A friend and I explore a new stretch of river in search of smallmouth bass. We caught a few with jigs and spooks but the BBZ-1 rat was what the bigger fish wanted.
I just can't fathom having such an amazing fishery. I can't stop watching your videos. Just discovered this channel like a week ago. It's been like Netflix binge watching seasons of shows. Incredible.
Matt: the quality, clarity, and first person perspectives of your videos along with the clear waters you fish in, literally seeing the fish underwater during the strikes and the fights makes watching feel like I'm actually fishing. Thank you so much for sharing!!
Thanks Larry! The footage from this trip came out great! I really like the hat cam for river fishing, there's just too much action that ends up being out of frame with the other camera rigs.
Thanks Miguel! I was surprised too! I'd imagine with how much time these river smallies spend tucked under the grass on cut banks they've probably seen a few mice fall in the river.
Thanks for the Kayaking videos. I'm a beginner kayaker, but am getting the hang of fishing out of one. The biggest I've caught out of my yak was only 4 lbs, so I am yet to land something big. Watching how you land these smallies is helping teach me a lot. Thank you once more.
really terrific info, by the way this is my wife's laptop (Nancy) my name is Michael, love how respectful you are: you have proved you can silently drift into a Smallies bed, catch her, and let her go right back to it with no harm: thanks alot!
you are the smooth jazz of fishing vids. thank you for keeping it real. it is too cold today for fishing but I feel a great season coming on. water is high, already had fish on this week, time is on my side.
Not only are these videos great, I cannot get over the quality of smallmouth fishing in the places you film. I live in California, and there is simply nowhere in the entire state one can nail smallmouth of this quality and quantity.
Great camera work! ...ok, that's kinda spooky looking place there! That castle looking building, in the mist. I was a river creature growing up too. if I were fishing there on this river that day, with the rat lure, I would have used my zebco 22 spincast with old fashioned short-handle grip bass rod.
Matt, I watch a lot of fishing video’s. I just noticed today how gentle you are with your release of the fish. Very respectful. I see a lot of people toss fish back. Unless I am on a bank and can not physically reach water, I see no reason to just drop or toss a fish. The Bitsy Bug strikes again. Headed to my local hot spot to try some jig fishing. First day on the big water, it just opened this week.
7:15 "You're eye balling my eddy" Me thinking; "Come on now, can't be calling dibs like that on the water". (First throw, and catch a fish on the eddy). Me; "Okay, since you caught on the first cast into it, you do get credit for calling dib, and coming through with the catch" You got me on this "unnecessary dib" 😃
I love your videos man. I'm in Ontario Canada, and it's -20 out but I've been watching your videos all morning drinking coffee and sitting by the fire. Can't wait to get out on the open water again. Do you ever get a chance to come up to Northern Ont. It's a lot like your videos. Lots of bass, pike, musky, walleye, lake trout, brown trout, brookies, steelhead etc. I love using top water for bass as well, but when the smallies aren't hitting I use a tube jig. I found that a tube jig usually out fishes even live bait, especially tipped with a gulp crayfish. If you haven't yet try it out. You won't be sorry. Keep those rods bent!
I haven't spent much time in Canada other than a couple trips to Winnipeg years ago. Taking the kayak up north into the wilderness would be awesome though! I'll have to add a pack of tubes to my bag of plastics and give them a try. Most of the time the smallies on the rivers around here won't turn down a black bitsy bug jig/black grub if it gets anywhere near them.
as always simply awesome footage, some of the very best on UA-cam. keep it up, I look forward to every one of your posts. filming and editing is finominal.
Just had a day out yesterday with the family at a local conservation and had some largemouth top water action. I spoke with a guy when i came to shore about mouse lures working well in rivers close to his place, but was having a hard time in the pads of this spring fed lake. I came home, found this video and went out for what i could find for a mouse lure. lol there are so far two things that have greatly improved my fishing; my kayak and my anchor with a rigged trolley, for my kayak. Everyone here is likely in the same boat, but that boat is a kayak and we enjoy watching others in the great experience while we fantasize about our next outting... so rigg a trolley for your anchor. It will greatly improve your targeting and it can be done inexpensively with things available at your local hardware store. thanks for the videos! - Jim from Canada
Thanks Jim! I have an anchor trolley rigged up on my kayak but I don't ever bring the anchor when I hit the river. If I want to stop at a spot I'll usually find a log or something to get a foot on or just hop out and wade fish. On this trip we had 16 miles to cover so we had to keep moving too. I added a power pole to my kayak recently also. You can see its mounting base on the back of my kayak at the start of this video. I plan on mostly using it for catfishing but it came in handy for stopping at a couple bass spots on the way back downstream when I tried it out last week.
