Berryessa Smallmouth questions

Went out to lake Berryessa yesterday and fished the northern part of the lake in my tube, fishing was slow for me despite hearing reports of bass starting to show up within 10-20 ft of water. Most of my bass experience has been throwing poppers for largemouth, but am very interested in smallmouth after hooking a nice one on the upper Russian river last year in April. Wondering when the smallmouth really start to come into the shallows at Berryessa? Also heard that the Putah creek arm can be great for SM if you can row a ways up there in a kayak or pontoon, wondering if they only spawn in arms or also in the main body of the lake?

Yesterday fished clousers and other streamers on a sinking line, in addition to float n fly. Finally got desperate and tried trolling crawfish and rubber worm soft plastics on full sinking line (purists may look down on me, but works great for largemouth when topwaters dead and they won't hit streamers) and even that didn't work...Guessing they were still too deep. Thanks for any insight into Berryessa smallies.

I think April, on average, is a top month for SMB in Berryessa.

My friend Dave Hudson is a top SMB fly angler on Berryessa.

He uses a smaller size fast sinking full line with small black wooly buggers.

I went twice in March last year and did not catch anything. April 1 the water got to 60 degrees and I started catching large and smallmouth. They were in the shallows and I was walking the shoreline casting small clousers. By May 1 the water was 70 degrees and a couple weeks after that they were off the shoreline and into deeper water and not biting for me.

Thank you guys! I will try again next month.