Ham

19) Cardinal Shiner It required some patience and a couple of fly changes before I could hook and hold one

18) Northern Snakehead kinda proud of this one

17) Longear Sunfish

16) Northern Rock Bass

15) Banded Sculpin

14) Ozark Sculpin

Yep

The flaw with it is that some counties randomly decide that a section of river is non floatable even though it clearly is. A wealthy landowner that has a connection with a county judge can have it ruled “unfloatable” and run barbed wire across it to keep his cows in. The same cows that he lets ruin the streamside.

"Copolymer lines are cheap at the cash register but, in my experience, can be quite expensive on the water in lost fish. Only one I've ever loved is the original P-Line CXX. " You pay your money, and you take your chances. MIllions of fish are caught on house brand lines that I would never consider using. I have literally caught thousands of fish using copolymer lines and I have ZERO concerns about the quality of those type lines costing me a fish. P Line is a good line. I really like CX Premium as a finesse line.

There are wadable areas on the White when they are generating. They might not be where you want to fish are large enough for your time, but you can catch fish. See below. There is wadable water up by the dam. You need to follow the Special regs carefully. There is wadable water off Denton Ferry Road. There is wadable water at Cotter. There is wadable water at Buffalo City. Minimal areas that you can wade when they are running water on the Norfork. Sorry. it is what it is. You could easily rent a boat on the White and use it as a water taxi to motor to a spot. Anchor the boat. Get out and wade. Too many spots to list. You could always get a guide, but I know that is expensive and not always possible for everyone. Get the COE app (Little Rock District). It will give you "real time" water levels and release rate. You should figure on water heading downstream at 4 miles an hour. It can take a while to drain down depending on how much they were running. Err on the side of caution always. The water is very cold and you might not have anyone around that can help.

I got my box too. I thought I was chipping in a little extra, but was actually 2 Pennie’s short. FWIW : you could have sent mine the cheapest route possible

CheaterScope is very helpful even if you aren’t video game fishing. Being able to run a series of brush piles and quickly see which ones have active fish on them w/o dropping a single time. For me, it would be huge just staying lined up with brush piles and being able to present lures properly with maximum efficiency. I think it would be huge for White Bass fishing too, but that’s a theory for me. I don’t have CheaterScope yet.

Good Job Jeff! Sounds Great!

I dug around and found that "Pool Three" or really ZONE Three is from the old hatchery dam to the park boundary. I only ever fished in Zone 1. The people in Zone 2 were crazy and I was with my family so I had minutes to fish. I would like to fish Zone Three sometime or better yet downstream of the park boundary.

RR 100 % for sure has lots of Knobfin Sculpin. I bet other stuff too especially Pool Three or the river below it.

It’s weird getting complimented and hated on at the same time. What the heck? Dave sand bags really hard. Every time I looked up he was catching or releasing a fish. Somehow, he insists that he caught less fish than I did. And he of course worked his Green Sunfish magic again. I think he caught more fish than me, but he can’t count or keep up with how many he has caught. I was really distracted by high numbers of suckers swimming around. I tried for them , but got no love at all. it’s a fun enough place to go once a year during C&R.

