# Little Miami River smallmouth



## crankbait09

Just curious.....For those of you that wade/fish from shore/kayak the Little Miami River around Cincinnati area, What is the largest smallmouth you have ever caught (weight)


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## Fishin4meat

Im the gmr from. Miamisburg to Fairfield area we catch several a year over 4 to 5 lb and a lot of 3lbers


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## garhtr

How far down river do you consider Cincy area, below Milford, below Loveland, maybe Morrow?
For me 19 - 20 inch fish anywhere on the river are pretty rare, in fact I've failed to catch a 20 incher two consecutive sesaons. I'm certainly not a dedicated SM fisherman and I know they are in there but at least for me anything 18 or above is cause for celebration, in fact I've been known to celebrate any fish over 15".
Good luck and good fishing !


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## crankbait09

I guess I should have been more specific, or less specific. I was mainly talking anywhere around or inside the 275 loop. Even Morrow would be in the ballpark. I see the LMR goes up as far as Clifton (East of Dayton). So maybe Morrow and down South, in to Cincinnati


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## Harry1959

I have fished the LMR from Waynesville to mathers mill I’ve caught a lot of 15-17 “ SMB. Maybe 18 inches. Pretty sure I’ve never caught a 20 incher. If I have it was long ago. I know the LMR gets bigger as it travels toward the Ohio River, so I always figured the 20 inchers came from closer to the Ohio river.


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## garhtr

My post really didn't answer your question, I personally have never caught or seen a Lmr fish over 21". I've heard of a couple 22 inchers back in pre cell phones days--- easy to say 22" but I've never seen one.
I've probably caught a half dozen 20" fish and I've fished the lmr a long time(but they're much better fisherman out there). The last two fish I've taken that were even close to 20 both came from the lower river( below the confluence of east frk) and at night.
Good luck and good fishing !


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## Harry1959

Really, when I say “a lot” of 15-17 inchers..... that term is relative. Probably less than a dozen in my life. However, I haven’t fished the LMR very much the last 15 years. I didn’t catch any over 15 inches last year. Year before I caught 2 that were between 15-16 inches. Am curious if anyone ever catches 20 inchers north of say, Todd’s Fork.


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## fishing on credit

Largest of my career was last year 19.5. May or early June. Caught her above Lebanon. Year before I caught 6 fish between 18.25 and 18.75 mostly in the fall but two were late August. All caught below castle in Loveland and Newtown. It seems very few river fisherman weigh more talk about length. 18 inch LMR smallies I guess would start around 3.25 pounds and fish @ 20 inches push 5 pounds. What do the more seasoned guys think about the length to weight estimates.


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## fishing on credit

Harry1959 said:


> Really, when I say “a lot” of 15-17 inchers..... that term is relative. Probably less than a dozen in my life. However, I haven’t fished the LMR very much the last 15 years. I didn’t catch any over 15 inches last year. Year before I caught 2 that were between 15-16 inches. Am curious if anyone ever catches 20 inchers north of say, Todd’s Fork.


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## fishing on credit

I would say more big fish come North of Lebanon than South. My guess is based off photos and reports and those guys are more Dayton area guys (Or OSG knows all the 20 inch fish North of Lebanon by name) I would say he catches nearly as many or more 20 plus inch smallies than everyone else on this board combined.


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## crankbait09

OK, I'll ask. What is happening north of Lebanon that would cause them to be larger in size compared to the southern part?


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## BMagill

Nothing happens north of Lebanon. Fake news


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## garhtr

fishing on credit said:


> I would say more big fish come North of Lebanon than South. My guess is based off photos and reports and those guys are more Dayton area guy


  All of those big fish caught by " Dayton " area guys Aren't coming from the LMR  
Could it be there are other rivers in that area that are even better for large SM ? ?
Good luck and good fishing


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## Saugeye Tom

garhtr said:


> All of those big fish caught by " Dayton " area guys Aren't coming from the LMR
> Could it be there are other rivers in that area that are even better for large SM ? ?
> Good luck and good fishing


Lies. All lies


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## garhtr

Saugeye Tom said:


> Lies. All lies


 That's what fishermen do best ! 
Good luck and good fishing !


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## G-Patt

My fishing buddy caught a 21" SMB (somewhere within 5 miles of the OHR) while fishing for catfish. We immediately measured it because we couldn't believe how big she was. She's in there now waiting to be caught. He drifted a piece of creek chub into a deep-cut bank. That bass ambushed it from under a downed tree. In all my years, that's the only SMB over 18" I've seen. It was amazing!


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## oldstinkyguy

I think on average the fish in the LMR run smaller than other streams in the area. You are more likely to catch an 18 inch fish in the GMR, the Mad and the Stillwater than the LMR in my opinion. The GMR ABOVE Dayton say around Troy, Piqua, is probably the best smallmouth stream in Ohio that doesn't connect to Lake Erie.
Above Waynesville the LMR is small and has lots of sand and gravel on it's bottom and I think just isn't fertile enough to produce big fish on average. Waynesville south to Loveland is probably the best smallmouth fishing on average tho the lower LMR produces fewer but larger fish on average.
All those facts listed above have little or nothing to do with producing a 20 inch smallmouth bass if you ask me. I think you could fish a good looking riffle on any river named above your entire life and fish it well without ever catching a 20 inch smallmouth bass. I think under normal average conditions our fish top out somewhere in the 19 to 19.5 inch range at most. You know why the state or the EPA hardly ever electroshocks up a 20 incher from one of our streams? Because they are trying to get a handle on the smallmouth population as a whole in the river so they shock a good looking pool and riffle which gives them a nice handle on the population as a whole.
Now I didn't say it wasn't possible to catch 20 inch smallmouth bass out of the LMR, what I said was you weren't going to do it fishing normally very often without some serious luck or years of fishing. But a couple things make it more likely tho still hard.
First the LMR (and the GMR, WWR, Mad, Stillwater, Etc) have been heavily influenced by man much more than say rivers in the mountains of Tenn or WV. Most of the pools have soft mucky bottoms from a couple hundred years of farming and aren't as good a habitat as they could be. But man has influenced our rivers in other ways as well. The LMR has had at least fifty mills built on it. Fifty! The tribs of the LMR had close to 300 built on them. Even the tiny wooden ones often had a section built out of stone to protect the wheel and the mill. There were also dams built to provide power to factories before electricity as well as countless tons of rubble dumped in places by the long gone railroad to protect the tracks from erosion. Old bridge abutments, all kinds of things like that.
Secondly during most of the year with the exception of the fall migration, smallmouth bass in streams are very sedentary spending EVERY summer their entire lives in one section of stream.
So combine these two facts, unnatural manmade conditions and fish that live their lives in one piece of stream. You find that one or two pieces of river in five or ten miles that are by luck influenced by all the concrete, stone walls, old pieces of mills, whatever, that just happen to make that one spot better habitat than all the rest of the river. A super current break combined with just the right bottom to produce tons of food. The vast majority of manmade things in the river do little or nothing to help it, but there is that one in a hundred in every stream around here that as if by magic produce that one in a thousand fish. I'm more concerned with finding that one perfect spot than I am what river I'm on. Or even creek for that matter, there are magic spots on tributaries as well, where the creek for five miles might not have a fish over 14 inches but there was a mill or a factory two hundred years ago that has something in the creek that produces a hole with superb habitat and huge fish. Or that one perfect little spot with just one giant. I think if you are a reasonably competent fisherman going to the local historical society will help you catch a twenty incher more than the latest issue of Bassmaster. 
The biggest smallmouth I personally have ever seen in Ohio I lost I guess a decade ago on the LMR out of a big deep pool in the late fall. I'm not one hundred percent sure it wasn't the biggest smallmouth I've ever seen anywhere and that includes a couple true giants from the boundary waters. But it was late fall and that fish probably migrated from who knows where upstream or down to that hole. But that fish tells me the LMR has the potential somewhere to produce a freak like the 1941 smallmouth that was caught out of the lower Mad. Anyways since it's a cold winter night I've rattled on way too long. Here's a photo of the biggest smallmouth I've caught out of the LMR proper, right at 21.


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## fallen513

4.5 lb is my biggest out of the lower LMR. I was not fishing for smallmouth. Caught on a Clouser minnow, fishing for hybrid striped bass. 

Nice info Steve! I don’t fish for smallies really at all, but they are really the best fish to target in all of our streams. They eat readily, topwater, flies, jerkbaits, grubs, slow rolling or ripping, summer, winter. And they’re everywhere. Sounds easy!  

