Ham

Hey River Runner. Send that guide down to south Louisiana. If he pulled that crap down there, he'd be educated very quickly. I would imagine that a fist fight or worse would be included free of charge in his education. Everything you posted should be the common sense "rules" of a boat ramp. Maybe a quick, "Hey Buddy can we use the ramp now" said after 1-2 minutes of waiting and BEFORE you got angry would have done the trick. Easier for me to say that than to be there and do it I know. What guide service was this? A few calls to the guide service complaining about the operator of that boat/vehicle might make a difference. If the guide doesn't know basic boat ramp behavior, I doubt he'd be a good choice for on the water stuff either.

You too Buffalo Bob. Leave a fish or two for me would ya?

Fish. Fly fishing for panfish might be tough to do in the winter time though. for your fly rod fishing, silly trout seem to bite all year. Crappie can be caught all year long at least down here.

Why aren't the ramps on TR steeper? It is hard to launch a bigger boat on TR without getting your rear tires wet. I'm used to ramps that allow you to float the boat off without drowning your truck.

Man that's great! I hope you have the time to spend with the dog to get the full potential out of it. Labs can be so wonderful or just nervous energy chewing machines.

Bobber my man, you're killing me. If I live long enough, I'll know every decent smallie that lives in that river by name. For now, I have to read your trip reports and grit my teeth. For some reason, my life doesn't seem to be my own anymore. Come Hell or high water, I'll live in Arkansas within 5 years. I might be divorced, broke, and living on pork and beans, but'll have good fishing gear and more chances to use it. I'm 5 hours away and I have to work at the hospital this weekend so I'm O-U-T.

They are definitely predators. Their tiny size is the only thing that keeps us from catching them all the time.

Why so many all at once? I like Tiemco, Gamakatsu, and the better Mustads. I buy as I need for a new fly pattern, but I'm not much of a tyer.

Hey That's great. Awful shallow for the weather we've had lately, but they are where they are.

Dear Santa: I want a three day work week, a house in the Ozarks, my fishing buddies to live less than 2 hours away, and to catch a Giant Honkin Brown trout in 2007. Enforcement of existing immigration laws would be nice if you can't get me the other stuff. Thanks your pal, Ham

We all get them at home and work. I hope nobody is getting unhappy with the site over spam that slips by the filters.

Different folks like different styles of indicators. Indicators aren't all that expensive. Buy several styles and fish them for yourself BEFORE you rule out any design. "Bigger" and "faster" water will require more lead to keep the fly(s) down so you'll need more of an indicator to keep the flies from hanging up. You'll have fun learnig to balance those two things. I've used the putty floatant, the sticky back foam, and the styrofoam and toothpick. I've caught fish on all three and have found disadvantages with all three. I'll probably continue to try all three and may add another design or two to the vest. Make repeated drifts through an area. If you never hit bottom, you need more lead. If you are hung up constantly, you need less lead or less line beneath the float. If the float sinks every cast you need more float. Watch the way the indicator moves normally. Lift on anything abnormal.

I wouldn't worry about getting a Tetanus shot anymore often than every 5 years, but I remember hearing about a study where they found it very rare that anyone got tetanus after having been immunized at any point in their life. I need to google that. The crappie from deep water thing is interesting. They can get back down when yanked from 25 foor down or so, but deeper than that and they are going to have issues. In Texas, they waive the 10 inch minimum on Lake Fork, Lake of the Pines, Toledo Bend and maybe Sam Rayburn. You MUST keep the first 25 crappie you catch. No C & R fishing. I have put some smaller crappie in the livewell and they have recovered over the course of the day. If you put them back and they don't get back down pretty quickly, the gulls, loons, peilcans, or cormorants will eat them. I'm sure you could "fizz" the crappie, but oddly enough I've never seen an article that stresses catch and release for crappie.

You're not the first person to think that those fish might be Brown Trout. A lady I work with thought she was catching a lot of Brown Trout on the Spring river. They weren't Brown trout though. I actually like the chuhbs and odd ball fish of the world. By the way, what kinda of fish is that in the water just under your thumb in the photo ?

