Stoneroller

don't over simplify islamic extremists by thinking that they have a 'command structure' or 'leaders'. these people have a belief system that does not include the indulgences and debauchery prevelant in western society. They see us as a fundamental stopping block to their happiness and will not rest until we are dead and they win. this has done as much to stop/curb terrorism as killing Pablo Escobar did to stop/curb the cocaine trafficking in the world.

if our current talking head is 'responsible' for killing bin laden, then he is also responsible for our terrible economy and lack of jobs. Being a leader means taking responsibility, not just for the good things, but also for the bad. clearly we see that term cannot be applied to our current 'situation' in the white house.

the flooding has topped the emergency spillway and is eroding the surrounding area. the Corps claims that the darn and the lake are safe... who else sees the conflict that reality has with the Corps statement? How can they know it's safe? Does this picture convey the concept of "Safe" to you? I'd err on the side of caution and say its under threat of imminent failure, especially with the rain that's been falling there nonstop since saturday night... I wouldn't want to be the Corps spokesperson that has to eat crow because of a shortsighted statement made with little to no scientific evidence to back it up not to mention the physical evidence that is counter to the statement of 'safe'. if you live downstream from Wappapello, I'd be packing up all your stuff right now and getting the hell out of the way. Wappapello is one of the oldest lakes in the state... which means the dam is one of the oldest... you do the math...dam failures aren't an unheard of thing in this state...

good thing I don't worry about being politically correct then. =) anyone may use the term 'no motor' instead of they so choose. Due to the flooding situation, it does not look as though camping will be an option at Duck Creek CA this coming weekend and I'm not even sure we can get access to the lake due to the floods. SO, I'm going to postpone Duck Creek CA to a later date, when the waters have gone down. Instead we can fish Council Bluff, but it will have to be the following weekend, May 14th. We will prefish friday May 13th and the tournament will be on saturday the 14th. catagories will be: Black Bass Temperate Bass (white, stripe,hybrid) Catfish Redear Sunfish

quit being a bunch of girls, everyone knows the leprosy and TB cook right out. the leprosy especially adds that little extra something that pulls the dish together, really highlights the flavor of the meat.

interesting name the shooter has...

I think everyone is kind of wondering how all this rain is going to affect things, there is a cold front coming through tonight, but a warm front coming through thrusday night/friday morning. weekend should be decent weather, well better than we have had at least. depending on lake temps I'd guess the biggest fish are probably on beds and the majority of the rest are in heavy prespawn with the males making pits and the females trying to decide which one they want. The higher water may throw all that into a tailspin, which could be good if the bass decide to change nests, if they've choosen one, as they should be aggressive and wanting to keep any smaller fish away. I'd look for shallow flats 3-6' deep to start. with the fronts, they could be staged at the first significant depth change or on structure at the edges of the flats. but your best bet is most likely to be in water 10feet or shallower. LOZ could make a liar out of me though. I've never fished the area of the lake you are going to be in, but it's water, it's got fish, and they have to eat.

I prefer the Rain Song... or maybe even Riders on the Storm...

come on now, it's water, we are fisherman, grab your boat/waders/canoe/kayak and a fishing rod and get to it!! I just looked and there is an area at the southwest corner of Missouri that has had over 16 inches of rain in the past 7 days... st francis river is at 16 feet and will kill you if you try to whitewater it. Huzzah is a 9.5 feet and 5500cfs. that's 6.5 feet over normal and 10x's the highest recorded discharge rate for this date... two words that'll get this thread locked... Global Warming...

the rods I use for this technique are a basspro shops carbonlite. i think it's like 6'8" or 6'9" and the perfect action, but runs $99, although it's frequently on sale for $70, which is when I jumped on getting mine. I've also used a berkeley Amp rod. which retails for around $40. it's quite a nice rod for the price and worked just fine, but i'm now using it to toss grubs and flukes.

we saw a couple at MoBot Gardens (st louis) a couple of days ago.

led zeppelin, pink floyd, jimi hendrix, cream, james gang, steely dan....

here is the video of that fish...

