When you can't decide whether to hit the lake for largemouths or the creek for smallmouths, there's only one thing to do.

Do both.

This was the dilemma Alan Thomas and I faced over the weekend when we had to abort a trip to the Kings River. My son Matthew and I planned to camp on the river Friday night and then wade fish a section on Saturday with Thomas. However, a major accident near the I-40/I-430 interchange backed up traffic for miles. We tried to bypass the snarl by going up JFK Boulevard, but several thousand other people had the same idea. We stopped at U.S. Pizza Co., to reassess. After consuming a pepperoni/mushroom masterpiece, we concluded that it was too late to continue.

Al concurred, so we batted around ideas for Saturday morning. Illinois Bayou was in primo wade fishing condition, he said, regaling me with tales of monster smallmouths he's caught near Dover.

"Or," I countered, "we could fish for largemouths from kayaks at Huckleberry Lake."

"Hmmm," Al said, in a long, drawn-out, two-toned, three-syllable intonation. And then he said it again. Sold!

Huckleberry Lake is the municipal water supply for the City of Russellville. It is ultra clear and ultra clean, with a beautiful setting. Gasoline powered motors are prohibited, so it doesn't get a lot of fishing pressure. Those who use electric motors or paddleboats can enjoy superb fishing for big, healthy largemouths, bream and crappie.

We met Saturday morning at the Huckleberry boat ramp. Four other vehicles were there, but four boats can get lost on a lake of that size. I only saw one, a solitary man fishing for crappie in deep water, at the far end near the water control structure.

We intended to fish the flooded bushes near the ramp, but a stiff wind made it too hard to keep the boats stationary. I paddled to the dam. It would provide some shelter from the wind, but it's always been a good place to catch bass with crankbaits and stickbaits, both of which excel in those conditions.

My shoulders and biceps burned nicely when I finally got to the dam. There was no wind directly in its shadow, but water pulling through the control structure created a strong current. Big bass crashed the surface periodically all around me. It might have been the same bass, but I couldn't catch it. I tried crankbaits, jerkbaits, topwaters and soft plastics. I got one strike on a Zell Pop, but didn't get a follow.

Al texted me and said the wind was too much for him. He suggested we go for lunch and then migrate to Illinois Bayou.

The return trip to the ramp was a lot easier with the wind to my back. I stayed within casting distance of the flooded bushes and threw a Luck-E-Strike RC Freak crankbait. A feisty 3-pound bass took one of my first casts. I took photos to prove it. I caught two small bass as well.

Lunch was at Dwayne's Diner in Dover, where we plowed into open-faced roast beef sandwiches with brown gravy that were darned near too pretty to eat. It took everything I had to fight off a nap and soldier on to Illinois Bayou. We launched our kayaks at the Highway 7 bridge, but they only served to carry our gear and carry us through deep holes if necessary.

The water was swift and beautiful, with a deep, green tint. It is the only "bayou" in the world with Class 2-3 whitewater.

Despite our great expectations, the fishing was lousy. Smallmouths ignored all our usual offerings of Zoom Tiny Brush Hogs and Zoom Tiny Lizards. They ignored my Yum Craw Papi, and they ignored my Zoom Critter Craw. They ignored all that stuff with appendages dipped in garlic flavored red and chartreuse dyes. They ignored Booyah buzzbaits, Zell Pops and Booyah spinnerbaits. Al caught one fish on a junebug colored Tiny Brush Hog.

We rounded a bend into a long, straight, deep pool and worked opposite sides. Bream savaged our soft plastic lures, but the smallmouths wouldn't play.

I finally caught a bass on the last cast of the day with a Luck-E-Strike square-billed crankbait. That fish plunged a treble hook in my thumb, which is why it was the last cast of the day. It was quite an uncivil offense.

Sports on 06/19/2014