September smallmouth

Hello all, this will be my 5th year coming up to the Flowage (stay at Deerfoot). I have a question about smallmouth in September. We usually find them in shallower weed edges, shoreline timber and structure we can see with our eyes. East is usually better than West. We usually pull up a lot of pike and an occasional walleye too. Without good electronics it's hard for me to know what's going on out in the deeper areas, especially when you're trying it and not catching fish.

I've not had great success using the spots on Hot Spot maps - does anyone have any other opinions on how they are relating in that time of year? We are going to try the tail end of September this year as opposed to Labor Day.

Keep up the work Maxx, it's been a pleasure to watch things on your site develop over the years and I bought some of your jigs (have tied deer hair on some), look forward to using them in 2014.

Hi Doc,

Thanks for buying my jigs. I make a size three in the inline proaggressive model now. For sept. smallmouth, I never really target them but catch quite a few fishing the deeper wood while I'm after the walleyes.It's usually a minnow bite by then(end of Sept.) but if you can still get leeches, then get them. Smallmouth out in the deeper water love the leeches. I like to put on a piece of scented plastic along with live bait on my jigs and the bullet shape head of my proaggressive jig can be worked over and around the rock and wood cover areas without snagging up all the time and the hooking percentage is so much better with the new jig.

I look forward to seeing you when you come up next. Be sure to stop and say hi out on the Big Chip. Good luck fishing.

Walleyemaxx