Smallmouth Bass Turn On as Champlain Tournament Anglers Score Big

What's biting

What's next

With water in the Winooski watershed sitting at 73°F as of this morning's USGS reading (gauge 04294500), Lake Champlain itself is almost certainly running similar or slightly warmer in its shallower bays, since tributary temps typically track close to or a touch cooler than the main lake's surface layer in mid-August. Expect that number to hold steady or inch up over the next two to three days if the current stretch of summer weather continues; check local forecast before heading out, since no wind or sky data came through in this cycle.

If the trend from the August 8-9 Bass Federation tournament (per The Fisherman — New England Freshwater) carries forward, smallmouth should keep firing through the coming week. Tournament-grade weights like the 30-plus-pound non-boater bag reported suggest fish are grouped on classic late-summer structure: rocky points, mid-lake humps, and drop-offs adjacent to deeper water. Anglers planning a trip this weekend should target early-morning and late-evening windows when bass push shallower to feed, then follow them out to deeper breaks as the sun climbs and surface temps peak in the afternoon.

Landlocked salmon are the harder read right now. No source in this cycle reported salmon activity, and that tracks with the seasonal pattern: once surface water pushes into the low-to-mid 70s, salmon typically retreat to the thermocline, well below where topwater or shallow presentations reach. Anglers chasing salmon over the next few days should plan on downrigging or leadcore trolling in the cooler water column rather than expecting surface action, and should be ready to fish early to beat the heat of the day before boat traffic and warming water push fish deeper still.

Timing-wise, the coming weekend looks like a good window for bass-focused trips given the tournament momentum, provided conditions hold. Anglers without electronics to mark the thermocline should lean on local knowledge of typical mid-August salmon depths rather than guessing, since no fresh reports came through this cycle to pin down exact holding depths. As always with a single gauge reading and no buoy data available, treat the 73°F figure as a directional read on the watershed rather than a precise lake-surface number, and adjust presentations based on what you're marking on the water.

Context

Mid-August is squarely peak smallmouth season on Lake Champlain, and the tournament result reported by The Fisherman — New England Freshwater (a 30-plus-pound non-boater bag from the August 8-9 Bass Federation event) is consistent with a typical, healthy late-summer bite rather than anything unusual for the calendar. Champlain's smallmouth fishery is well regarded regionally, and results like this one suggest the season is running on schedule rather than early or late.

For landlocked salmon, the near-total absence of reports in this cycle is itself typical for mid-August. Salmon fishing on Champlain is usually a spring and fall game around the shoulder seasons when surface temperatures are cooler and fish hold higher in the water column; by August, with surface readings in the low-70s (matching this morning's 73°F watershed reading), salmon have almost certainly settled into deeper, cooler water and require different tactics than the open-water trolling that works in May or October. That is a normal seasonal lull, not a sign anything is off with the fishery.

Beyond the one tournament report, there is not enough direct Champlain-specific intel in this cycle to say definitively whether the smallmouth bite is running ahead of, behind, or exactly on a typical late-summer pace. One strong tournament weight is a good sign but not a full trend line. Anglers with a longer view of the lake's season should weigh this report alongside their own recent trips rather than treating it as the complete picture.