+NDYakAngler the power pole is a pro set up, looks to be an awesome piece of hardware! We have some decent stretches of river here but I normally do about 12 -15 km, so 7 - 10 miles at a time. I mostly bring the yak to a launch 5 minutes from my place and just travel up stream and back down hitting holes, pillers and weeds along the way, or check out the local conservation, which can also great small and largemouth fishing (as well as pike, perch and other pans). This is when I find anchoring best. Looking at a used hero2 to share my experiences, until then Im going to binge watch to get some fix. thanks again!
Love smallmouth fishing, to bad all the lakes I fished for them here in California are either to low to launch or to low that they are closed to fishing. They fight so hard for their size, good video. Scott - CCB.
Thanks! I'm glad my friend talked me into getting a kayak about 6 years ago, it's been one of the best purchases I've ever made! I really like my Tarpon 120, it's not as fancy as most of the newer kayaks but its great for small rivers like this and it has good speed for when I hit bigger lakes.
+NDYakAngler I'm not looking for fancy haha. Functionality and stability is what I'm looking for bc you can always modify what you have. Your other videos on your tarpon set up gave me some good ideas. Thanks!
Just a tip, if you want a fun video, the pike in Long Lake are biting topwater right now. Try it out. My family went there. Half of our pike were on topwater. The rest were on spinners.
Great. The three lures we used were a Rapala Original Floater, Jitterbug, and a Blue Fox Vibrax. I must warn you though, be prepared. My little brother lost a 12-15 pound pike. The pike was to large to fit in the net, and while I was trying to get it in, it spat out the hook and fell in the water.
Prob average size for you but where I live each of these smallies and a fish that would take me a week to hunt down. Fish the right local and I can find plenty of half to 1pounders. Some awesome trophys. Fish on and keep doing what ya love.👌👍😊
Jesus! I watched first 10 seconds of the video and immediately pressed ''like''. Now i'm at work so i don't have the time, but can't wait to go home and see the whole video.. I' hope that on the end of the season you will make ''Top water strikes 2016'' video, because ''Top water strikes 2014'' was in my humble opinion one of the best videos ever on youtube!! Didn't like 2015 version that much because the scenes was cut to short.. It had to much strikes but to little fighting and landing the fish... It's just my small sugestion for the 2017 compilation but I love all of your videos. Cheers!
Thanks for the feedback! I'll have to watch the 2014 and 2015 topwater strike videos again and see the difference. I'm planning on doing another one of those videos this year but I think most of the best topwater strikes I've caught on film this year have been with the hat cam so I might use some of that footage this time.
Excellent video. I really enjoyed watching all of the trailing fish behind there. A quick question, I am from Wisconsin and on some of our small rivers we have some interesting dams, is that concrete structure in the beginning a little bottom draw dam? Just never saw anything like that on a river here in Wisconsin. Not sure if they are common around your part of the world. Again excellent video!!!
Thanks Christopher! There's a main dam just around the bend upstream. A small canal diverts around the dam to that building which houses hydroelectric generators.
NDYakAngler, that's interesting. Never saw anything like that before. Keep up the good work on the videos. I have been tying up rat fly patterns here at home and just waiting for the warm weather to come back again.
Matt, love watching your videos. You make it look so easy. I just bought my first kayak last September (Tarpon 120) and am itching to get out on the James River here in central Virginia. What size is the rat that you are using? These smallies are gorgeous!
My goodness... if u keep this level of quality videos up, I'm gonna unsubscribe to everyone else and just watch u slammin' river smallies!! Unbelievable man👌👍
Thanks! Most of this stretch was sand or gravel on the bottom with a few scattered rocks and boulders but there were a few spots where it was mostly rock.
