"Joe Haubenreich" wrote in
message news
My partner at last weekend's tournament to welcome home the 101st from
Iraq
was SSG Todd Stites. He caught three largemouth for the day, but as we
fished a shallow cove, he snagged a skipjack on his quarter-ounce Rat'l
Trap. The skipjack were hammering our spinnerbaits and crankbaits in the
shallow water, so if we'd thrown some little inline spinners, I bet we
could
have caught scores of them.
Joe
wrote in message
oups.com...
I did some more research and it looks like it was a Skipjack herring.
Funny, but the picture doesn't look as much like a tarpon as I
remembered it. I know they were great jumpers when you caught one of
the little rascals.
It was on the Pearl river below the dam, so I guess they would come up
river and get stuck at the dam and stay for a week or so and then
disappear. You might not see them again for a long time.
wrote:
The smallmouth love to congregate up and chase yellow tails,(skipjack),
in
the current down here....
We used to catch a small fish that looked like a baby tarpon and we
called it a skipjack. We used them for cut bait to fish for catfish.
They seemed to just show up for awhile and then you might not catch any
for a year. I don't remember the time of the the year, but I am pretty
sure it was summer. You could talke a small bait like a beetle spin
and run it real fast near the top of the water to catch them. They
wouldn't be over 8-10" and looked and jumped just like a tarpon. Funny
you should mention that, I haven't seen one in many years.
Hey folks, and JS,
Yes, we call them freshwater herring. Awesome fish to use for bait and can
be caught in huge numbers on small panfish lures. A lot of people I talked
to when I use to live on Wilson Lake in North Alabama told me that a lot of
the locals, "knocked them in the head" and threw them back.
I use to catch them congregated up in the back of 6-mile creek and wear them
out on a rooster tail or a "pin" minnow.(A really small rapala type bait.)
Well its raining here finally and were off to Sevierville Tennessee to visit
the Smokey Mountain Knife Works and the Bass Pro Shop there so I wont be
around for a few days..