I stepped into the river at 6 and found the water level up from the thunderstorms in Mass last week.
The water clarity was fine and there was good depth around the flats.

As a final thought I had thrown 2 soft jerkbaits in my bag as I left the house, so I tied one on to start.

The jerkbait was perfect and on the 2nd cast I locked up on a solid strike.
This fish ran me around on a few long powerful runs, but never jumped. I actually thought I had snagged a carp until I saw it was a real nice smallie.


I released her and cast to the same area again and had one literally wake over to it and smash it. I set the hook and it jumped, but threw the bait off the hook. I landed the fish but wanted that bait back that was now floating down river.

Down to 1 bait, I re-rigged and fired it out.
Same deal...like shark week, a fish v wakes over and grabs the twitching bait. It's a medium sized smallie and quite the fighter.
I'm on a definite pattern now...

I cast again...

De ja vue..wake, hit, set, come tight and it throws the bait off during the fight and I lose the last soft jerkbait on me. Uugggghh
I have hundreds of them at home..but now 0 with me. Game Over!

Moving up river I then switched to top waters for a few hours and caught a few more decent ones and had a few swing and misses.

Out of the water by 10 to get some other stuff done.
Memo to self...never leave home with only 2 soft jerkbaits.

It was a great way to start the day.

Real nice fish, congrats.

If I may ask, was this upper ct river? I’m struggling to find the bass bite on river in Haddam area. Nothing better than catching a bunch of smallies.

This is the upper CT river north of Windsor.

Way to go Jon!

I think they're like what used to come with the banjo minnows.