My bad, I didn't mean to be obtuse. Our friend,Cajunangler, has abused me with a spinnerbait multiple times. I more than returned the favor this past April at Lake Ouachita. It was brutal. I ended up giving him my rod and "the bait" and the front of the boat ; unfortunately he still couldn't buy a spinnerbait fish. JTM is a seine when he has spinnerbait fish and the front of the boat. It's horrible.

Actually Phil, Capitalist. Not that I like it anymore than you do, but at some point we might have to pay per view any NFL game. That'll really motivate me to spend more time outdoors and less time in front of the TV.

I've been on both ends of the boat when it wasn't good to be the guy behind the first spinnerbait the fish saw. I didn't enjoy either experience, but it was easier to deal with the guilt of catching all the fish than it was to deal with the frustratuion of watching all the fish get caught. Good report. Thanks.

I'll be computer free for a few days and wanted to say Happy Thanksgiving to everybody. Take a little time to Thank God for your many blessings. Enjoy your families, food, and football too.

Tectan has a wonderfully small diameter. Great for casting and letting you fish small jigs with minimal impact from the current, BUT that thin diameter works against you when it comes to abrasion resistance. I had a HORRIBLE experience with Tectan 4.9 fishing for Guadaleupe bass in the Texas Hill Country. I broke off several SMALL fish and put that rod aside in favor of my normal 8 pound Silver Thread. If I have to go up to 8 pound Tectan to avoid break offs, why bother ? I can get that diameter in a less expensive 4 pound line. I can't imagine how thin the 2 lb Tectan would be. I can imagine that I would break off just by thinking about setting the hook if I spooled up with the 2 pound.

Hey Terry: I had a Great Blue Heron scare the bejesus out of me one night on the Norfork down near McClellands. It was very cloudy and rainy as well as well....dark. I couldn't see the water I was standing in and I was in about mid thigh. Chunkin streamers on a six weight and catchin trout was all I was thinking about when this explosin of noise from very close got me thinking about something other than trout. I never saw it, but it was very close. I heard the individual wing beats.

I absolutely understand what you're saying. I am aware of your preference to fish fast and that makes a lot of sense. The stream smallies are often very aggressive and a high speed approach puts you in contact with more active fish. Fishing a shallow crank in clear water might be a lot more like a buzzbait bite than I have considered before. I have fished the deep divers where the fish just loads up on the crankbait or shallow divers in high current areas where you don't see the bite. Man I need a fishing trip.

Well well about time. Has it only been 18 months since you moved to Nixa? Seems like a lot longer than that. My loss is yalls gain. CajunAngler moved from not too far from me to half a world away. Redfish did someone say Redfish? The cool thing about Redfish is they act like aggressive shallow water Largemouth, BUT They pull like a Striper.

I had bought a good number of Wiggle Warts when a K Mart was going out of business. I was going to build confidence in them by using them when I had a good crankbait bite going on a local bayou. I could pull up to the mouth of a slough draining into the bayou and expect a bite. I had already caught numerous fish on Bombers and Bandits. The WW did not get a bite. None. Switch back to Bomber fish. Back to WW -zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz This happened on about 6 areas and I never had the confidence to fish them again. I'll buy a few after I move north and give them another try. Al, I really don't like crankbait fishing for stream smallies. I've caught them on it, but it seems like a waste of a perfectly good topwater bite or tube bite or senko bite. Yeah, I catch the fish, but its dull compared to getting the thunk on a tube. I cranka few cranks, but it is a bait of near last resort.

The only crankbaits I ever hear about for Table Rock and Bull Shoals are Wiggle Warts. I had bought some Wiggle Warts years ago and got rid of them when they failed to produce for me on the rivers and lakes I fished back then. I use Bandits 100/200 and Bomber 2A/6A mostly, but own a bunch of other crankbaits as well. What is so special about the Wiggle Warts and are they really must haves of Ozark Hill Land lakes?

I have a Bass Pro Micro Lite 3 piece 6 foot light rod that has served me well for trout. It really isn't sensitive enough for delicate bites, but using inline spinners or jerkbaits that hasn't been a problem. They are often on sale for $30. They might be right now.