Really neat fish.


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## kingofamberley

OSG, posts like that are why I keep coming back here after all these years.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


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## Saugeyefisher

kingofamberley said:


> OSG, posts like that are why I keep coming back here after all these years.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


He is truly a river smallmouth genius. I'm glad hes still contributing! Makes us all smarter anglers!


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## Fish Ohio

oldstinkyguy said:


> I think on average the fish in the LMR run smaller than other streams in the area. You are more likely to catch an 18 inch fish in the GMR, the Mad and the Stillwater than the LMR in my opinion. The GMR ABOVE Dayton say around Troy, Piqua, is probably the best smallmouth stream in Ohio that doesn't connect to Lake Erie.
> Above Waynesville the LMR is small and has lots of sand and gravel on it's bottom and I think just isn't fertile enough to produce big fish on average. Waynesville south to Loveland is probably the best smallmouth fishing on average tho the lower LMR produces fewer but larger fish on average.
> All those facts listed above have little or nothing to do with producing a 20 inch smallmouth bass if you ask me. I think you could fish a good looking riffle on any river named above your entire life and fish it well without ever catching a 20 inch smallmouth bass. I think under normal average conditions our fish top out somewhere in the 19 to 19.5 inch range at most. You know why the state or the EPA hardly ever electroshocks up a 20 incher from one of our streams? Because they are trying to get a handle on the smallmouth population as a whole in the river so they shock a good looking pool and riffle which gives them a nice handle on the population as a whole.
> Now I didn't say it wasn't possible to catch 20 inch smallmouth bass out of the LMR, what I said was you weren't going to do it fishing normally very often without some serious luck or years of fishing. But a couple things make it more likely tho still hard.
> First the LMR (and the GMR, WWR, Mad, Stillwater, Etc) have been heavily influenced by man much more than say rivers in the mountains of Tenn or WV. Most of the pools have soft mucky bottoms from a couple hundred years of farming and aren't as good a habitat as they could be. But man has influenced our rivers in other ways as well. The LMR has had at least fifty mills built on it. Fifty! The tribs of the LMR had close to 300 built on them. Even the tiny wooden ones often had a section built out of stone to protect the wheel and the mill. There were also dams built to provide power to factories before electricity as well as countless tons of rubble dumped in places by the long gone railroad to protect the tracks from erosion. Old bridge abutments, all kinds of things like that.
> Secondly during most of the year with the exception of the fall migration, smallmouth bass in streams are very sedentary spending EVERY summer their entire lives in one section of stream.
> So combine these two facts, unnatural manmade conditions and fish that live their lives in one piece of stream. You find that one or two pieces of river in five or ten miles that are by luck influenced by all the concrete, stone walls, old pieces of mills, whatever, that just happen to make that one spot better habitat than all the rest of the river. A super current break combined with just the right bottom to produce tons of food. The vast majority of manmade things in the river do little or nothing to help it, but there is that one in a hundred in every stream around here that as if by magic produce that one in a thousand fish. I'm more concerned with finding that one perfect spot than I am what river I'm on. Or even creek for that matter, there are magic spots on tributaries as well, where the creek for five miles might not have a fish over 14 inches but there was a mill or a factory two hundred years ago that has something in the creek that produces a hole with superb habitat and huge fish. Or that one perfect little spot with just one giant. I think if you are a reasonably competent fisherman going to the local historical society will help you catch a twenty incher more than the latest issue of Bassmaster.
> The biggest smallmouth I personally have ever seen in Ohio I lost I guess a decade ago on the LMR out of a big deep pool in the late fall. I'm not one hundred percent sure it wasn't the biggest smallmouth I've ever seen anywhere and that includes a couple true giants from the boundary waters. But it was late fall and that fish probably migrated from who knows where upstream or down to that hole. But that fish tells me the LMR has the potential somewhere to produce a freak like the 1941 smallmouth that was caught out of the lower Mad. Anyways since it's a cold winter night I've rattled on way too long. Here's a photo of the biggest smallmouth I've caught out of the LMR proper, right at 21.
> View attachment 291387


Great Information. I've been doing the research from the sites you mention on Facebook. Disappointed that I just missed your talk in Columbus by a few minutes.


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