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Yesterday I tried Watson lake in Fort Collins for the first time and decided it was pretty slow. I lost something near the inlet (rainbow/ walleye) on a tube jig setup that I was attempting to catch smallmouth with.
I headed over to Horsetooth to give it a quick shot before I had to go back to work. I caught a 14" smallmouth on my texas rigged/ pegged weight 4" tube setup in the first few minutes and then didn't have much action for the next hour.
Right as I was about to call it a day, I thought the tube setup had snagged on a rock (because it had been doing that frequently) and I gave the rod a snap to get it free or at least see what was going on and it pulled back quite strongly!
I knew it was a pretty big fish but was surprised to find a 19" smallmouth on the end of the line after a couple short energetic runs.
Here are a couple pics of the big fat smallie. She was caught in about 10 feet of water, not far from shore. Seemed to like the sandy bottom. Water temp was in the mid 50's last time I checked. The smallmouth action at the 'tooth has been pretty consistant lately. I'm not sure how long this pattern will last.
I'm throwing a couple more examples of decent smallies I have caught within the last week as well as a nice ultralight rainbow and cutbow that were caught on the Poudre last week when it was fishing so good before the flows started to come up and get off-color. The trout were going nuts for small spoons and spinners reeled just ahead of the current.
2 pics of the 19" fattie. Sorry about the pic quality...I have resorted to a point and shoot film camera because the digital is dead...you know..baptized.
14 and 15" smallies
Rainbow and Cutbow
I headed over to Horsetooth to give it a quick shot before I had to go back to work. I caught a 14" smallmouth on my texas rigged/ pegged weight 4" tube setup in the first few minutes and then didn't have much action for the next hour.
Right as I was about to call it a day, I thought the tube setup had snagged on a rock (because it had been doing that frequently) and I gave the rod a snap to get it free or at least see what was going on and it pulled back quite strongly!
I knew it was a pretty big fish but was surprised to find a 19" smallmouth on the end of the line after a couple short energetic runs.
Here are a couple pics of the big fat smallie. She was caught in about 10 feet of water, not far from shore. Seemed to like the sandy bottom. Water temp was in the mid 50's last time I checked. The smallmouth action at the 'tooth has been pretty consistant lately. I'm not sure how long this pattern will last.
I'm throwing a couple more examples of decent smallies I have caught within the last week as well as a nice ultralight rainbow and cutbow that were caught on the Poudre last week when it was fishing so good before the flows started to come up and get off-color. The trout were going nuts for small spoons and spinners reeled just ahead of the current.

2 pics of the 19" fattie. Sorry about the pic quality...I have resorted to a point and shoot film camera because the digital is dead...you know..baptized.

14 and 15" smallies


Rainbow and Cutbow