Thanks Wyatt! I haven't uploaded anything new in a while, I've been having computer problems but I got it up and running again so I've got some editing to catch up on.
damn dude really??!! now why'd u hv to go and do that? LOL. fantastic footage. man u really had to be on ur A game thru part of that stretch. I would of lost half my gear. LMAO.
There were a couple spots where the river got narrow with some low hanging trees but most of it was a pretty easy float. The one spot where I almost got eaten by a tree I made the mistake of pointing the front of my kayak towards that bank so the current pushed me into it. I think this stretch will be awesome all summer though, we might have to hit it next year!
sweet vid, i like the tip u had to take ur reel off, rather than dunking it, all my reels r shimano and i luv them but idk wat it is with their reels and water, but weather its a cheapo r a more expensive one, they start locking up as soon as they get wet,i found out i can fix them quick tho by removing the spool and rotating the handle backwards for a min or so and it fixes it every time
I fished the Rum out of a kayak this past weekend. The water level was SO high, I couldn't believe it. Had fun exploring, but it was tough to fish as everything was flooded.
This river is up a little bit too since this trip. They usually draw the water level down this time of year but I think we need some dry weather to help out too.
Thanks! This was actually in Minnesota. I live right on the ND/MN border so once the fishing season opens in MN there's a lot more water to fish there. There's a few spots on this stretch where the rolling hills look a lot like one of the rivers I fish in ND though.
Thanks! This is in Minnesota. I put a polarized lens on my GoPro so it caught about the same view I had through my shades. This is about as clear as I've seen this river though. It was an awesome day, we were seeing fish swimming around all over and they were in a feeding mood!
+NDYakAngler bro that's awesome man. what gopro do you use exactly? I didn't know there were lenses for go pro. I can't wait for the bull red run in Oct/nov
I use a Hero 4 silver with my hat cam, also a Zoom H1 with a lapel mic to get audio. I've seen a couple aftermarket lenses for the Gopro but I had a couple 46mm polarizer lenses I used with another camera so I rigged one onto the Gopro housing.
Hey man this was an awesome video. such great scenery. If I ever get to nd I'm going to have to hit you up. although I don't think the chances of coming their any time soon are that good.lol
Every pike I caught would be dinner, there would be far many more smallies in that river if not for the pike. Here in Washington, they have a 10$ bounty for every pike head turned in on lake Roosevelt
Super jealous of the quality smallies you have up there. By far my favorite fish to catch. I see you generally take 3 rods and one always seems to have a spook on, what do the other 2 start the day with?
The other spinning rod has either a Bitsy Bug jig or a wacky worm depending on how fast the current is moving. Most of the time when I'm river fishing the baitcaster has a Reef Runner Cicada tied on but this time of year when the topwater bite is hot I've been leaving the rat on that one.
i say it time and again best fishing vids on youtube! i just moved into college in PA and found a small river right behind my dorm. i started catching tub smallies on topwater in this 40 yard wide, gin clear river and it reminded me so much of your videos! i have a video on my channel called "giant river smallmouths" skip to 5 minutes in the video and i start ripping em! what gopro and settings are u using? quality looks amazing!
Thanks Alexander! That's awesome you have a good smallie river close to you now, I'll have to check out the video! I leave my gopro set to pretty much stock settings, 1080/30/Wide. I rigged a polarized lens to the housing I use with my hat cam too so that helps cut the surface glare and probably makes the sky a little more blue. I'll usually export my videos in WMV format, I've found with my editor that format has very little loss of picture quality.
Thanks! It depends on how fast you fish it. If you keep it slow it stays at the surface, a little faster and it will dive under a few inches. I like to try to keep it at the surface, you can reel it pretty slow and it will keep that nice swimming action.
Do you think the BBZ-1 rat would do well in stained muddy water? Or would it be more effective in clear water? I've been thinking about picking one up but most of the water I fish is pretty stained
I've done well with it in muddy water conditions too. It rattles so that will help draw fish in. I've heard the morning dawn color is supposed to be great for muddy or stained water.
Thanks Mike! I was surprised how well it worked for smallies but I'd imagine on a small river like this most of the bigger bass have seen a mouse or two fall in off the bank.
I met a guy kayak fishing on a river in Tennessee. He was the one to tell me about this channel. like an idiot I didn't get his number, idk I guess im hoping he'll see this. I'd like to fish with him sometime
Largemouth are what I grew up fishing. I never even caught a smallie until about ten years ago. One good day of fishing them on the river is all it took to get me hooked!
