Devan S.

I realize your venting but it seems like the TRL guys are complaining all the time too about high water. Cracks me up. I wish they would just get rid of the dams and show everyone what real flooding looks like.

Man this plane crashed and burned.....don't extinguish it now. But for real: The argument on here constantly is the fishing or the hunting was better back X(10, 20, 30) years ago. That drums been beat to death over every fishery including Taney which has kicked out back to back state records. Everyone has their spin on why but nothing seems to solve the problem. So for all you guys with the years of wisdom, knowledge, and experience, what fishing has gotten better since X years ago?

USGS gage shows a good rise last night. Not sure if its all from dry hollow down or not but the rain should add some color and move some fish around...maybe even out of the park. Be a good time to go and try and trick a big one before he gets targeted all winter long.

Yep when I did the MR340 current just sitting in the channel drifting was anywhere between 3-5 MPH.

Man from slide 40 on it really shows the dams do their job. I couldn't imagine 200K+ CFS going through Branson.

To follow up with this some more. I emailed Power Pro....which is really shimano. I asked if they still were making power pro depth hunter in 10lb and could advise what vendor may have some. My email back said yes they did make depth hunter but the person emailing me was unsure of what 10lb meant and therefore couldn't advise. I guess I managed to get the customer service rep that has never been fishing...probably someone in an low cost region office. Go figure. I also emailed both vendors above and asked about stock in the 10lb line and they were out of stock as well.

Thanks. I called this morning and got some on order...will give it a try.

I have inquires into both the websites above. I thought I had found an online source....paid and then got told it was out of stock with no ETA to be in stock....which tells me something similar to Randy probably not being made anymore. Quickly cruised through ebay but didn't find anything. Was hoping maybe to find an alternate if possible. Have you used the stuff from Extreme yet?

have been using power pro 10/2 metered braid but seems I cannot find a source online anymore that has it in stock looks like I can get higher ratings 20, 30lb and bigger but cant find the 10lb. Is there any other metered braids someone would recommend?

I fished Kings river on Sunday. Was able to catch 11 crappie. Seen quite a few dead shad floating on top and the crappie were just chock full of 3" shad.

I think the NCAA did some research on this at one time and published % of high school athletes that go D1 or D2 and then go onto a pro level. As I recall for the major "pro" sports that get you into making serious money its something like less than 10% to college and then like low single digit percentage or less than 1% to pros. So effectively a tenth of a percent chance your high school standout makes it pro. Some sports don't make squat when you factor in the "real" costs and I would assume pro fishing would be that way for all but a handful of the actual guys(even then they make their money elsewhere). In fact, I would bet there's more money to be made as a BAD doctor, scientist, engineer, salesman, or project manager than there is being a mid of the pack pro fisherman. If someone had a serious interest in fishing. I would highly recommend pushing them towards marketing, engineering, business and get in the industry and work there. A lot more money to be made with the stability of not having to chance everything to make your next entry fee count unless you can really beat the top dogs day in and day out. If they decide then someday they don't like it there not just a washed up fisherman selling junk on TV, they have skills that put them somewhere else.

Is outlet 1 right at the cable? The smaller outlet that just cascades down the rocks?

Bingo.....seen a couple of guys in a canoe one time paddle along with a spot light....find a bunch of fish holding in a spot with the light then get up stream and drift their chub back into the fish. Pretty easy to cover lots of shallow water and pick out the biggest of the big way up the river. I will give those guys credit though...when the times right they are out there no matter the weather.

As someone that fishes the river run in the early spring fairly hard, I can say there are some monsters out there. However MOST of the people I run into out there in the cold at dusk, dawn, or even night are not the type that I would expect to take pictures and post online. Most of these guys are fishing live bait....in little bitty flat bottoms with small motors that they only use to get to their spot then they fish on bank. They are the type of people that if/when they catch double digit fish, it will get the knife and other than their closest fishing buddies nobody will ever know if that fish was 20lb or 15lb. They don't want the record and don't want anyone to know where they fish or how and certainly don't want to get the government/MDC involved in any form. I'm fairly certain they are likely over possession limits or they are eating multiple fish every night.

Good to see you getting back out! I'm ready for the upcoming weather change.

Its really incredible the fish they produce and they are fished hard by catch and keep. IIRC 12" length and 15 fish per person. We did the similar trip a couple years ago but had to bail on Grenada due too an east wind in the 30 mph range. We fished a north/south cove on Enid and still managed a pretty good haul of 13"+ fish with waves coming over the front and back of the boat. Was a good time and would love to go back with a jig pole and waders and hit up the stake beds in the spring. Also really like the biscuit pit there in Grenada.

As the title implies, what is your bucket list fishing trips separated into 2 categories. One category is thing you want to do and likely can do just need to make it happen. The second being the trip you want to do but have significant barriers(time or $$$) that prevent you. My likely ones are spending time fishing Lake Fork for a big bass or going back to Mississippi Delta for Crappie and jigging them in waders. Followed by Musky at Pomme and/or Striper at Beaver. Canada is always on my mind too along with Missouri/Mississippi river cats. Least likely is Artic Char in that deep red color and/or Alaska fishing in general second may be Sturgeon in the northwest. Probably wont ever happen until the little one is grown and gone but will never say never.

I'm use to launching at ramps(Kings River) where there was enough erosion that if you got off the ramps without the boulders you would really be in a pickle.....I guess based on that it doesn't really bother me that much.

Probably to prevent erosion from washing out materials from under the ramps and causing buckling of the ramps.

It's funny you bring up Viney. Looks like it will be closed permanently next year with MO Parks not involved anymore. When the closing of Viney began, they had the "town hall" meeting the corps said any ramp in Emerald beach or owl creek were public ramps and there was nothing anyone could do to prevent the use of the ramp. The only recourse they had was if you were parking above the take line. Isn't it funny that the corp will do that exact thing they said private citizens couldn't do in closing the ramps at Viney Creek?

There is no question in my mind....you take it to be certified.

Keyboard Warriors. Those same people that say he should have released it would be the first ones to question the size if he would have taken pictures/measurements and released it immediately. I think everyone that knows anything about Taneycomo knows that the team at Lilley's has a top notch setup. I would wager 99.99% of places that have the potential for multiple state/world record class fish don't have the facilities/setup to even begin to attempt to keep a fish like this alive through the process. I would also wager that 99.99% of people that catch a fish in the world record class wouldn't think twice about trying to get certified measurements regardless of what they proclaim on the internet. Your fish was 20% larger than Frank which means the likelihood of him being caught again was low since he made it that much bigger than the state record without being caught to begin with. Heck Frank, Frankie, and Carl has really stuck to a pretty predictable stretch of the lake and none of them are being caught multiple times. Most people aren't remotely prepared to catch a fish that size on regular trout gear. Congratulations on the fish of a lifetime.

On Taney is the suspension or even depth of a jerkbait critical? It seemed even with the 110 my lure was only maybe running 3-4 feet and due to the current there was no way it was actually suspending. All of my jerkbaits are bright colors. Maybe I need more dark colors(similar to the sculpin colors) that would be a little more realistic? Seems like unless theres shad present the darker colors tend to be the direction the big fish go.

I'd be the first to admit we didn't/don't know what we were doing. We basically drifted more or less dead center and cast upstream to either side bank and worked them back to the boat. Trying to avoid letting the lure get way behind the boat and having to work against the current.We tried a couple drifts closer to the bluff side banks but really felt like with the short casts we weren't covering much water so we backed off and threw longer casts.

Mcstick 95, 110 and countdowns. Everything we threw was 3" or bigger.