Classic November Smallmouths

5 .5 lb Smallie

4 lb Bronzeback

4.5 lb Smallmouth

4 lb Smallmouth

Scott and I got up with the chickens this morning and navigated the pre-dawn fog to partake in the first light striper top-water bite on Watts Bar this morning.  The lunar calendar was in our favor and said fishing should be excellent today - especially from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Boy was it ever right!  The moon was full last night, and will actually be at peak tonight. We started in "Row" Cove looking for packs of silver kings cruising the shallows for shad.  The minnows have been congregating in the backs of coves recently in search of the warmest water they can find.  The surface water temperature was around 58 F, prime for stripers roaming around like a pack of wolves looking to put the feed bag on.  There was a little bit of surface action, but nothing significant - just an occasional largemouth or white bass chasing minnows near the shore line.  We worked our way into the very back of the cove where we saw feeding fish working some shad minnows over.  I was throwing a 9" redfin and picked up an extremely aggressive 1 1/2 lb largemouth (talk about your eyes being bigger than your stomach!), and then a nice 2 lb white bass on a shad colored Excalibur lipless crankbait.   At about 8:30 a.m. we decided to get bait and start looking for smallmouth.   We headed over to the rock pile at Thief Neck Island.  I pretty much always fish a float when using live bait in this area because of the jagged rock bottom.  Fishing on the bottom here will almost always guarantee a hang up.  Right away we started getting bites and boating smallmouth.  The fish were aggressive and feeding. The rig of choice was a standard bobber with a 3' 4 lb test flourocarbon leader on 10 lb test Power Pro and a 1/0 Owner Mutu Light circle hook.  This rig was delivered on my new 7' Temple Fork Outfitters ML matched with my Shimano Stella 4000 FB.  We caught a 5 1/2, a 4 1/2, two 4's, a 3, and multiple 2 lbers. All tolled we caught over 20 smallmouth.  The best 5 weighing a total of 21 lbs!  This easily the best bunch of smallmouth we've ever caught in one trip - A great way to break in my new TFO rod!