Float Trips for Smallmouth Bass! Floating rivers in a canoe, boat or kayak is a wonderful way to fish for smallmouth bass. This enables you to reach areas you may not have access to otherwise, leave the crowds behind and fish many different types of cover.
This last point is very important because on some days you may find the best fishing around some types of cover and not others. For example, if the heavily shaded banks where the water is 4 to 6 feet deep are producing best you can concentrate on these by going from one of these to the next as you float downstream. However, if the fast runs below the riffles are the areas which are giving you the best action you can reach your boat upstream of the riffles and wade to fish these areas thoroughly. When the rivers become low many of the large bass are very wary and you can float in behind limestone ledges to hide and fish the open water on the far sides of these ledges. The shade afforded by aquatic grassbeds is often appealing to large bass and it is easy to float outside of these grassbed and fish the edges and open bays within them with poppers.
One ploy which helps us catch many large bass is to float the river on the “falling water” several days after a 2 to 3 inch rain when the stream is still too high to wade safely. If you have enough clarity to see two feet down into the stream this fishing can be excellent. The most productive areas of this “falling water” are the back eddies on the slow sides of the rivers below the riffles. These may range from 5 feet to 30 feet in diameter and from 4 feet to 6 feet deep. Fish these as deeply and slowly as possible. I usually use a sinking head line or a sinking tip line with a 5 ft. 10lb. test leader on this falling water. This great fishing usually last a week.
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