Ask Fish and Game

Q. I hear someone caught a new Idaho record smallmouth bass? A. True enough. Dan Steigers of Juliaetta caught a 9.72 pound smallmouth in Idaho's Dworshak Reservoir on October 28. Big as that is, that's still more than two pounds shy of the 51-year-old world record. The record 11.9 pound smallmouth was caught by Kentucky angler D. L. Hayes on July 9, 1955, in Dale Hollow Lake along the border between Tennessee and Kentucky. Steigers also held the previous Idaho state record smallmouth at 8.31 pounds, caught in Dworshak Reservoir on October 14, 1995.