got bored, decided i'd give lake 'X' a shot, it's near my 'secret' lake and i figured, if idnr shocks bass at over 120/hr, it's worth a shot. (20lb blue catfish from this lake is nothing to get worked up about either...) anyway, so I drag all my stuff out, don't you love when you bring 8 rods and only end up using 1? =) anyway, I saw shad jumping all over the place, and figured I'd throw the good ole white spinnerbait again. I caught a 10 incher within my first dozen casts. I figured that wasn't too bad, but 18 inches is the limit on this lake and you can only keep 1 at that size or larger. only 2 other boats on the lake and they were both fishing for crappie, which are numerous but not trophy size in this puddle. I did notice tons of caddis flies all over the laydowns in the water, the crappie were jumping out of the water when the caddis flies would land on the water's surface. probably should have noted that as i only got nibbles on a white crappie jig. so i'm beating the crap out of the water, the shoreline, the trees, bushes, rocks, docks, etc with this spinnerbait. about an hour into my drift, i feel what i can only describe as a mack truck on meth, slam my lure. instinctively i jerked back. my rod doubled over about the same time my jaw hit the deck of my kayak. as soon as i felt the line go tight, i knew it was decent fish, but wasn't exactly sure till i got a flash of color shortly after hooking it. i though, well that's bigger than 18 inches, now where's the net??? D'oh, in the back of my car.... that's when I'm thinking... this pig better be hooked well... I reached for it a couple of times to "lip" it with my thumb in it's mouth. yeah, it wasn't having any of that nonsense and ripped away from my hand a couple of times. luckily it was well hooked and it's cavernous maw was big enough to get my entire hand into. secured, the smiles began... this fish is a personal, verfied best for me. I've caught a fish around this size but it was neither measured, nor weighed, althtough I do have a picture of it. This fish went 22 inches and an even 6 lbs. (that's a certified scale) I ended up boating another 6 or 7 fish, but as soon as the water started to cool off, the fish shut off. All the fish I caught were on a white spinnerbait. water temp was 68. this fish had obviously been working on a spawning bed, but had not spawned out yet. the fish i caught were 'shallow' but had access to deeper water, they weren't up on the shallow flats yet. i didn't even get a bite there. lake 'X' rules supreme.

i'd like to float the osage fork of the gasconade sometime in midmay... just tossing that out there if there is interest we could surely set something up. (it's significantly closer for me too =)

Duck Creek CA tournament will actually be on sunday may 8th. the 7th will be a 'prefishing' day. I will not be able to get down there till later in the day on saturday, but take pictures of anything you catch on saturday and we'll compare what everyone gets that day too.

that's exactly what it is. a big fish seeing two smaller fish chasing each other thinks, "2 for 1 meal". It triggers that predatory instinct to be the top predator in most fish.

the first stop on the no motor/paddling tourney trail is going to be Duck Creek CA! May 7/8. Be there, maybe we'll see more cool stuff like this.

