One of my favorite forms of fly fishing is catching smallmouth bass along shaded banks on poppers. This becomes challenging as the interwoven oak tree limbs become heavy with summer foliage causing them to hang down close to the surface of the river.
Frequently the bass choose feeding stations close to these tree-shaded banks which may be 20 feet back under the limbs. I find that if there is a 3 to 4 foot gap between the tree limbs and the surface of the river I can use a low side-arm cast in order to shoot my poppers back against the banks and catch these bass. If the limbs are down to within a foot to two feet of the stream a slightly different cast can be effective: this is the “grasshopper cast”. Using a low side-arm cast the popper is presented with extra force so it touches where the tree limbs are close to the stream and skips back toward the bank. This is much like skipping a flat stone across the surface of the water. However, what do you do when the tree limbs brush the surface of the river 20 feet out fro the river bank?
Here I look for an opening in the limbs from 40 to 50 feet upstream of the bank feeding station. I make a regular cast into this opening so my popper lands close to the river bank. Instantly I impart a strong upstream mend to the line which permits the popper to drift deeply back under the tree limbs. By repeating this mend every 10 to 15 seconds I can often catch several large bass well back in these heavily shaded feeding stations.
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