Hi hope you are well l would like to ask you a question about hair jigs do you use them and what color and do you put trailers on them. If you can would you like to make a video on some hair jigs. Thanks 👌🏻
Hey Matt, after using the Rat last season, how would you reveiw it? I've never used a wake style bait, but that thing looks incredible! It's hard to imagine a better day than this. wow.
I've already ordered a few more for this summer! I really liked the BBZ-1 rat, it's just a fun lure to fish and it caught me a lot of nice smallies! I'd recommend ordering a pack of spare tails from spro though, especially if you fish it around pike. Even after a full day of river smallies like this I'd usually have to swap on a new one. A plastic worm can work as a substitute too if you can find some thin ones.
NDYakAngler they sure worked well for you! I've been having a toss up between trying a Rat and the whopper plopper. Both have been well reccomended and clearly the smallies like the Rat!
I just can't fathom having such an amazing fishery. I can't stop watching your videos. Just discovered this channel like a week ago. It's been like Netflix binge watching seasons of shows. Incredible.
Matt: the quality, clarity, and first person perspectives of your videos along with the clear waters you fish in, literally seeing the fish underwater during the strikes and the fights makes watching feel like I'm actually fishing. Thank you so much for sharing!!
Thanks Larry! The footage from this trip came out great! I really like the hat cam for river fishing, there's just too much action that ends up being out of frame with the other camera rigs.
pro trick : watch movies on kaldroStream. Me and my gf have been using it for watching loads of movies during the lockdown.
@Carmelo Benicio definitely, have been using Kaldrostream for years myself :D
@Carmelo Benicio yup, been watching on KaldroStream for years myself =)
@Carmelo Benicio yea, I have been using kaldrostream for months myself :D
I never would've imagined how effective that rat is for smallmouth!! Great video as always!!
Thanks Miguel! I was surprised too! I'd imagine with how much time these river smallies spend tucked under the grass on cut banks they've probably seen a few mice fall in the river.
Your content is the best on UA-cam! Just a guy who loves to fish. Awesome tip with the reel removal! Thank you sir, keep it up!🔥🙌🏻🔥
Thanks for the Kayaking videos. I'm a beginner kayaker, but am getting the hang of fishing out of one. The biggest I've caught out of my yak was only 4 lbs, so I am yet to land something big. Watching how you land these smallies is helping teach me a lot. Thank you once more.
really terrific info, by the way this is my wife's laptop (Nancy) my name is Michael, love how respectful you are: you have proved you can silently drift into a Smallies bed, catch her, and let her go right back to it with no harm: thanks alot!
Dude, every video has me frothing over some river smallies. I'm learning a ton from your vids on how these fish behave and react to baits.
same i only really large mouth fish and i have a ok river near me but this has me small mouth fishing almost everyday getting home from school
This is as good as it gets- amazing parade of monster bronze backs
you are the smooth jazz of fishing vids. thank you for keeping it real. it is too cold today for fishing but I feel a great season coming on. water is high, already had fish on this week, time is on my side.
6 years later and your still smashin world class smallies from the kayak.
Your videos kick major ass. I love them. Keep em' coming.
The mistic smallies lol place looks awesome in the morning
Wish I had rivers like this around me. Good vid!
Love to watch your video, it not too much talking, beautiful river , it's really relaxing. Thanks man!
That is such a beautiful stretch of river.
You absolutely have the greatest fishing spots on the planet...
Not only are these videos great, I cannot get over the quality of smallmouth fishing in the places you film. I live in California, and there is simply nowhere in the entire state one can nail smallmouth of this quality and quantity.
As always, a pleasure and joy to watch. Great quality and catches sir.
Thanks man! Days like this are what I dream of over the winter when its -20 outside!
I bet haha!
Simply awesome vid! Damn you fish some beautiful water! Keep the vids coming! I very much enjoy them! 👍🏻
Great camera work!
...ok, that's kinda spooky looking place there! That castle looking building, in the mist.
I was a river creature growing up too.
if I were fishing there on this river that day, with the rat lure, I would have used my zebco 22 spincast with old fashioned short-handle grip bass rod.
