Smallmouth Crush on the Delaware

[Gerry Zagorski]

One of the most amazing days of fishing I’ve ever had. We stopped counting at 50 fish and also had one Walleye.

Jake and got a treat fishing with Mikey Topaz on his custom built drift boat. This thing is sweet and comfortable. https://www.facebook.com/MikeKGuideService

Fast Eddie, Luke and Barry Kayaked and crush them too

If you haven’t done a trip like this I would highly recommend it. The fishing is insane and so was the scenery as well a watching a bald eagle swoop down and grab a fish.

Really great trip which I’ll never forget.

[FASTEDDIE29]

Good times had by all on the mighty D! The Smallies up there are like friggin’ Piranhas. Awesome to see you and Jake out there on the drift boat catching fish after fish. Congrats on your first Walleye too Cap’n Gerry! Man, I love that area!
TIGHT LINEZ!:D
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[Mikey topaz]

Thanks for playing ! Welcome anytime Capt Gerry

[John D.]

Looks great. Would like to take my son (11) on one of these guided smallmouth trips. Is there a best month to go for smallmouth on the Delaware?

[Gerry Zagorski]

My first time for me but I’m told August is the best month and you and your son will absolutely love it.

[Broad Bill]

Looks like the Milford / Montague bridge in the back drop. If so, nice float, very productive and beautiful stretch of the Delaware. Nice seeing the smallies population flourishing again, the Big D can at times be a tough river to fish but at the same time is one gem of a diversified fishery and a beautiful part of the state. Sounds like you guys hit it right and had a great float, couldn't ask for a better day on the water.

Were most fish caught on artificials or hellgrammites and crayfish for the smallmouths. We're they concentrated in the rapids, deeper pools or spread out?

Did you see any signs of this year's juvenile shad fry on the river during your drift? September and October they typically start skipping their way on the surface down the river, curious if you saw indications of their presence during your trip.

Fantastic report.

[thmyorke1]

Looks like the Milford / Montague bridge in the back drop. If so, nice float, very productive and beautiful stretch of the Delaware. Nice seeing the smallies population flourishing again, the Big D can at times be a tough river to fish but at the same time is one gem of a diversified fishery and a beautiful part of the state. Sounds like you guys hit it right and had a great float, couldn't ask for a better day on the water.

Were most fish caught on artificials or hellgrammites and crayfish for the smallmouths. We're they concentrated in the rapids, deeper pools or spread out?

Did you see any signs of this year's juvenile shad fry on the river during your drift? September and October they typically start skipping their way on the surface down the river, curious if you saw indications of their presence during your trip.

Fantastic report.

Yes Milford to dingmans.

I didnt bother trying to park and walk on of faster rapids/runs, although Mikey with the drift boat and anchor was doing that in a few spots and they had more success.
In some faster moving water before/after the rapids, I would just drift a weightless fluke and every time it got picked up by a smallmouth.
I ended up focusing more on the slower water and hit the edges where the shore was, pretty much just outside the grass. I got most of my nicer ones there, spotted bigger ones as I floated over them. One of the better ones i lost at the side of the canoe was out of one of the creek confluences, smallmouth was sitting in like 5 inches of water and it waked and slammed my lure as I swam it back.

I did see some big schools of baitfish but unfortunately I couldnt tell if they were shad or not.

I could have sworn i saw some shad (like 8-10 inch) swimming fast around one of the slower/weedy edges. Couldnt get a good glimpse of them but definitely had the forked tail and oval body shape.

https://i.postimg.cc/4HY09Kwq/0805230918asmb2.jpg (https://postimg.cc/4HY09Kwq) https://i.postimg.cc/XXqmhh3L/0805230947aredbreast.jpg (https://postimg.cc/XXqmhh3L) https://i.postimg.cc/6TPgN0pX/0805231400smb.jpg (https://postimg.cc/6TPgN0pX)

[Gerry Zagorski]

Looks like the Milford / Montague bridge in the back drop. If so, nice float, very productive and beautiful stretch of the Delaware. Nice seeing the smallies population flourishing again, the Big D can at times be a tough river to fish but at the same time is one gem of a diversified fishery and a beautiful part of the state. Sounds like you guys hit it right and had a great float, couldn't ask for a better day on the water.

Were most fish caught on artificials or hellgrammites and crayfish for the smallmouths. We're they concentrated in the rapids, deeper pools or spread out?

Did you see any signs of this year's juvenile shad fry on the river during your drift? September and October they typically start skipping their way on the surface down the river, curious if you saw indications of their presence during your trip.

Fantastic report.

Hey Bill... We fished Ned Rigs with the TRD PBJ color almost exclusively and that's what they seemed keyed in on... I started with a different plastic on the Ned which was not working and quickly switched over when we saw Jake nailing them on the PBJ.

