I caught crappies on Lake Eufaula with Todd Huckabee while testing new Yum crappie baits. And I caught my first smallmouth of 2011 on Tennessee's Center Hill with Jim Duckworth as he demonstrated a Bandit crankbait pattern. And I spent a cold night in Arkansas with Mitch Looper chasing double digit pre-spawn largemouth. But I really longed to return home for the early Erie smallmouth fishing.
Finally, after a couple false starts on Presque Isle Bay of Lake Erie, I had a most exciting day of fishing with my wife Marilyn on April 30. It took us about 45 minutes to locate a mid bay hump with a group of smallmouth hanging at the inside break. Marilyn scored first with a Hopkins jigging spoon.
After that first fish, however, it only took 15 minutes to catch a smallmouth on each of our 10 pre-rigged rods. Our early season PIB challenge is not to use a bait that has caught a smallmouth until every pre-rigged bait has produced a fish; it keeps us from settling into using the same old lures all the time. So, in addition to the jigging spoon, we quickly caught bass on a Galida Grub; Kalin Lunker Grub; Marabou Pro 2.0 Road Runner; Rollin' Runner with Baby Shad; Northland Bug-A-Boo Jig, Storm WildEye Swim Shad; Silver Lucky Blade Bait; Poor Boy's Tube; and a Mann's Sting Ray Grub! All lures were slow-rolled or deadsticked on the bottom.
With the green light to fish anything, it was tubes and grubs that produced the majority of our fish. We landed 20-some smallmouth (missing a good number of strikes) that include six bass in the 5 to 5.5 pound range. But our best accomplishment was a pair of 20-inch 6-pound smallmouth (weighed on digital scales). This was the first time in nearly 40 years of fishing together that Marilyn and I each caught a six-pound smallmouth on the same day!
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