“Wisconsin Muskie Fishing with Brian Long”

Part 5: Smallmouth Bass Fishing in Muskie Country

Editor’s Note: Brian Long from Glidden, Wisconsin, owns and operates Brian Long’s Muskie Guiding and has been guiding for muskies for 40 years.

Question: Although you’re a muskie guide, you like to catch smallmouth bass, too, don’t you?

Long: Yes, I do a little guiding for smallmouths, and on my days off, that’s what I like to go fish for the best. I catch them in river systems, flowages and in clear-water lakes. Smallmouths are one of the native fish here in northern Wisconsin. I use a lot of Mister Twister as well as Mepps products when I’m fishing for smallmouths. My two favorite lures are either a No. 2 or a No. 3 Mepps Aglia with a silver blade and a bucktail. Then for finesse fishing, I like a 4-inch Mister Twister Curly Tail Grub on a jig.

Now, one of my favorite trips is to float the river system. The smallmouths look like a black current in the river. All you have to do is to cast the Aglia close to the bank and start retrieving them back to the boat. On a good day of fishing, those bass will just blast that Aglia. If I have someone who doesn’t mind getting in and out of the boat to fish the rivers with me, catching 40 or 50 smallmouths is not uncommon.

I fish these rivers out of a 15-foot rowboat, and we have a lot of rocky shoals and sand bars to get across. So, when we come to a shoal, we may have to get out of the boat and pull it across the shoal. Then, we fish below the shoal with the jig and Curly Tail Grub, because if there’s a hole beyond that shoal area, which there usually is, the bass will be holding in that hole.

Question: What size Curly Tail Grub are you fishing with when you fish the jig?

Long: I like the 4-inch tail, and the colors I prefer are yellow, white, red and black. I’ll be using 8-pound-test line, and I’ll be fishing from a 1/2- to 1/4-ounce jig head. Now, many times you can simply cast the jig and reel it back to the boat. Because of the twisting action of the tail, the bass will eat it up. Often, I’ll start reeling it in, stop, let it drop and then start reeling again.

Now, the bass we start catching in the river won’t be as big as the bass in the flowages. A 19-incher is a really-big river bass, but we’ll catch a lot of 14- to 15-inch bass, which are what I call “action bass.” This trip is great for someone who just wants to go fishing and catch a lot of fish. Every once in a while, we’ll catch a northern pike. One time we were fishing for smallmouth bass, and my daughter caught a 38-inch muskie on a Curly Tail Grub.

When I’m fishing the flowages, I look for a point that has both rocks and logs in it. If I’m fishing late in the day or early in the day, I have a really good chance of catching those big smallmouths. If I’m fishing in the middle of the day, those smallmouths are a little bit harder to catch. If we’re fishing in the flowages on an average day we can catch several fish that are 20-inches long. You also have a legitimate chance of hooking a muskie. Now, a muskie will usually bite off the lure, because you don’t have any sort of leader, and that fish has razor-sharp teeth. But, sometimes you get lucky and will hook a muskie in the corner of the mouth, and we can get it in the boat.

To learn more about muskie fishing, contact Brian Long at 715-264-4974, or email him at brianlong@centurytel.net.