Hey, I went with my brothers in law to Jordanelle on Wednesday and Thursday this week – we fished late Weds and camped, then fished early Thurs. It was pretty good, although not as fast of action as we’d hoped. But I’ve learned from the past two years that this is the prime time to find good smallies in the shallows at Jordanelle.
The three of us caught about 20 fish total, but that included about five chubs. Funny, after my bro-in-law released a 15-inch chub, later that night we looked online (with my phone) and saw that the state record chub is smaller than that! Probably because no one is proud of catching chubs so they don’t get them certified for the record, huh? Are they trash fish, or are they OK to leave in the lake? I was tempted to kill 'em, because I think they’re trash, but we weren’t sure. Anyway, Ryan will now be known in the family as the state-record chub catcher!
ANYWAY, I caught my biggest smallie yet – a nice 17-incher. Photo is below, along with two from the brothers. We tried Cliff’s drop-shot rig with the gulp minnow, and it worked OK, but the biggest ones were on a popper as it was getting dark (my 17" and a few others from the bros) and on a watermelon-seed tube jig (I think it’s a 4" size, and it caught me a 15-incher in the morning). I need to learn more about technique with the drop-shot rigs. The other guys caught some on curly tailed grubs and a small spinnerbait. That popper was working quite well as it was getting dark on Weds. Anyway, we had a lot of fun until the wind got bad on Thursday. Here are the photos: