Hello Fellow Anglers,

Being a Texas Angler I know the old Bucket Mouth Largemouth Rules the water, but I have an excellent opportunity do some smallmouth fishing on Burt Lake outside Alanson Michigan in early July.

I haven't done a lot of fishing for smallies but do continue to find lots of resources on drop shot fishing. Does anyone have any other tips or experiences to share?

Peace,
HawgWrangler

I'm not an expert but used to fish Green Bay and Lake Michigan for smallies every summer vacationing at a friends condo/yacht. Depending on water temps, you might still have some luck fishing with split shot rigs with fluke or a smaller senko bait fishing rocks that were 6 to 8 feet deep in late June/July timeframes. Especially first couple of hours and late evening, and also working those rigs over the top of grass. We used to have luck with colors similar to the KVD Caffeine Shad Green Pumpkin Sapphire (a little lighter and more fleck than what works well on N Texas lakes). Later in the day, slow rolling a 1/4 oz jig head with a curly tail grub (3.5 inch) in the same type of color over slightly deeper rocks would produce pretty good. A drop shot with a fluke or caffeine shad bait nose hooked will work well if the fish are holding deeper than 10ft. A bunch of folks use the Ned rig up there if you cant catch anything on the above, but I get frustrated fishing those and tend to catch 9 inchers on it, so dont have a lot of experience with it.

Don't forget to slide over to Mullet, its good too. Down size baits and line. Tube baits, twin tail grubs and hold on !!!

O yea, pop - r and small crank baits

For bigger Smallies, try fishing for them at night on steep, rocky banks (chunk rock is best) with black single-spins.

We just got back from fishing Lake Mich Grand Traverse Bay East arm. What a fishery! Caught 28 on Tues and 55 on Wed. Biggest of trip was 5lbs. We had 12 over 4lbs. Used three baits......tubes, swimbaits, and drop-shot. What an awesome area, got to travel the length of the state of Mich by car. It's a beautiful state this time of year. Enjoy your trip......

hey Okie Poke sound like you just did what I have on my bucket list. I'm lucky enough to fish toledo bend all i wont but dream of smallies at grand traverese bay would like to talk to you about your trip .

I get to fish in the Cheboygan River often, which is just north of Burt Lake. I can tell you that I have great luck on top water baits (mainly poppers) and wacky rigged senkos. I throw a wacky rigged senkos more than anything else and really do a number with them. I've had most success with baby bass color. Also downsizing line and hooks will help a ton fishing for clear water smallmouth. Hope this helps. Good luck, those smallies are a blast!

Just got back Wednesday from Burt and Mullett. They were just finishing up the spawn while we were there. We did catch some cruisers though on The Turd(Ned), tube,jerkbaits and spybaits.
Lots of great lakes including THE Great Lakes to check out while there. Douglas was good for us on a day when the wind howled, but Mullett was by far the best we fished while there. We had crappy weather on GTB East and Torch that really limited our success there.
Be prepared to see a cereal bowl lake with sand flats surrounding it- those natural lakes are a totally different animal than our reservoirs.
Definitely try to make the drive from Petoskey to Grand Traverse and also check out the Mackinac Bridge- some great sights to see!
It was an awful drive, but I'm sure I'll be back!

Hey Okie,

When were you there?
What were the water temps like?
Were there in dominate structures or depths?

Thanks,

We fished this last Tues and Wed. Water temps were 58-61. Best depths were 8-15ft across sand flats with grass on them.

Well, the trip to Great North Michigan was a success in many ways. Had a great time with the wife, who was a real trooper on her first long distance road trip. It was a really great visit with family and friends.

As for the fishing, it was okay. The holiday weekend was miserable thanks to all the pleasure seekers on Saturday and Sunday. The two boys (13 and 11) are not experienced anglers but were really eager. They were told the boat left the dock at 5:00 AM every morning. They were there and ready to go. We only fished until 10:00 AM because that's when the tubers and water skiers started getting active. We would then go out again for a couple hours in the evening.

The fishing was slow on Saturday and Sunday. Spent most of our time looking for areas that held good structure in 10 to 15 feet of water and that wasn't bothered by the pleasure boaters. Found one spot that had the ideal structure and depth and saw a few fish on the graph. We saved that for Monday morning.

On Monday morning we pulled up on the spot found Sunday and within an hour there were six more fishing boats around us. I was kind of proud I found an area that seemed to be right on track. We caught several good fish using a drop shot and a hula grub on a football jig.

The boys still weren't sure I knew much about fishing and I would agree when it came to clear water smallmouth fishing. I was completely out of my element and no matter how much research I had done, it was overwhelming. I am however only more determined to do it again!

My redemption came when we were invited to a private pond that didn't get a lot of fishing pressure. I ended up with seven happy anglers from 7 to 49. Everyone caught multiple largemouth with the lunker weighing nearly five pounds.

Overall, I used three main techniques that produced fish and included drop shot, ned rig, and football jig. All were thrown on a spinning Quantum Smoke PT paired with a Smoke PT Reel. As recommended by many on TFF, we spooled them up with 15 lb. braid and fluorocarbon leaders of 10 lbs. Baits of choice were Strike King KVD Dream Shot (Morning Dawn) and KVD 4" Super Finesse Salt Impregnated (Coppertreuese) and a Yamamoto Double Tail Hula Grub in Cinnamon Green Flake on a 3/8 oz. Strike King Tour Grade Football Jig Head. As for the Ned Rig, I went with the Z-Man Finesse ShroomZ head with a Finesse T.R.D. in Green Pumpkin Goby.

Thank you to everyone that offered tips and encouragement.