Matt,
I watch a lot of fishing video’s. I just noticed today how gentle you are with your release of the fish. Very respectful. I see a lot of people toss fish back. Unless I am on a bank and can not physically reach water, I see no reason to just drop or toss a fish. The Bitsy Bug strikes again. Headed to my local hot spot to try some jig fishing. First day on the big water, it just opened this week.
I love the vids with my coffee. I'm getting you pliers
These videos make me want to move to the Minnesota area. Beautiful scenery and awesome fishing.
7:15
"You're eye balling my eddy"
Me thinking;
"Come on now, can't be calling dibs like that on the water".
(First throw, and catch a fish on the eddy).
Me;
"Okay, since you caught on the first cast into it, you do get credit for calling dib, and coming through with the catch"
You got me on this "unnecessary dib" 😃
I love your videos man. I'm in Ontario Canada, and it's -20 out but I've been watching your videos all morning drinking coffee and sitting by the fire. Can't wait to get out on the open water again. Do you ever get a chance to come up to Northern Ont. It's a lot like your videos. Lots of bass, pike, musky, walleye, lake trout, brown trout, brookies, steelhead etc. I love using top water for bass as well, but when the smallies aren't hitting I use a tube jig. I found that a tube jig usually out fishes even live bait, especially tipped with a gulp crayfish. If you haven't yet try it out. You won't be sorry. Keep those rods bent!
I haven't spent much time in Canada other than a couple trips to Winnipeg years ago. Taking the kayak up north into the wilderness would be awesome though! I'll have to add a pack of tubes to my bag of plastics and give them a try. Most of the time the smallies on the rivers around here won't turn down a black bitsy bug jig/black grub if it gets anywhere near them.
as always simply awesome footage, some of the very best on UA-cam. keep it up, I look forward to every one of your posts. filming and editing is finominal.
Thanks Andrew, I'm glad you enjoy the videos! There should be lots more to come, the next couple months are some of the best fishing of the year.
Looking forward to it!
Just had a day out yesterday with the family at a local conservation and had some largemouth top water action. I spoke with a guy when i came to shore about mouse lures working well in rivers close to his place, but was having a hard time in the pads of this spring fed lake. I came home, found this video and went out for what i could find for a mouse lure. lol there are so far two things that have greatly improved my fishing; my kayak and my anchor with a rigged trolley, for my kayak.
Everyone here is likely in the same boat, but that boat is a kayak and we enjoy watching others in the great experience while we fantasize about our next outting... so rigg a trolley for your anchor. It will greatly improve your targeting and it can be done inexpensively with things available at your local hardware store.
thanks for the videos!
- Jim from Canada
Thanks Jim! I have an anchor trolley rigged up on my kayak but I don't ever bring the anchor when I hit the river. If I want to stop at a spot I'll usually find a log or something to get a foot on or just hop out and wade fish. On this trip we had 16 miles to cover so we had to keep moving too. I added a power pole to my kayak recently also. You can see its mounting base on the back of my kayak at the start of this video. I plan on mostly using it for catfishing but it came in handy for stopping at a couple bass spots on the way back downstream when I tried it out last week.
+NDYakAngler the power pole is a pro set up, looks to be an awesome piece of hardware! We have some decent stretches of river here but I normally do about 12 -15 km, so 7 - 10 miles at a time.
I mostly bring the yak to a launch 5 minutes from my place and just travel up stream and back down hitting holes, pillers and weeds along the way, or check out the local conservation, which can also great small and largemouth fishing (as well as pike, perch and other pans).
This is when I find anchoring best.
Looking at a used hero2 to share my experiences, until then Im going to binge watch to get some fix.
thanks again!
Love smallmouth fishing, to bad all the lakes I fished for them here in California are either to low to launch or to low that they are closed to fishing. They fight so hard for their size, good video. Scott - CCB.
Your content is the best. Your kayak is awesome. I'm convinced I need one now lol. I usually fish out of my canoe with a friend.
Thanks! I'm glad my friend talked me into getting a kayak about 6 years ago, it's been one of the best purchases I've ever made! I really like my Tarpon 120, it's not as fancy as most of the newer kayaks but its great for small rivers like this and it has good speed for when I hit bigger lakes.
