Paul Trybul

Dan, I struggled with the same feelings. Small stream smallmouth fishing for me is an escape where I try to get away from people and technology. I have paid my dues and have 20 years of scouting on some rivers and was hesitant to share information. I don't own the river, we all share it. As long as people care for the resource & are passionate about protecting it , it can be enjoyed like I have enjoyed it for generations. I thought that was a good article too.

Joseph, I'm glad you enjoyed our meeting. Thank you for attending and taking the time to check out our website. This is a good place to excellerate the learning curve with catching river smallmouth. Eric, He put his real name at the bottom, doesn't that count?

Eric, That is a very good idea. I also think it would be valueable to discuss with a conservation police officer the laws regarding river navigation, what's legal, what's enforced, and what could be done to make our laws more like Wisconsin's. Another one of the big ? in our wonderful state.

I fished a lot of the gulp alive minnow last fall and I made a few observations. I did not see an increase in smallmouth catches over other products. Smallmouth are sight feeders mainly so this makes sense. I did catch some decent smallmouth on them so I didn't think they repel smallmouth. I did see an increase in catches of other species mainly walleye and catfish. I was able to fish this plastic tight to wood where jig and minnow would have been difficult. The results were some nice walleye and catfish on plastics. The other field test was in Canada. Our outfitter delivered our live bait to a different camp. The guy with the gulp alive did significantly better on walleye than regular gulp or regular plastics.

Smallies will definately be deep in Sylvania in August. They should still be catchable but don't expect a hot topwater bite or anything unless you go to some of the largemouth lakes. I'm doing a father/son canoe & camping trip on the black river in Wisconsin in July. I can let you know how it goes. As already pointed out August would be better on rivers that lakes for smallies. The rivers should be low and stable and the smallmouth should be in predictable summer haunts in areas with current & rock. So many rivers so little time. The farther north you go the better your opportunities but there are decent places in IL as mentioned.

Its good someone around here stocks slider heads. I went to the new Cabelas store for the 2nd time and they still don't have slider heads. I told them I'm sure I'm not the 1st to ask & I guarantee I won't be the last to ask. They don't listen. They make more money selling stuff designed to catch fisherman instead of fish. I like the spider sliders with the 3/0 hooks. That wide gap slider has a very very thick hook. You really have to hammer home the hookset to bury that through the plastic & a fish.

Ron, I thought those rainbow looked bigger than those scrawny ones the DNR stocks. Don, Sorry about my past posts of my big fat mug taking up more than your whole screen. I'm wondering now if more poeple have it resize like me & Ron or if more people are like Don with it staying bigger than the screen? It could be just an internet browser setting. Don have you upgraded from that commadore 64 yet? I'm just lazy & don't want to resize my pictures and have doubles choking out all of memory on my PC. I'm willing to conform if it is more than Don. Can we get a survey here?

That's a nice stringer of rainbows. Are those from the DNR spring or fall stocking programs here in IL?

If you give it time it will shrink down to an appropriate size once it is loaded. I suppose for people with dial up that could take a while. Don't you want the fine detail enough to see an old decayed sassy shad sitting a foot under the water?

Ron, Although Don's instructions are good for all message boards, the 9 step program there doesn't scream out I'm easy. The ISA and its advanced message board technology with image hosting built in provides an easier solution. The problem with tinypic.com and other image hosting sites is they have time limits on accounts if they remain inactive. Then people go back through old posts and you see the box with an x in it where a picture used to be. Anyone seen that before? Consider the ISA boards easier option. Of coarse like bterril said, you must have your pictures downloaded off of your camera and on your computor saved in a location you can find. 1) Just under the message box I am typing in now there is a section called Attachments. In the right hand part of that section is a button called Browse... Click that button. 2)A box will appear that is a window to your computor. Go find where you saved those pictures (My Pictures for example) and click the Open button in the bottom right of the window once you have found & clicked on the picture you want. 3)The window to your computor files will disappear and a path to your pictures will appear to the left of the browse... button. Your next step is to click the UPLOAD button just to the right of the Browse... button. A message of Uploading File will appear with a circular spinning graphic. 4)The last step is to put your cursor in the spot of you message that you want the picture to go. Basically wherever you stoped typing last. Then go back to the Attachment section and click the down arrow to the right of Manage Current Attachements. Click on the picture you uploaded and it will be placed in the spot where you were last typing in your message. Here: That's a total of about 5-6 clicks and your there. I hope this helps.

The advertisement on TV says the boat show is free. I think this is misleading. Last year the boat show was free but the other 1/2 with the fishing related booths cost $5.00. I will be there every day and we have some extra vendor passes. I will have my cell phone on me and you can call me and set up a meeting so I can get you a vendor pass. That way you can walk in like you own the place. My cell number is 815-703-2651 and if you're a telemarketer, take me off your list.

