Bass Fishing Articles / River Smallmouth -Topwater Secrets / Bassintips.com

One of the most popular ways of fishing, topwater; mix in river smallmouth and you got yourself one of the funniest ways of catching bass. River smallmouths are strong, smart and somewhat easy to catch.

Both before you ever think about stepping into a pair of old tennis shoes and wading the skinny water, most must understand bass biology and current. First, a bass must breathe through the mouth and out the lungs, so the head of the fish will always point upstream. They sit with the head pointed upstream for two main reasons. To Breathe and smallmouth position themselves to grab anything that floats downriver. So keep this in mind when attempting to catch some river bound fish.

Now to the actual fishing. I like to position myself on one side of the river in a pretty calm of the river for the *Heddon topwater torpedo to become successful. Try to cast slightly upstream directly across the river. This allows for fish downstream seeing the bait. Never cast downstream, because the retrieve will have to be worked back upstream and smallmouth bass feel and hear the bait coming from behind them and gets spooked thinking it might be a bigger fish such as a pike or muskie. Many torpedo using anglers, actually use the wrong retrieve when fishing it.

They basically cast out and reel back in. The bait’s propellers create a churning of the water creating nice action, but it’s not effective to the bass. The proper way of fishing it is a lot slower. First you cast it out and let it sit until out rings disappear; be careful though, the bigger smallmouth attack it as soon as it hits the water. Then jerk the rod pretty hard causing the bait to actually dive under the surface. The propellers then create small air bubbles which triggers the fish. Pause. Let the bait float back up to the top and let the rings disappear again.

Watch your bait! A lot of the time a smallmouth will sit under it and wouldn’t hit it until it dives under and you will not see the bait float back up. So if you notice something like that set the hook.

Once the rings have vanished repeat with a hard jerk. Continue this process the whole retrieve back.
Remember, just like every other bass fishing technique out there, the *Heddon topwater torpedo is sometimes great, then other times not so great. I like using the *Heddon Tiny Torpedo the best, in a stained river with some cloud cover in mid summer.

The worst time when river fishing for smallmouth bass is when the water is very low and clear and the sun is shining.

Product Sources:
Heddon webpage
Heddon Tiny Torpedo webpage

Advertise Here
click for more info