Hello all,
Jesse Rice here in the Tri Cities.
I usually lurk,not able to fish much in the last year, but in the case of
bass fishing with a fly, I have to say that the lower yakima from Benton
City to the Tri Cities has world class small mouth fishing with both dry
poppers and streamers. Plus it is close enough for me to have time to fish.
>From about now until the end of the spawn, which can be middle to the end of
june(depending on the crazy weather), Floating the section from benton city
bridge to priest rapids dam can produce 3-5 pound aggressive fish all day
long, by just looking and casting for the mating beds along the shallows.
The float will take a good 8 hours and is really easy. Shorter floats can be
done from west richland to the mouth. just about any fly that looks like it
will mess with the spawning beds will produce a strike.
One of the lastest FH news had the area mapped out with good put in and take
out spots.
On a side note, last weekend the professional bait casters finished a
tournament on the Columbia river/mouth of the Yakima confluence area, with
some of the fish taken from the mouth and up on the Yakima ( as far up as a
bass boat and 150hp can take you) and they had many large 4-5 pound small
mouth at weigh in time. So it appears that now would be a great time for
anyone wanting to fyfish for small mouth.
Jesse