+NDYakAngler I'm not looking for fancy haha. Functionality and stability is what I'm looking for bc you can always modify what you have. Your other videos on your tarpon set up gave me some good ideas. Thanks!
pro tip: this is the best video to watch while tripping on acid everything looks so cOOL
I come back every month to watch this vid damn dude great work
You could cast into a glass of water and pull a 20in out
wow 12:30 WAS awesome! just like you said... great video.
Thanks Jarrod! I love watching them come up and hit topwater lures in that clear water!
Looks like youve discovered heaven ...super nice action
Awesome video.... Been a minute since I fished water that clear.
Great day on the river.👍🐟🐟
Amazing action!!!!! Now that is a productive trip!
Just a tip, if you want a fun video, the pike in Long Lake are biting topwater right now. Try it out. My family went there. Half of our pike were on topwater. The rest were on spinners.
The smallies have been crushing topwater the last couple weeks too! Some pike would be fun for a change though.
Great. The three lures we used were a Rapala Original Floater, Jitterbug, and a Blue Fox Vibrax. I must warn you though, be prepared. My little brother lost a 12-15 pound pike. The pike was to large to fit in the net, and while I was trying to get it in, it spat out the hook and fell in the water.
Prob average size for you but where I live each of these smallies and a fish that would take me a week to hunt down. Fish the right local and I can find plenty of half to 1pounders. Some awesome trophys. Fish on and keep doing what ya love.👌👍😊
Anchor wizard with heavy drag chains will do you wonders in that swift water.
Love the action. Gotta say your videos are super underrated!! Gotta get you more subscribers!!! Video has been shared.
I would say that "mouse" lure works pretty well!
Great video 👌👍🔥
Awesome video as always man!
Well done man, got in an obstacle got out of it and still had the fish legendary dude legendary🤙🎣😎
Jesus! I watched first 10 seconds of the video and immediately pressed ''like''. Now i'm at work so i don't have the time, but can't wait to go home and see the whole video..
I' hope that on the end of the season you will make ''Top water strikes 2016'' video, because ''Top water strikes 2014'' was in my humble opinion one of the best videos ever on youtube!!
Didn't like 2015 version that much because the scenes was cut to short.. It had to much strikes but to little fighting and landing the fish...
It's just my small sugestion for the 2017 compilation but I love all of your videos. Cheers!
Thanks for the feedback! I'll have to watch the 2014 and 2015 topwater strike videos again and see the difference. I'm planning on doing another one of those videos this year but I think most of the best topwater strikes I've caught on film this year have been with the hat cam so I might use some of that footage this time.
10:50
the things we'll do for a Bass hahaa!! gotta love an adrenaline rush.
Looks like you had a pretty good fishing trip.
Cool to see you fish the same section of the river I grew up fishing. It's definitely a "best kept secret" place in the area!
It's a great stretch of river! I fished it probably 20 times last summer and only saw a couple other boats. I do my best to keep it a secret.
Yeah you narrowed it down to Minnesota for us. Thanks alot.
man, you caught more fish in one day than I've caught my whole life. I need you to teach me.....
It's pretty easy when the bass are willing to hit anything that moves! I don't think the bass on this stretch of river see lures very often.
Excellent video. I really enjoyed watching all of the trailing fish behind there. A quick question, I am from Wisconsin and on some of our small rivers we have some interesting dams, is that concrete structure in the beginning a little bottom draw dam? Just never saw anything like that on a river here in Wisconsin. Not sure if they are common around your part of the world. Again excellent video!!!
Thanks Christopher! There's a main dam just around the bend upstream. A small canal diverts around the dam to that building which houses hydroelectric generators.
NDYakAngler, that's interesting. Never saw anything like that before. Keep up the good work on the videos. I have been tying up rat fly patterns here at home and just waiting for the warm weather to come back again.
You're casting is epic love watching you fish man.... sorry I'm going thru your whole catalog this vid is prolly old by now
Matt, love watching your videos. You make it look so easy. I just bought my first kayak last September (Tarpon 120) and am itching to get out on the James River here in central Virginia. What size is the rat that you are using? These smallies are gorgeous!
I like the small 30 size rat for smallies. The medium 40 size being heavier seemed a little easier for them to shake.
My goodness... if u keep this level of quality videos up, I'm gonna unsubscribe to everyone else and just watch u slammin' river smallies!! Unbelievable man👌👍
Great video as always! You have a wonderful population of chunky smallies at your river. Does your river have rocks and boulders on the bottom?
