I returned conquer the stream that had humbled me a few weeks back(I floated the 20 miles from the Snelling Bridge to the Cressey bridge in August). That trip could be cut into thirds. We floated the second and third sections this time. We launched at the 59 bridge at 6:30am and floated to the Cressy bridge (15 miles), pulling out of the water at 8:30pm. The water was down, so we still had to stand up and walk in places and maneuver around trees and other obstacles, but it was relativley easy during the day!!!!!!!

I caught 16 spots, 10 largemouth, and 6 smallmouth. I used two rods, one with a 5" Excalibur Pop-R, and one with 4" & 5" Roboworm Zipper worms. My friend caught about 15 spots, 12 smallmouth, and 4 largemouth using a 3.5" Excalibur Pop-R and a Senko.

We didn't land any fish over 3lbs., but there were plenty of 2lb - 2.5lb fish. I lost one smallmouth that I hooked adjacent to some fast current. It was PEELING drag and went straight for a tree (while I was manipulating it out of the tree I saw it, about 4lbs). After that it went straight for another tree, I thumbed the spool to try and put the brakes on it because there was NO WAY of getting it out of that mess, and it straightend one of the treble hooks. BRUTAL. I was excited to have hooked it, but disappointed that I never lipped that monster.

The fish were stacked up in areas with a decent amount of current an no weeds. The larger areas with slack water and weeds held almost no fish. We would be catching one fish every 5 minutes for a half hour, and then go 2 hours with no fish. Two weeks ago we caught plenty of small largemouth in the slack water areas, but not yesterday. It was dead in that slow water.

All in all it was a great time.

Mike F