Good tip Rich. I went to Cabelas this weekend and they had these thin lead strips that come in a conveinent match book. I want to say it was only 99 cents for a pack of 20. They look great for weighting down plastic jerkbaits like a fluke.

Not that I'm a Blago supporter but Ryan left him a big $H!? sandwich to take a bite out of. I don't agree with some of the areas he's chose to cut but when you inheret a huge deficit its raise the taxes or make some cuts. It's not just the DNR, its public schools, IDOT, ect. We are going to be paying for years from the corruption of the Ryan administration.

Yeah, the guy holding the fish.

I purchased a canoe stabalizer about 6 years ago from Cabelas. At that time it was about $119.00. I see the price has gone up. For me & my canoe the stabalizer is invalueable. My canoe is very tipsy and is almost a guaranteed dump on most canoe trips. That limited me to warm weather and forced me to use my canoe for more recreational trips instead of fishing trips. Now my canoe is stable enough to stand up and sight fish out of. I have the confidence to take my children in it and anchor and fish out of it in heavy current. As long as it is installed properly, I can't dump it if I try. It can be a liability in tight quarters around wood. Please heed this one warning and use in the right spots. It does slow down your speed but in rivers the current is doing the work for you anyway. For me its all about confidence and my stabalizer gives me that. 3 generations safely navagating the Kishwaukee river in late September.

I live 5 minutes away from the Rock river and would like to see this added to the list. I would be happy to collect samples below many of the discharge sights to make sure they are in compliance. I've seen some that look & smell questionable.

As an added benefit for helping work the show, volunteers can get a vendor badge and see the show for free.

Pretty typical. One year we had snow like this and I cancelled that day. Still had a few people show up. The show must go on but use your best judgement while traveling. The NW regional also found out if you let Kevin Dells schedule a fishing outing 3-7 inches of rain are sure to fall a few days before.

We'll have a lot to discuss: upcoming fishing shows, 5 NW regional fishing outings, Gregg's book, tips on buying the right river kayak, Sylvania trip, and we have an open forum for any smallmouth related questions.

I had 3 very memorable ISA moments in 2007. I'll list them in the order they happened. #1 Clear Creek Shocking. I had never done a stream shocking before and had no idea what I was getting myself into. It was a very eye opening and rewarding experience. It took me back to my days of youth dabbling in the creek turning over rocks and catching things in buckets and studying them. #2 Wisconsin River Guided Trip with Gordon P. I decided to donate a little more money to the ISA by being high bidder at the blowout. I got my money's worth fishing 2 days with a free night stay on the Wisconsin River. The sections we fishing had outstanding natural beauty and the element of adventure with strong rapids through boulder fields. I caught some quality smallmouth including probably my heaviest smallmouth of the year. I also had a close encounter with a musky. Thanks again Gordon for a memorable trip. #3 Kishwaukee River Guided Trip. I also donated a trip in 2007 and got to fish with very accomplished angler that had fished in many corners of the world. I really enjoyed watching his agressive style and how excited he was catching smallies on my humble little local river.

Weeds aren't that big of an issue in the waters I fish. It looks like a good big fish bait early and late in the season when they are on a baitfish bite instead of a crawfish bite. I asked about the slow retrieve because it looks like in the summer you could throw a craw trailer on it and drag in along the bottom.

What weight works best in rivers 2-4 foot deep with mild to moderate current? Instead of a steady swimming retrieve, do you guys have any luck just crawling them along the bottom? How snag resistant are they? Those are my only questions. Depending on the answers I think I'll be ready to add them to my arsinal in 2008

The problem with those 3 way rigs are they are not meant to be casted. They end up getting all twisted up if you try to cast them. They are designed to just be lowered while fishing out of a boat. We used them alot in Canada fishing for walleye because you had to be deep to get them. They may work wading on a river if you are in a shallow riffle just above a deep ledge with fast current blowing over the top. Kind of a rare spot but that could be a useful technique if you could get close and just lower it down.

I'm ready to jump into the world of kayak ownership and have done some research. I would prefer to purchase one through Cabelas because that is where my pre-paid incentive credit cards works. They only have 1 that meets my needs which are pretty basic. I want a SOT that is short and manueverable for small streams. I may occasionally fish small lakes. I also want one that is lightweight and I'm not concerned too much about total weight capacity because I only weigh 150lbs and I plan on traveling light. The 1 I have me eye on is a Emotion Charger Kayak . Does anyone have any experience with this kayak?

Makes me wishin' I was takin' my boy fishin'. I've caught some nice smallmouth on that exact same jig and minnow set-up.