Thanks! Most of this stretch was sand or gravel on the bottom with a few scattered rocks and boulders but there were a few spots where it was mostly rock.
wow such a peaceful place to fish would love to be out there too
It was a perfect day to be on the water! Floating through the mist that first hour was about as peaceful as it gets.
great vid!
Awesome Vid man keep it up
Greatest video
Another great video. Were you using just a steady retrieve with that rat?
I’ll usually give it a steady retrieve with a pause here and there.
Man for some reason I haven't seen your videos in my upload page. I thought you haven't uploaded all year but its great to watch your video's again!
Thanks Wyatt! I haven't uploaded anything new in a while, I've been having computer problems but I got it up and running again so I've got some editing to catch up on.
I love the part when you put the Reel on backwards. I’ve got to try it. It couldn’t hurt the way I fish.
damn dude really??!! now why'd u hv to go and do that? LOL. fantastic footage. man u really had to be on ur A game thru part of that stretch. I would of lost half my gear. LMAO.
There were a couple spots where the river got narrow with some low hanging trees but most of it was a pretty easy float. The one spot where I almost got eaten by a tree I made the mistake of pointing the front of my kayak towards that bank so the current pushed me into it. I think this stretch will be awesome all summer though, we might have to hit it next year!
+NDYakAngler I am down for that! :-)
awesome smallies ,,,yes that rat bait is nice ..
If there's a heaven the river this guy fishes on the regular is it, if I die tomorrow I hope that's where I end up.
sweet vid, i like the tip u had to take ur reel off, rather than dunking it, all my reels r shimano and i luv them but idk wat it is with their reels and water, but weather its a cheapo r a more expensive one, they start locking up as soon as they get wet,i found out i can fix them quick tho by removing the spool and rotating the handle backwards for a min or so and it fixes it every time
Man what a Action day. What river is this ? Is still Mn ?
I fished the Rum out of a kayak this past weekend. The water level was SO high, I couldn't believe it. Had fun exploring, but it was tough to fish as everything was flooded.
This river is up a little bit too since this trip. They usually draw the water level down this time of year but I think we need some dry weather to help out too.
i love your channel !!! keep up the hard work
Thanks Mikey!
ND has some nice looking rivers. nice video
Thanks! This was actually in Minnesota. I live right on the ND/MN border so once the fishing season opens in MN there's a lot more water to fish there. There's a few spots on this stretch where the rolling hills look a lot like one of the rivers I fish in ND though.
I'd drown that dude casting on my fish....Does he push you out of the line at the hotdog stand too? What a guy.
great video man. the water looked bad ass on camera. had to be much better in person. where is this place at?
Thanks! This is in Minnesota. I put a polarized lens on my GoPro so it caught about the same view I had through my shades. This is about as clear as I've seen this river though. It was an awesome day, we were seeing fish swimming around all over and they were in a feeding mood!
+NDYakAngler bro that's awesome man. what gopro do you use exactly? I didn't know there were lenses for go pro. I can't wait for the bull red run in Oct/nov
I use a Hero 4 silver with my hat cam, also a Zoom H1 with a lapel mic to get audio. I've seen a couple aftermarket lenses for the Gopro but I had a couple 46mm polarizer lenses I used with another camera so I rigged one onto the Gopro housing.
I say hats off to you man (but I should say hats on)
Awesome video as always! Keep it up!
Thanks Paul! We might have to hit this stretch of river if you make another trip up this year!
What a beautiful river very natural looking.You mind telling us where you're fishing??
Dude your videos are awesome !!!
Hey man this was an awesome video. such great scenery. If I ever get to nd I'm going to have to hit you up. although I don't think the chances of coming their any time soon are that good.lol
That building reminds me of "It".
Every pike I caught would be dinner, there would be far many more smallies in that river if not for the pike. Here in Washington, they have a 10$ bounty for every pike head turned in on lake Roosevelt
Super jealous of the quality smallies you have up there. By far my favorite fish to catch. I see you generally take 3 rods and one always seems to have a spook on, what do the other 2 start the day with?
