Fly Fishing Smallies

[LostFisherman]

I'm going to be back in Ontario around Thunder Bay around the 21st of September on a lake with a nice smallmouth population and was wondering if anyone cold give me any tips on how to fish for them with flies at that time of the year? Do you use surface flies or sinking flies? I will be using my Sage #8 wt. with a Clouser line that I'm having put on and plan on using a wire like tippet because of the Northerns. Any suggestions on what flies to carry would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

[Gravelguy4]

I don't have any suggestion on which lake to choose, i would imagine around thunder bay most lakes would have a good population of smallies.
As for fishing techniques, clousers would be good, leeches, crawfish imitations and surface poppers. the usual small mouth stuff.
that time of year the fish might be feeding more in the shallows so a floating line might be all you need but if you have a sink tip, i'd bring it just in case.

i doubt that helped much.

good luck

[beachburger]

Ahhh. Late September.

Pleasant days.

Cool evenings.

Only the hard core on the water.

LMB and SMB with the feed bag on.

Even though I am a total fly fishing newbie, this is my favorite time of the year and one of the only times I chuck shallow running hard bodied minnows with the spinning/baitcasting gear. I plan on spending much of late Sept presenting biggish streamers (2"- 4" long) in 3-12 ft of water.

And if some chunky pike want to have a munch on a big streamer, I'm good with that.....

[Todd B.]

In the fall when they've put on the feed bag, I've found that they're predominantly feeding on bait fish, though topwater poppers can be effective as well depending on the bite.

Cheers,
Todd