http://mdc.mo.gov/blogs/duck-creek-ca-Spoonie Sighting! Posted by Frank Nelson That’s right we’ve had a spoonbill sighting at Duck Creek. Now if you’re a duck hunter, you might wonder why I am making a big fuss about a Northern Shoveler. We get those all the time. If you’re a fisherman, you might think I’m referring to a Paddlefish, which would be kind of cool to find at the end of your line in Pool 1, extremely unlikely, but cool if it happened. Well, I’m not referring to either one of these species. I’m talking about the large pink wading bird that is typically found along Gulf Coast wetlands or further south in Central or South America. Well, that may not help either since you might think I'm referring to an American Flamingo. Think the other large pink wading bird ... you know the one that goes by other common names like 'flame-bird', 'pink chicken', and 'banjo-bill'. Doesn't ring any bells? How about the Roseate Spoonbill (Platalea ajaja)? Familiar with the bird or not, one was seen on Duck Creek this weekend. Why is it here? Occasionally, like other avian species, a Roseate Spoonbill will get blown off course and end up hanging out in locations that are a little out of their typical home range. This often occurs after a hurricane, but can happen at other times too. If you were outside this weekend, you experienced the blustery 30+ mile per hour winds and can see how a bird may have found himself a little further north than expected. Where was it? On Sunday, Ryan Douglas and other birders spotted the 'bango-bill' in Unit A. Over the last few weeks I’ve mentioned other waterfowl, shorebirds, and waterbirds have been using the shallow water habitat and mud flats within this pool. It seems like this southern traveler also got "wind" of the spring buffet at Duck Creek (I’m sorry, I couldn’t help myself). Why the strange bill? Like the other “spoonies” there is a specific function to their strange form. A Roseate Spoonbill uses its flattened beak to sift through the muddy water to find food. As it sweeps back and forth through the shallow water, small prey (bugs, snails, fish, etc.) are stirred up from the bottom and within the water column. As the bird continues to swing its head, sensitive receptors in the bill signal when to clamp down and capture its meal. Foraging by touch is a handy adaptation for murky or densely vegetated habitats, which is often the case in wetlands. Are these birds common? Like many brightly colored species, Roseate Spoonbills were almost hunted to extinction during the days of market hunting. Their feathers were used for women’s hats and fans. Since the 1940’s these birds along with other species have been protected through regulations and have been making a comeback. Importance of wetlands However, during this time many states, including Missouri, have lost a considerable amount of the wetland habitats that these birds and others call their home. In Missouri, we only have 13% of the wetlands that were historically here. In the last 60 years agencies like MDC and USFWS and more recently programs like the Wetland Reserve Program have been managing and restoring wetland habitats. These areas provide habitat for a variety of wetland dependent species and have other societal benefits like water quality, flood relief, and multiple kinds of recreational use. At Duck Creek, our bread and butter may be ducks and fish, but the Roseate Spoonbill is a pretty cool reminder that there are other species that also benefit from these wetlands, both locally and regionally. Finally, I just wanted to say "thanks" to Al Smith and Chris Barrigar for their photos of our unique feathered visitor.

melanism is odd that way. It doesn't always make the animals hair all black, but their skin typically will be. hence what you observed, Al. Even rarer for there to be a twin birth with one normal fawn and one melanistic. That means two seperate eggs instead of a division of the a single zygote.

water temp: 64-72 2-5 feet clarity air temp 84 air pressure 29.79 and falling to 29.70 partly cloudy to overcast all of the fish I caught seemed to be males on a reaction bite. the lotus have broken the top of the water and are quickly forming large areas of pads. I saw a few very large bass making spawning nests, but it looked to be the first day they had started as none were well formed and there were only a few very large ones. most of the fish were hanging out near something 'odd' within the lotus field, say a log or stump or maybe the edge of a group of pads. won't be long and that area will be nearly unfishable because of the lotus. white spinnerbait, as always rocked the day.

as tim said sometimes it has a lot to do with forage base. Stripers are typically the best option for lakes overrun with adult gizzard shad. Not sure if this is an issue at Bull Shoals, but that's typically one of the major reasons that stripers will be picked over whipers for a given body of water.

Due to otherwise unforseen issues at the end of April, I'm going to have to bump Duck Creek CA to May 7/8th. Sorry for the short notice, but as we all know these things happen. Council Bluff event will be May 21/22 from what it looks like. I'll ask my 'secretary' if that jives with her master plans and repost. So to recap, May 7/8 for Duck Creek CA. We'll fish for black bass, catfish, 'panfish' to include crappie/sunfish, and grass pickerel. no motors of any kind allowed. any legal fishing method (except live bait) is permitted. this includes jug lines for catfish! please make sure to have your jug lines clearly marked with your name and conservation number to avoid any confusion. Hope to see some of you there.

http://mdc.mo.gov/blogs/duck-creek-ca-updates/mud-hens-money-markets-and-marsh-management here's an article about Duck Creek CA. The first stop on this summers tour! (april 30/may 1) be there or be mocked for not being there...

good stuff, the wind was just insane sunday. saw somewhere that people reported 100mph+ microbursts across Missouri and Illinois.