Smallmouth Bass
Smallmouths have busy spring schedules. Ice-out means it's time to build energy for spawning, which begins when the water temperature hits 60 degrees and occupies two weeks of a bass's life. That period generally encompasses some part of June, depending on the location of the particular water. There's a nest to construct, the actual job to be done, and finally the resulting progeny to protect from the panfish hordes.

After spawning, smallmouths disperse, but in a few weeks the schools begin to re-form. Their feeding intensifies as the summer deepens, their movements a part of the natural rhythms of a north country that first welcomed vacationing anglers in the decades following the Civil War-"and continues to do so today. Beneath a high summer sun, surrounded by bright blue water, the angling could not be more delightfully complicated: Read the lake or river. Find the bass. Ultimately, key the presentation to the structure and the forage.