This Weekend

[cavdad45]

Anyone planning to fish Southwest Washington tomorrow? Clark or Cowlitz County?

[lskiles]

I was planning to see if Lacamas was back up.

I was at Sportsman's Warehouse this week and as usual one of the fishing guys talked me into trying something new. First I was told to take these 3" lizards and properly rigged to a jig and tossed into any rocks on the Columbia a smouthmouth bass would be mine...garranteed! I did it with no results. Then I was sold a weedless jig with a black/purple/chartruese skirt and told to work that real slow accross the bottom of any cover and the bass would come running, could not fail. Lost it in about 6 casts.

This time I was sold a couple of nice big wooly buggers. I was told to string a clear bobber on my line then a small bead then tie a swivel clasp on. Tie the wolly bugger to a 36" leader and fill the bobber half way with water cast to cover or where ever I thought the trout were and use a slow retrieve. I am going to try that at the mouth of the creek at Lacamas...

...to be continued.

[Lyndon]

Hey iskiles, I just thought you might want to know that I fish Lacamas and stuff all the time and I also buy most of my lures at fisherman's warehouse and I was told the same thing about that jig in the columbia river. I also like you wanted to hook up with a smallie so I tried it with no success at all I tried it in the summer. That is probably like their sells pitch or something. Anyway I was at Lacamas today I used a blue/black jig and pig by structure with no success but I heard that it really works good so If you arnt having any success I might try that. My buddy caught one on a rapala but it was a half pounder. If your looking to catch something use a rapala but if you want something different use bigger baits at Lacamas and dont use rapalas because almost all the time the small ones will get it before the big ones its really frustrating sometimes. Anyway have fun and good luck and I would like to hear how it goes....

[cavdad45]

Was having a hard time deciding where to go fishing this weekend. My original plan was to fish the Willamette, but with all the rain, I didn't want to have any contact with our world famous sewage overflows, so I thought about Lacamas. I decided not to because of the low water and it just didn't "feel right."

So I ended up a Henry Hagg Lake down here in Oregon. I figured it was my best chance at a big smallmouth. When I arrived, the lake was down more than 40-45 feet from maximum pool. So I drove around the lake with my camera trying to capture key locations for future reference. You know, creek channels, underwater islands, I even found the foundation from an old farmhouse not too far from the boat ramp.

When I finally got around to fishing I was fishing the rough riprap of the dam face. You guys heard me talking about that before. As you also know, I suck at finesse fishing. So I forced myself to do it and not do what I usually do when dropshotting. Try it, get bored, pull out a crankbait or something more comfortable. Saturday I stuck with it dropshotting.

I caught 3 largemouths near the dam wall using a 3" Roboworm leach. First time I ever caught LMs that side of the lake. I was in smallie territory about 30feet down. No they were not hawgs, only 12-14 inches apiece, but it helped get a little foothold on dropshotting. Catching a couple fish on a new rig is a great confidence booster.

I just wanted to say thanks to my friends at WL.com for helping me learn the new technique and for all the input about fishing this nasty dam's rocks.