I conned Dave into joining me at BSSP today. I’m still pushing the Easy Button whenever possible to maximize the number of species on fly. Dave and I fished last year and I had a nice trip with Marty and John before John moved to the east coast years ago. It’s kinda becoming a little bit of a tradition. I hope I never make the mistake of being there during the Catch and Keep season, but the C&R season is manageable. It’s better if you get there on Friday and if the weather is awful. Thins the crowds and the trout are extra dopey on Fridays. Full Disclosure: while I am not there for the trout, I still want to catch the dopey things. I live on the White River and I can trout fish whenever I want. (Within reason right). I go for the multi species aspect of it AND To restock on 1/100 oz micro jigs for micro fishing. So, for me, today’s goals were to 1) Hang with Dave, 2) restock my micro jigs 3) get an Ozark Sculpin on fly 4) get a Northern Rock Bass on fly 5) catch 31 or more fish Day started off pretty chilly, but it turned out to be a beautiful day with lots of radiant heat from the Sun and minimal wind. First item of business was hitting the park store. I was able to get my micro jigs and a few other items. We probably got started about 9 AM and Dave quickly started catching fish. I was getting looks, but struggled to actually catch an Ozark Sculpin for like 10 minutes. The shorter TGO Bug Launcher makes the roll cast for Sculpin easier and you can manipulate the fly better. It’s all sight fishing. So, I thought I would be able to pound numbers of Ozark Sculpin, but I couldn’t. Dave was thumping them. I rolled a beadhead fly out there and two big Boi sculpin were fighting over it. One was much more Brown and less blotchy. I got hopeful that it might be a Banded Sculpin. Banded Sculpin are widespread, but not high in numbers anywhere; don’t catch a Banded Sculpin every year even. I for sure had never even had a shot with fly before. I actually did not screw this up. I Carefully worked him and snatched him when he finally engulfed the fly. and just like that a Flyfer was caught. I was fired up. people were rolling in and the trout were being even more weird than usual. I wasn’t catching that many fish. we worked our way down river catching one every now and then, but not big numbers by any means. water level and flowed seemed higher than usual and wading in non felt boots sucks. I gingerly worked my way around below the Whistle Bridge. I started picking up a few fish. I got a Smallie and then a Striped Shiner and then another Smallie. I was still looking for that Northern Rock Bass. Well, I found one. My Day was made. All I needed was a few more fish, but I was satisfied already and could have left right then and been ok. I picked up a few more fish. I got some trout in heavy current and I got a few on a Stimulator fly. That was fun. I hit my self imposed deadline of 3 PM and shut her down with on 29 fish brought to hand. So, I said my Goodbyes and started the run home. A very enjoyable day.

the trip started out kinda funky when a windshield wiper failed me. Ok timing though. I was able to replace it w/o a struggle. shout out to the guy throwing this Yo Zuri 135 pencil popper on 8 lb mono. #easycomeeasygo

I took a mosey down to the Arkansas River today. The siren song of Striped Bass lured me down there. I wanted one on fly. the trip down Hwy 7 was obscured by clouds.Honest to Goodness, it rained on me every minute that I fished and most of the 3 hours down and the three hours driving home. Long story made short cos I’m cranky. I got a couple of Stripers, but I’m still looking for one with a flyrod. I got a couple of Bass and a White Bass on fly that hit hard and fought hard. I thought maybe I had gotten that Striper I was looking for, but no. I got a nice Spotted Bass on a swimbait and some yellow bass on smaller Swimbaits Pretty decent results for 4 hours at a new rod me location in terrible weather. I’m cranky because the power assist on my brakes in the truck failed on the way home. I white knuckled it, but I had to cancel a trip I was going to make with CajunAngler tomorrow. Sucks.

13) White Bass

12) Largemouth Bass

What the heck John? I think I tried to borrow a fly rod from you to fish the Creek of Goodness to add some stuff on fly, but I was rebuffed. Maybe it was just too hard to get to your gear considering the minimal time between the request and your departure to meet me at the fishing hole. I honestly didn’t think about it before hand. I bought new luggage specifically to carry more fishing gear. I’ll try to always have micro, spinning, and fly rod gear with me going forward.

I’m surprised that I didn’t get to hear about the Big mystery fish that straightened your hook in Texas or the sturgeon that you had the immaculate connection with, but I can feel your pain for sure. I’ve lost multiple big mystery fish and uncommon fish that I had hooked. I still haven’t caught a Silver Carp and I’ve hooked > 15. I will wholeheartedly agree that finally catching the target that you have been chasing for years can be almost overwhelming. When I Finally got my Lifer Orange Spotted Sunfish, it really got my heart racing and my hands shaking. I was so completely Happy.

I also have caught 8/10, but only 4 on fly. I’m so relived to have gotten a musky and to not have to ever worry about trying for another one.. 😆