Most of the fish were caught in the deeper water after rapids and the most productive areas seemed to below the rapids in pockets close to the bank. Cast upstream let the Ned float downstream twitching through the ripples and you were on. Stopped several places that looked fishy, anchored up pulled a dozen and moved on to the next.

We did see a few big schools of small bait twitching up top but not sure what they were.

Between our larger group we also caught 2 Walleye and probably a half a dozen Fall fish. First half of the float where there were more rapids was best and deeper long lazy stretches it slowed down a lot.

The float boat was the way to go. Mikey would row us into casting distance in a fishy looking spot, drop the anchor with the special anchoring system he has and we'd go to work. Other times he'd row up stream into the current to slow the drift down so we could work the Neds better and that was productive too.

Jake commented several times during the trip, shaking his head in disbelief, how did I not know about this fishery? It's unbelievable!

All in all one of my most memorable fishing trips and I plan to do this a lot more. So peaceful, so productive and so relaxing, especially with Mikey doing all the work for us :)

[Gerry Zagorski]

Yes Milford to dingmans.

I didnt bother trying to park and walk on of faster rapids/runs, although Mikey with the drift boat and anchor was doing that in a few spots and they had more success.
In some faster moving water before/after the rapids, I would just drift a weightless fluke and every time it got picked up by a smallmouth.
I ended up focusing more on the slower water and hit the edges where the shore was, pretty much just outside the grass. I got most of my nicer ones there, spotted bigger ones as I floated over them. One of the better ones i lost at the side of the canoe was out of one of the creek confluences, smallmouth was sitting in like 5 inches of water and it waked and slammed my lure as I swam it back.

I did see some big schools of baitfish but unfortunately I couldnt tell if they were shad or not.

I could have sworn i saw some shad (like 8-10 inch) swimming fast around one of the slower/weedy edges. Couldnt get a good glimpse of them but definitely had the forked tail and oval body shape.

https://i.postimg.cc/4HY09Kwq/0805230918asmb2.jpg (https://postimg.cc/4HY09Kwq) https://i.postimg.cc/XXqmhh3L/0805230947aredbreast.jpg (https://postimg.cc/XXqmhh3L) https://i.postimg.cc/6TPgN0pX/0805231400smb.jpg (https://postimg.cc/6TPgN0pX)

Great fishing with you Luke!

[thmyorke1]

Great fishing with you Luke!

Same! Hope to see you sometime again, maybe salmon run or hybrid meet n greet :D

[Broad Bill]

I could have sworn i saw some shad (like 8-10 inch) swimming fast around one of the slower/weedy edges. Couldnt get a good glimpse of them but definitely had the forked tail and oval body shape.

https://i.postimg.cc/4HY09Kwq/0805230918asmb2.jpg (https://postimg.cc/4HY09Kwq) https://i.postimg.cc/XXqmhh3L/0805230947aredbreast.jpg (https://postimg.cc/XXqmhh3L) https://i.postimg.cc/6TPgN0pX/0805231400smb.jpg (https://postimg.cc/6TPgN0pX)
8-10" for this year's YOY juvenile shad would be too big for shad. There's a number of different shad/herring species in the Delaware, that's probably what you saw. Large schools of bait fish skipping along the surface around 2 inches long at this stage would most likely be shad which is probably what you saw on the surface.

I would think some of the smallmouths you caught would have been spitting up shad as I'm sure they're gorging themselves on them.

[thmyorke1]

8-10" for this year's YOY juvenile shad would be too big for shad. There's a number of different shad/herring species in the Delaware, that's probably what you saw. Large schools of bait fish skipping along the surface around 2 inches long at this stage would most likely be shad which is probably what you saw on the surface.

I would think some of the smallmouths you caught would have been spitting up shad as I'm sure they're gorging themselves on them.

thanks, yea true might be another herring.

i didnt happen to see any bait skipping myself, think Gerry did, but rather some bigger schools subsurface around one of the weedy edges. The bait didnt look very "herring/shad" like though so curious if I could find that out.

[dales529]

One of the most amazing days of fishing I’ve ever had. We stopped counting at 50 fish and also had one Walleye.

Jake and got a treat fishing with Mikey Topaz on his custom built drift boat. This thing is sweet and comfortable. https://www.facebook.com/MikeKGuideService

Fast Eddie, Luke and Barry Kayaked and crush them too

If you haven’t done a trip like this I would highly recommend it. The fishing is insane and so was the scenery as well a watching a bald eagle swoop down and grab a fish.

Really great trip which I’ll never forget.

Knew it the second I had to bail:mad:. Great trip Gerry, Mikey sure knows how to find them. On the mend and will reschedule as soon as my PT and other treatments are over!

[Mikey topaz]

Knew it the second I had to bail:mad:. Great trip Gerry, Mikey sure knows how to find them. On the mend and will reschedule as soon as my PT and other treatments are over!

Missed you man! I’ll get you out sooner then later! Feel better