Fly Fishing for Smallmouth Bass

A Maine Bass Fishing Trip

Our fly fishing for smallmouth bass adventure was underway! The forests of New Brunswick were slip-sliding off to the right as we gunned the boat up the St. Croix River. Downstream, Dave Reed and I had paused to watch a trio of bald eagles on their own fishing expedition. Jeff Wright, in the lead boat, had pulled far ahead of us, and we were rushing to catch up.

We’d barely done so when Jeff cut hard to the left and stopped his boat close in to shore. “This is it,” he announced.

At first we couldn’t tell what “it” was. The area looked no different than many another wide spot we’d passed on the 30 minute run upstream. “Watch up ahead,” Jeff instructed.

After a minute or two we saw it. The dark bronze backs of smallmouth bass breaking water. Some of them looked to be of good size.

Although the surface often looks no different, river currents on the St. Croix pile rocks up into shoals and bars, with deep water on either side. Sometimes these underwater ridges are eight to ten feet higher than the surrounding bottom. Smallies cruise these rock bars, looking for crawdads and baitfish. These are ideal conditions when fly fishing for smallmouth bass.

The flat-topped shoal we were watching lay only a foot or so under the surface, dropping off into eight feet of water. Bass were actively feeding in the rocks. “Go get ‘em,” Jeff hissed.

Dave and I anchored upstream to fish the shoal directly. Since we were fly fishing for smallmouth bass, we’d obviously be using fly fishing tackle. Meanwhile, Barbara and Jeff, using conventional spinning and casting gear, worked the rocky shoreline in a serious of downstream drifts.

The anchor had hardly grabbed when Dave started casting one of my Big Eyed Flash-A-Buggers. The olive stream hadn’t drifted six feet when Dave lifted his rod tip sharply, and, off-handedly said, “Fish On!.” You know, like he did this every day.

My own flash-A-Bugger was in the water as he played his fish to the boat. Before he could lift it I had one on myself; a tannin-dark smallie that tipped the scales just above the two pound mark. Fighting the stiff current as well as the fish, it felt more like a five pounder.

And so it went. Not on every cast, to be sure. But certainly every third or fourth drift of the fly produced a hit. Fly fishing for smallmouth bass was never so good! Meanwhile, gleeful whoops from the other boat told us they were into fish too.

This type of fly fishing for smallmouth bass was not a bad introduction to Maine bass fishing.

Maine? Yes, Maine! The north woods. Deep, tannin-stained lakes and streams. Serrated rows of spruce and pine marching to the water’s edge. The lonesome cry of a loon---symbol of all that’s wild and remote and free---echoing through the mist.

And smallmouth bass! Deep-bodied, fierce fighting smallies. Tough fish reflecting the wilderness they live in.

The Downeast State usually is associated with trout and salmon. But the same cold water and forage base which produces large landlocks and squaretails also breeds battling bronzebacks the equal of those found anywhere. Maine bass fishing rivals anywhere else you might choose.

It’s a relatively underutilized fishery, too. Although angling literature has many references to Maine bass fishing I never knew of anyone who’d actually fished for them there. But we wanted to give it a try and find out if the reputation and reality jived at all.

A friend of mine in Calais---the easternmost city in the United States---suggested Jeff if we were going fly fishing for smallmouth bass. At the time Jeff ran a lodge on nearby Pocomoonshine Lake, and guided on both the lake and St. Croix River, but he’s since moved to Florida.

I booked Jeff for three days. We’d spend one day with him fishing for bass on 2,600 acre Pocomoonshine Lake. “The smallmouth are larger in the lake, but aren’t as numerous,” he pointed out. “But there are some little known largemouth holes I can show you, too.”

Sounded like a plan. Besides which, the idea of three southerners going all the way up north to fish a lake named moonshine held a certain appeal of its own. .

Second day we’d fish the St. Croix River, whose 90 mile length forms the border between Maine and New Brunswick, Canada. “The smallies aren’t particularly big in the river,” Jeff pointed out, “but there are lots of them. On a good day we catch and release upwards of 100 bronzebacks in the 1 ½-2-pound range. And there are just enough three to four pound fish to keep things lively.”

It isn’t often that fishing trips exactly follow the gameplan, but this one almost did. Because the weather was perfect for fishing the river, we actually ran it the first day, then hit the lake next morning. Other than the change in sequence the trip pretty much went as Jeff had outlined.

Out on the St. Croix we continued working the shoals and rock piles, not all of which are in logical locations. The currents of spring can carry a load of rock and drop it in places that, later in the year, have no discernable reason for holding bars and shoals. But every one of them produced fish. So either a good guide or a depth finder is essential.

Next day Jeff led us to his favorite Maine bass fishing spots on the lake. These are a lot easier to locate. Generally speaking, they were rocky points dropping off into deeper water; the kind of smallmouth structure you’d look for anywhere.

Dave and I alternated fly fishing for smallmouth bass with bass fishing lures, such as jigs, spinners and crankbaits. In the lake, weighted Big Eyed Flash-A-Bugger patterns, in olive, black, and off-white, worked best. We’d cast them towards shore, let them sink, and hand-twist them slowly back along the rocky bottom.

My best guess was that the smallies mistook them for crayfish. Jeff felt otherwise. “Probably,” he thought, “it’s just something that appeals to their predacious nature. Something that looks edible moves past, and they grab it.”

Later, when we threw jigs, spinners, and crankbaits with our spinning gear, the smallies pounced on those baits with equal abandon, suggesting he was right.

As Jeff had promised, we didn’t take a large number of smallmouth from Pocomoonshine. But those we did catch averaged larger than those we’d taken in the river; including one that tipped the scales a hair below six pounds. When fly fishing for smallmouth bass, six pounds is nothing to sneer at.

Me, I’ll take that sort of quality over quantity any day. But as we’d discovered, with Downeast smallies, it’s pretty easy to have both.