MOPanfisher

Sorry I've been gone for a few days. Our Lake Level management plan has us with a target level of 841 from march 15 or so til June 15, then it drops to the "normal" of 839.0 That is an agreement with MDC for the benefit of the fisheries. sometimes Mother Nature works with us sometimes not. Right now she is not really leaning either way.

Some more water in creeks would be good, but the amounts I heard forecasted will be good for soaking in and helping lawns and gardens but not do much for the creeks.

Shaker, some time we need to get a couple cold ones and talk about the Corps and we do and don't care about. You might be surprised. The main thing we cannot control is Mother Nature, (and Congress) but that would require extra cold beer.

Well its getting close to the Memorial Day Weekend. So far things have been relatively quiet. Just had one incident with a swamped boat today, but no injuries except to boat and owners wallet. Fortunately they were wearing PFD's. For all of you going out on the lakes/rivers this weekend, enjoy the time with friends and family. Looks like a warm and maybe breezy weekend. Watch out for those who aren't paying attention or simply left their common sense at home. Be safe and remember PFD's don't work very well unless you are wearing them. Lets do our best to make sure that everyone who enjoys the waters this weekend makes it back home safe and sound.

Thanks Fishbait3, it does suck when people steal stuff.

NO NO NO, there are not any Walleye in Pomme you have to go to Stockton to fish for them. I know the exact point you are talking about and it can often hold a nice wally or two, they do hate a fire-tiger crankbait. Musky and me have a love/hate relationship, they apparently love crankbaits too and I hate it when they try to take it away from me, sometimes succeeding.

I apologize since I haven't read those regs recently but doesn't the MDC require anyone using Juglines/noodles to be in attendance of them. meaning you can't just drop them and check them later.? At work we find several each year apparently drifted far away from their original location. Sometimes with their name and address sometimes not. It would be pretty easy for a muskie on pomme to take a perch/bait and be long gone with the jug in a short period of time.

Well we haven't gotten to june yet so we don't know for sure what it will be like. Streams here in what I would call the northern edge of the ozarks are doing pretty well, about normal for this time of year. Seems last several years we don't get the sustained rains, instead we get heavy drenching rains that jump the creeks up high and drop back quickly, without the benefit of a sustained flow. Makes the graveling and streambank erosion situations worse. While I don't mind some additional Smallmouth regulations if it is drought that is causing the loss all the regulations in the world won't change that. I love to wade fish for smallies and don't keep them. I have kept a few on canoe trips for a fish fry but generally a couple hours with a small jig will produce enough gogglers or green sunfish to fulfill the needs for a small fish fry.

Yep that would be martins flats. I was fishing last night and we caught 3 walleye, one keeper and two shorts. Pomme has a pretty good population of walleye, however the problem as I see it for walleye fishing compared to stockton is that we don't have the really good places to fish for them. Stockton is blessed with many many windy chunk rock points and areas they love, pomme not so much and the few areas that are pretty good are well known.

http://www.nwk.usace.army.mil/WaterManagement/ThreeDayLakeForecast.cfm This website give a 3 day resevoir forecast for the lakes in the Kansas City District. Sometimes useful to get an idea of what the expected crest is predicted to be, and outflow expectations. Keep in mind that the level are just predictions based on current inflow any additonal rainfall or change in outflow will affect it.

Lilley leave them nasty ole trout alone for a while and come up to Pomme! Lots of us hillfolks just now got private phone lines and we are working our way up to computers.

I went out with a friend on Tuesday evening to troll crankbaits for crappie, new thing for me. We ended up catching a few, but not many, although more than other fishermen were getting. The brushpiles are absolutely blown up with fish on them, I assume waiting till dark to move to the bank, spawn a little and move back out. Once the spawn is over the crankbait thing should be awesome, we will see. I am also seeing a tremendous hatch of fry in the shallow waters, werent sure what they were, but today I scooped up a few in a smalll net to look closer at, they are so small and nearly transparent its hard to tell for sure, but judging by the small mouth that appears to be almost upturned slightly I believe they are gizzard shad, so the food base seems to be safe for another year. The water on the lower end of the lake is not quite as clear, starting to get some of the greenish cast to it from suspended algae. Dang weather just won't stabilize long enough for me to work on them. On the plus side my buddy has a Humminbird Down Imaging unit on his trolling motor and while trolling the crankbaits we find many many more brushpiles that with the push of a button become marked in its GPS memory, makes me want one of those units just for that purpose.

