Hocus Pocus..now you see 'em....

When fishing Smallmouth it is fairly common to have a larger fish follow in and strike at a smaller one you playing to hand. In fact, I find it so common that I look for it and generally always recast to an area where one is caught several times to pick up the follower.

A couple of days ago I wish fishing a shalllow riffle, ripping a Gurgle Pop across and down and getting a hook-up very 2-3 casts. On hook up was a fish of no more than 3" ...I saw it clearly as it popped straight up about 10 feet from me when it whacked the fly...

The tiny Smallie and fly go back under, line goes slack, then a thump, bump and some considerably heavier resistance and another skyward fish...well, no trophy but the dink had given up it's place on the hook to a 10" Smallie!

I wish the trade up option was always in effect.

I've had that happen a number of times with LM bass, but I've never been able to get them to "transfer" the hook to the larger fish. The most memorable time I had this happen was when I was landing a 13-14 inch bass on my 7wt rod. The water was a bit stained and visability was limited to about two feet. As I got the fish to the bank, he dove straight down as the water was about 3-4 feet deep at the bank. When I when to lift him to the surface, he was very heavy so I thought he had buried himself in weeds. I stripped the line in until I had the rod tip right at the water and I eased him to the surface. What came up shocked me. A huge LM bass had this 13-14 inch fish about halfway in her mouth. There was only about six inches of the fish's tail sticking out of her mouth. The very large bass looked at me, spit out her "lunch" and slowly swam away. I switched over the the largest streamers I had (8-9 inches long) but they looked puney compared to the size meal she had in mind. I don't know how large she was, but I've caught two bass in the 10 lb range on my fly rod and they were nowhere close to the size of this fish. I guess that's what keeps us pumped-up for the next trip.

Jim Smith

I was fishing at Damon's Seven Lakes (a private fishing club, just outside Damon, TX) about 3 months ago. Threw a nice cast about 50ft out, with my Adams settling softly on the water, when I saw the take. Started stripping in to find the "taker" wasn't much larger than the fly! 2.5-3" bluegill. Well, I continued to strip it in, skipping the 'gill across the top of the water. About 20ft of line left, and the water exploded! I hauled in a 4.25lb largemouth. She'd knocked the 'gill off the hook and taken it herself. NOT quite, I imagine, what she'd intended, but it made my day!
:D
This is the only time this has ever happened to me.

A fish trailing a hooked fish is pretty common in smallie fishin. My theory on this is that the caught fish at times is throwing up what is in its stomach in an effort to got loose and the trailing fish is reaping the rewards.

My grandfather was fishing off the Central Coast of CA for rockfish (not FFing) out of a rubber raft. He caught a 3-4 lb blue rockfish, and could see it coming up through the clear water. He leaned back and kept reeling until the line stopped. My dad razzed him about having the fish wrap him around some kelp...until the line started moving and the rod started throbbing. My Grampa kept reeling and brought up 32lb lingcod which spit the blue out and began swimming around the boat. My dad leaned over and "foul hooked" the link with a gaff...good eating, there.