Smoky Mountain Bream

[fishhead2112]

Did pretty good on bluegills this past weekend. Also caught a few decent smallmouth.

day 1



day 2

[papa]

Nice mess of fish, I need to get my old fly rod out and try it.
Eddie

[dixieangler]

17 on day 1 and 14 on day 2. I know it was lots of fun . You are going to love those 100 fish days when it happens :D. What flies were you using? I see a Spongy Spider (I think) on the fly rod for day 2 but can't tell what the other one is for day 1.

[fishhead2112]

17 on day 1 and 14 on day 2. I know it was lots of fun . You are going to love those 100 fish days when it happens :D. What flies were you using? I see a Spongy Spider (I think) on the fly rod for day 2 but can't tell what the other one is for day 1.

Dude,
Those are just the ones I kept, but thanks for the attaboy.
The popping bug in both pics is an Accardo Bream Master.

[dixieangler]

That's great, so what was your approx. total (caught and released) for each day?

[fishhead2112]

That's great, so what was your approx. total (caught and released) for each day?

Well, gee whiz, Bob. I caught some, I kept some, I let the rest go......:rolleyes:

[papa]

Who counting any way, did you catch those in the river? Im from Rock Hill and work up your way a good bit.
Eddie

[fishhead2112]

Who counting any way, did you catch those in the river? Im from Rock Hill and work up your way a good bit.
Eddie

I'm glad somebody got my point. These fish were caught from Lake Chatuge near Hayesville, NC. It's hard to get an idea of the size , but the biggest smallmouth in the top picture was 15", and two of the big female bluegills were just under 13". I've never caught bluegills that big in Wylie, but have caught shellcrackers that size.

[CatchumDeep]

two of the big female bluegills were just under 13". I've never caught bluegills that big in Wylie, but have caught shellcrackers that size.

I've bream fished all my life and never caught a bluegill that large either. Shellcrackers go that big and larger around the northern Mississippi area and in Arkansas. I do most of my bream fishing at Pickwick Lake and we catch lots of 9" and 10" bream. How much does a 13" gill weigh?

We also do a lot of catch and release...just keep the ones that are large enough to filet and limit the number to how many we want to clean. My wife has a "keeper size criteria" and it gets larger every year...drives my brother-in-law crazy when he fishes with us cause he wants to keep most of them and gets the evil eye from her everytime he puts a baby in the livewell. :D

Dan

[fishhead2112]

I've bream fished all my life and never caught a bluegill that large either. Shellcrackers go that big and larger around the northern Mississippi area and in Arkansas. I do most of my bream fishing at Pickwick Lake and we catch lots of 9" and 10" bream. How much does a 13" gill weigh?

We also do a lot of catch and release...just keep the ones that are large enough to filet and limit the number to how many we want to clean. My wife has a "keeper size criteria" and it gets larger every year...drives my brother-in-law crazy when he fishes with us cause he wants to keep most of them and gets the evil eye from her everytime he puts a baby in the livewell. :D

Dan

Dan,
not sure how much a 13" 'gill weighs. If I had to guess, I'd say probably 1.5 pounds. Heck of a fight on a flyrod! My wife and I are the same as you guys. We don't usually keep them unless they're big enough to fillet. We had a fish fry this past weekend for my stepdad's b-day, I discovered I had accumulated about 30 pounds of bream fillets in the freezer since May of this year. ALL were caught around the new and full moon cycles. I'm sure I could have doubled that number, but that's more than enough to last the two of us til next April when they start bedding again. Besides, I get tired of cleaning fish after 30 or 40 of them, lol.