bronzeback miner

I am planning on camping the weekend of 7/14 and 15 with my wife and a friend at Jerktail. I have tried to search the official NPS website, I have tried to search other websites and not really getting anywhere. I am now wondering if anyone has any personal experience with this place? I am mainly interested in quality of campsites ( clean, secluded etc.) atmosphere, Is it a premiere party place or mostly overlooked and any recent fishing experiences would be helpful. Thanks

My limited experience has always been that any spot below the spring at Hodgson Mill/Sycamore access will have enough water. I did a little fishing at Martin Cemetery and Warren Bridge and caught decent fish both times. I never had much luck at Florence Cook (approx 4 mi from NF confluence)

Interesting insights here. I have always wondered about those streams that run into our reservoirs like James, Flat Creek, Beaver etc if the smallmouths migrate downstream to the lake and shelter in the deep still waters of the lake? If so how would they 'know'? A newly hatched fry in the spring is somehow to know that 30 or 40 miles downstream is the ultimate winter hibernating pool? Thoughts?

Sequiota Park in Springfield actually used to be a rainbow trout hatchery. Man that would be cool if that were still the case! That is true, Sequiota was used as a hatchery until 1959 when Shepherd of the Hills Hatchery came online with the completion of Table Rock Dam

If you are going to be in the Forsyth area best places are Shadow Rock Park right there in the town on Swan Creek, just below Powersite Dam a.k.a. The Pothole, or about 1-2 miles south of Forsyth at COE campgrounds at Kissee Mills on Beaver Creek

I don't know if you got to get out today or not. I had the opportunity for a few hours this afternoon. Thanks to our veterans I had the chance to exercise my freedom to fish a nice stretch of public water, unfortunately the trout exercised their freedom to not bite. I did get a chance to visit with the owner of the dairy farm, he was really helpful and informative.

I started stream fishing about 20 years ago or so, and it seems like back then there were numerous access points to our rivers, but many of them required 4x4 vehicles and determination to get to them. Now I notice that many of those places have gone to either one of the polar opposites; they are completely sealed off with signs, paint, gates and fences, or they have been so developed that you can make it there in Granny's Caddy. So much so that I am thinking of getting a two wheel drive for my next vehicle.

<snip> On a side note, I'll never go back to bootfoots- the stockingfoot are just too comfortable for hiking in and out. Rob Amen to that, I switched from boot foot to stocking foot 4 years ago and I love it. Besides with a small adjustment in sock wear you can use just the boots for summer wet wading

I usually use what I call the ratio method... Ratio Method: hour/day i.e. if I drive 3 hours to get someplace for me in Springfield that would be like Eleven Point or Current, I would like to have at least a 3 day weekend to make it feel like it was worth my while, If 2 hours that falls in range of Big Piney or Gasconade I'd like to have two days, if it is someplace an hour or less I like to hit it in a long day. Of course this is never hard and fast and always subject to change

I really like Skip's Originals Toobies tubing/steel shot sinking rig. BPS carried it only or a short period of time and then quit, which disappointed me, then one fall day I pop into Readings on my way to Bennett and found out he still carried them (had to blow the dust off of them first though), the man is a wealth of information and stories, what I hoped to be a 3 minute in and out turned out to be more like 45

Way back in the mid-90's a friend of mine and I did some hiking and cave exploring around Scottsboro, and it truly is just like the Ozarks. I remember staying at the COE campground by Lake Guntersville, very pretty place, didn't get a chance to fish it though

For what it's worth, I was reading of an account by Vance Randolph in Ozark outdoors; hunting and fishing stories of the Ozarks, by Vance Randolph and Guy W. Von Schriltz. of catching trout at the place where Roaring River and White River joined, he wrote of this trip in the 1930's, definitely pre Table Rock days

Things we're still struggling with: 1) Knots/tangles/handling of tippet. I'd say the ultra noob among us and my buddy spent nearly half their time fixing crap and the other half fishing. I had a furled leader this time and that made a world of difference. I spent way more time fishing than I have in the past and from what I could tell it didn't hinder my ability to catch fish (always had 2+ ft of tippet on it). 2) Moss. Now that we're down deep enough this is finally becoming a problem. 3) Finding/and/or enticing the fish. I'm sure our drifts aren't perfect, and practice will go a long way to help. 4) Losing fish once they're hooked. Actually a new problem, it was nice to get into more fish but would have liked to handle more of course. 5) A bigger cooler. The beer runs out faster when you go hours without catching fish A few suggestions I might make... 1) Fresh line will help, I don't know how old you're tippet spools are but fresher tends to be more manageable 2) As Justin said, wait until the winter die off, it will be reduced so fouling should lessen 3) You are right, it will take mainly time on the water, you will figure it out, just be persistent and patient 4) Sharp, barbless hooks. Keep a hook hone with you on your person, scrape your hook point across enough rocks and it will get dull, sharpen frequently, go barbless if you aren't doing so already, they make smaller holes in the fish's mouth so slip outs should reduce, as long as you keep your line tight a barbless hook will hold just as good as a barbed one. 5) I am not a beer drinker so I can't help you on that one

It's times like these I don't think you could pay me enough to be a COE lake manager. "I honestly thought the main purpose of the White River System Dams were to provide the electricity to the area back in the day" Most of the power generated around here is sent 'on the grid' to Oklahoma