The other spinning rod has either a Bitsy Bug jig or a wacky worm depending on how fast the current is moving. Most of the time when I'm river fishing the baitcaster has a Reef Runner Cicada tied on but this time of year when the topwater bite is hot I've been leaving the rat on that one.
i say it time and again best fishing vids on youtube! i just moved into college in PA and found a small river right behind my dorm. i started catching tub smallies on topwater in this 40 yard wide, gin clear river and it reminded me so much of your videos! i have a video on my channel called "giant river smallmouths" skip to 5 minutes in the video and i start ripping em! what gopro and settings are u using? quality looks amazing!
Thanks Alexander! That's awesome you have a good smallie river close to you now, I'll have to check out the video! I leave my gopro set to pretty much stock settings, 1080/30/Wide. I rigged a polarized lens to the housing I use with my hat cam too so that helps cut the surface glare and probably makes the sky a little more blue. I'll usually export my videos in WMV format, I've found with my editor that format has very little loss of picture quality.
+NDYakAngler good to know, thanks!!
Need a drift sock. Way to slay 'em.
Go fishing with friends more to help relax the filming anxiety. Congratulations on the baby.
Lmfao jesus man what a save at 10:45 thats the worst
Matt, have you ever used the Googin Revolver? If so what are your personal thoughts and opinions about it?
Another awesome video. Is that rat almost like a wake-bait? or a very shallow diving crankbait?
Thanks! It depends on how fast you fish it. If you keep it slow it stays at the surface, a little faster and it will dive under a few inches. I like to try to keep it at the surface, you can reel it pretty slow and it will keep that nice swimming action.
Do you think the BBZ-1 rat would do well in stained muddy water? Or would it be more effective in clear water? I've been thinking about picking one up but most of the water I fish is pretty stained
I've done well with it in muddy water conditions too. It rattles so that will help draw fish in. I've heard the morning dawn color is supposed to be great for muddy or stained water.
Great Video as always! I have to get one of those rats
Thanks Mike! I was surprised how well it worked for smallies but I'd imagine on a small river like this most of the bigger bass have seen a mouse or two fall in off the bank.
I met a guy kayak fishing on a river in Tennessee. He was the one to tell me about this channel. like an idiot I didn't get his number, idk I guess im hoping he'll see this. I'd like to fish with him sometime
u have gotten me to small mouth fish i only really large mouth but u got me to try i thank u
Largemouth are what I grew up fishing. I never even caught a smallie until about ten years ago. One good day of fishing them on the river is all it took to get me hooked!
@@ndyakangler speaking of hooked my first smallmouth hooked me in the finger it went in and back out it was nasty
What region of ND are you fishing? Are there campgrounds nearby?
I know it would be bad manners to ask which rivers your fishing but maybe you could give me a hint as to the general area of the state?
Hi hope you are well l would like to ask you a question about hair jigs do you use them and what color and do you put trailers on them.
If you can would you like to make a video on some hair jigs.
Thanks 👌🏻
I’ve used them a few times, usually black although I tried a perch pattern one too. I don’t put trailers on mine but I’ve seen it done.
@@ndyakangler Thanks for your reply 💯👍🏻
nice video!
WOW!
Hey Matt, after using the Rat last season, how would you reveiw it? I've never used a wake style bait, but that thing looks incredible! It's hard to imagine a better day than this. wow.
I've already ordered a few more for this summer! I really liked the BBZ-1 rat, it's just a fun lure to fish and it caught me a lot of nice smallies! I'd recommend ordering a pack of spare tails from spro though, especially if you fish it around pike. Even after a full day of river smallies like this I'd usually have to swap on a new one. A plastic worm can work as a substitute too if you can find some thin ones.
NDYakAngler they sure worked well for you! I've been having a toss up between trying a Rat and the whopper plopper. Both have been well reccomended and clearly the smallies like the Rat!
Dude! You gotta get yourself an anchor. as soon as i hook a fish i hit the quick release on my anchor and it "almost" always keeps me outta the shit.
Your a sniper with those casts!!. Do you ever use leaders? Or is that all nonsense ?
Treat yourself to the KALAMAZOO RIVER in MICHIGAN, launch st ft.custer and float downstream
Curious as to what Knot you’re using? To tie those rat, I’d hate to lose that lure fighting big fish
I use the Trilene knot for just about everything. It’s quick and I rarely break off at the knot.
No changes in fishes 😂