Recommended Gear for River Plate -Emu Outfitters, Brazil

River Plate opened Brazil’s Peacock Bass fishing to the public in 1992 and has been providing the finest Peacock Bass fishing trips available since then. As late as 2000 there were fewer than a handful of operators offering trips for this hard fighting member of the “African Cichlid family of fish. Since then the interest in Peacock Bass fishing has exploded and today there are several fixed lodges operating on the upper Rio Negro watershed and upwards of 30 mother boats handling 24 fishermen or more per day, each plying the Rio Negro out of Barcelos, the hub of the modern day Peacock Bass fishing industry. As these mother boats draw 4 - 8 feet of water, they are relegated primarily to the main Rio Negro Channels within 100 mile radius of Barcelos. This means there can be as many as 100 - 150 bass boats on these waters in a given day during the fishing season. Some of these operators have tried to compensate for the limited mobility of their mother boats by equipping their guides with heavy, large high powered bass boats which allow them to run 30 - 60 minutes from the mother boats to reach their prime fishing areas. This limits fishing time plus the ability to get into select backwater lakes and lagoons.