyle Thede and I both started out with Venom Tubes, I picked brown pumpkinseed while Kyle elected to use green pumpkinseed.  Within 20-30 minutes, Kyle had two Bass while I had not gotten a single bump.  He encouraged me to switch colors and I did and with minutes, caught two fish myself.  Also, Kyle encouraged me to wait a bit longer for the hook set and he was right.  A very slow retrieve to entice the bite and a long patient five seconds wait was needed to successfully hook the fish.  Many were missed that either threw the hook after jumping or when the set happened too fast.

The difference between playing the Largemouth and Smallmouth was significant.  The Smallmouth was very aggressive and it took longer to bring in.  It is always a treat to catch a Smallmouth, inch for inch, the best fighting freshwater fish in my opinion.