Many years ago I knew a gentleman who had retired from the Missouri State Water Patrol as a dive team capt/member or something. He made many many dives for body recovery, stolen goods recovery and the like. He used to laugh at the catfish big enough to eat a person stories.

I don't think the bas spawn is anywhere near over, typical spawning her would be late april. If the water temp had stayed as warm as it was in march maybe, but the crappie spawn isn't anywhere near over yet. Bass probably have a little while to go yet. Lots of fat egg filled female crappie being caught some with flowing eggs but most not spawning yet, hopefully the weather will warm up again and they will spawn. With the lake slowly dropping I expect they will spawn fairly deep compared to other lakes. Lower end the water is VERY clean and may spawn deeper. But each year is different so who knows.

The "plan" calls for a lake level of 841.0 at this time of year. Currently 844.99 and looks like we have essentially crested, came up .01 since this morning.

Looks like we are starting to peak out at a little above 844.50 and should begin to drop maybe by tomorrow depending on weather. I would suspect that bama rigs trolled might just produce nicely.

There is a lot of brush piles around Lightfoot area, all are fair game. (Even if I did help put them in) Some are marked some aren't wish I had a GPS instead of a poor memory so I could mark them. Oh well that what makes it fun. The up/down nature of the lakes sometimes makes it tough to get it right, especially when you go when you can not when you should.

I'm not gonna say you won't catch any White Bass on Pomme right now, but the population is very low. Talked with the MDC guys last week and during their regular shocking trip up the Pomme river they shocked a total of ZERO white bass. Timing with the warmer than normal water probably had something to do with it though. You might get lucky and catch a Walleye, terrible thing to have to take one home for supper!

Hey those are MY piles. Lightfoot should be a good place to start, muddy water shouldn't be there. Doubt if I get to try fishing until later in week, mowing, church committee meetings etc. etc. etc. I firmy believe that all non-critical meetings and work should be postponed until after April!!

Just made first increase from 100 CFS to 500 CFS in another hour it will go to 1000 CFS. Don't know yet how long we will stay at 1000 CFS. Will Update when I know more.

As soon as the Missouri State Highway Patrol class finishes jumping into the river today (scheduled to be finished by about 4:00 p.m.) I will shut the outflow down in two stages an hour apart, 1500 to 500 then to 100. It will stay at 100 through the weekend. I can control the river, now if I could just control the weather!!

So the MDC enacted a new regulation to help keep out an invasive species and somehow we are upset because they (who don't have the power to do it) haven't cracked down on things like sewage retention lagoons? Thats like being mad at the Corps for the State of MO deciding that every floating dock on COE lakes has to have a 911 address sign. How many of us have actually purchased crawdads for bait, I have used many for bait, but always stopped and caught them from the river I was fishing. I am too cheap to buy them!

Oneshot replace the spoonbill with some pig meat and directions to your house!! Looks like the outflow will stay at 1500 until late on Friday afternoon/evening. Probably back to 100 or so then.

Brad I don't know, it doesn't seem to affect bass as much, but usually it will turn off the bite until they seem to get used to the dropping level. Last night I went a little early to beat the start of the releases, caught four nice ones right off the bat, then the switch went to OFF, shall, deep, piles, docks nothing worked after that. I always likened it to motion sickness they seem to have to get they stomachs back before they bite again. Oh well it will only last through Friday, but weatherman says possible substantial rains may be coming, at least it is spring again not summer in march.

Thought I would give the guys who like to fish Pomme a quick update for this week. Our inspection was last week and we resumed a 100 CFS outflow last friday. The lake is currently at 842.4, just under a foot and a half over the target of 841.0. The reason we didn't begin to lower the lake back to the targe immediately is we knew the Missouri State Highway Patrol was planning on hosting a swift water rescue/training exercise for their officers this week. We will be releasing 1500 CFS for their training, probably begin those releases today so they can start bright and early tomorrow morning. What that means for fishermen is that the lake will be dropping this week I'm guessing 3-4 inches a day which will likely move the fish out a little. Crappie on Pomme seldom spawn in very shallow water so I don't think we will be doing any damage to this years hatch by pulling 15-20 inches of water. May be a little tougher fishing though. Coincidentally I am planning on fishing tonight so I guess I'll get to face the dropping level also!