riverfish

i was raised trot lining as a kid with my dad and uncle there is a fine art to it. its not just stringing out some line and tieing hooks to it if your trying to do it right. it was one of our major food sources growing up and yes we were very poor. it almost takes two nights of trotlining the first we set multilple lines both deep and shallow to find the fish then you spend all night catching shad to put on them finally get them baited take a nap until right at daylight go run em because the fish start to twist off if you get there two late. when your finished you move the unproductive lines to similar areas of the lines that were productive. then you begin your day of catching perch all day long to have fresh bait on them throughout the day then you start all over again in the evening catching shad again and freshening up your bait on the lines. you also have to find what part of the water colomn there in you can't have your lines too tight or to baggy they have to be just right to realy score.i remember catching up to 75 fish in two nights as a kid. a vacation or weekend that involves trotlining like this is really no vacation at all. then you get home and still have all the work of cleaning the fish and putting away the gear from the weekend. when you do it the way my dad and uncle taught me its not really fishing its a way of life

don't know if your from the rogers/springdale area but i see the guys at hook line and sinker replacing rod tips almost every time im in there. they do a good job i don't know what they charge for it. im sure they have quite a variety of quality and types lord knows they have one heck of a tackle selection

something that capt. joe said made me think about when i was first starting i didn't realize how important my rod is. it;s the sole thing that tells me if im getting bit or just bumping rocks. its not the bait, the reel, the boat,the line and so forth,although they can contribute, its the rod. every year i have fished i have made at least one upgrade to a better rod with more sensitivity. i wish i would have started with better rods to begin with. it would have been money saved.i now prefer falcon rods

the jig was my crutch for the longest time not to say that i don't still use one alot just that i could throw a particular bait for maybe 15 min maybe an hour and if i didn't catch anything i could pick up my jig and at least catch a fish. practicley anywhere anytime you see it is a confidence thing more than a bait thing. bass in this lake main forage is shad and crawdads. they will eat numerous other things its just that these two baits are among the many ways to find out if the fish want a vertical or horizontal presentation once you get bit one way or the other you can further duplicate this specific piece of the puzzle along with terrain, pocket, point,flat,b channel swing so on and so forth. its called pattern fishing. hope this helps you out some

trolling an a-rig or crank bait or any other bait with the trolling motor is against the rules. these instances would be where one is pulling the bait with the TM or big motor . throwing your bait out leaving your reel in free spool for 200 yards then clicking to begin your retrieve is NOT illegal as long as the boat has stopped and you never moved your bait. like hodge said your kinda splitting hairs with the not moving your bait in the slightest thing. the reason they were doing it this way is unbelievable i would have never thought one could get the depth out of strike king xd6 or dd22 like these guys did by using this technique i mean they were getting these baits to consistently bounce off the bottom EASILY up to 35 to 40 feet deep. IF you have never tried this or not seen it done i don't really think you understand what your whining about. trust me cranking a cinder block for 200 yard at a time over and over again all day long is NO EASY FEAT. even with a 7 11 rod and the revo winch series reel YOU WILL WORK YOUR BUTT OFF using this technique. it is to be commended in my opinion

my uncle swears by bang garlic he says it work i myself never use any scent a good friend of mine uses the smelly jelly on his jigs no matter what time of year he says they eat it better and hold onto it longer one thing i can tell you " IF YOU USE SUNBLOCK" use the spray on kind and DO NOT rub it in or bring some soap and water with you in the boat i myself have witnesed this first hand they say alot of sunblock has shark repellant in it and it will repel a bass or any other type of fish. one time i was fishing with my dad and he put the sunblock on and rubbed it in without washing his hands i outfished him ten to one litterally i tried to tell him but the old man didn't listen we fished for two day i probably caught twenty keeps in the two days he only cught 3 fish total between the two. this year he bought the aerosol spray stuff and never touched it with his hands and we both fished equally well for those two days. so my opinion is that in some areas SCENT DOES MATTER

i don't think my credit is good enough to get a loan to buy one of those things i would have to hang it from my ceiling for decoration

i was on grand just the other day throwing a dd22 go down a main lake point markin fish on the graph like crazy and no bites so i turn around ang go back the opposite way and wammo its a directional thing have done this many times here at home the fish really do notice a baitfish swimming up current they think it retarded so they leave it alone;)

joson if you go to the missouri dept. conservation websit you can see all the colors of crawfish that live in the state their colors which part of the state which rivers,lakes,streams,east,north west the whole nine they do not however go into much detail about the molting processor when it occurs, but there is a specific crawdad that is primarily found in table rock lake especially the river and creek arms that has orange pincers with black tips but does not say if that is their color for most of the year or not but there is a picture of itmaybe it will help

jason is right too much money not enough payout i mean i fish a few of the derbys around here. when it gets hot outside i really like the nite bite but, if i can't catch my fish within a mile or maybe two of take off i will just stick to losing my 35 bucks not that and fifty in gas

yes all lakes mentioned aslo have much longer growing season because of milder winters as well and they dont stop eating as much and also lots of florida strain lmb in those lakes as well especially in texas which is over half the lakes mention above like i said in the title ad also my post my opinion is my opinion just like you have yours and them boys can go to grande all they want but it is illegal to transport bait fish across state line from one lake to another according the mo con agent i spoke with they can get their bait from their own lake

feathers, i know a striper guide that has been coming to table rock lake to catch shad by hundreds maybe even thousands to take back to beaver to use on his guide trips this tells me one of two things the stripers have really worn down the shad population on beaver or its just flat out easier to catch them here either way he has been reported i also look at the tourney #'s put up on beaver lake and they are nowhere near table rock and i feel like that probably has alot to do with the lack of forage in the lake for the lmb to feed on. i just like the direction our lake is headed and i wouldn't want food to be a reason for decline. i mean when you think about it a striper is going to outeat a lmb ten to one how long could it take before TR shad population starts to decline. i have heard you mention a few times on the forum about how "shad rich" TR is and it is because there are not stripers being stocked just my opinion

my opinion about this is that our tr fishery is just starting to get back to where it once was and i would just as soon see our bass population grow larger (quality and quantity) and thrive more than to see striper in here eating up everything in sight and i also have fished the kings river arm my whole life hence the name and i have never caught a striper nor heard of one being caught although i have caught some 3 to 4lb class whites and several of them on the kings. i personally don't like the stripers and there is a reason they have not been stocked here let them stay in beaver

i had a good friend fishin this past weekend at the mouth of big creek he was throwing topwater at first light up toward the bank when he heard some activity behind the boat out in a little deeper water he flung his gunfish right in the rings of the last surfacing fish and proceeded to catch the biggest bass ever on table rock he fought and fought the fish as it made powerful run after run he finally got it to the boat and it turned out to be a 10lb striper. i always knew their was a few but hoped that most of them stayed way up on the upper end. whats you guys' thoughts about this

no, i personally don't think so and it seems to me like the "up the white" that we are seeing or hearing about ranges from campbell point all the way up to holliday island i just don't think there is trout that far down

mitch is right i picked up some trokar straight shank flippin hooks and had a ball the first time out the only problem was my best fish of the day near seven lb i figure threw my hook i truly believe the point of penetration was wollard out and cut to death i noticed on some of the fish that i was catching when i went to remove the hook the hole was significanly bigger from being cut as the fish fought it almost fell out i think i may still use them though on long cast situations such as big worms etc. for easier penetration at a greater distance

trust me i live up on the hill in the very back of roaring river arm opposite side of the waterfall and the quality of fish up here is as good as anywhere on this lake its just a little different fishing also not as many people want to make that kind of run from the dam or kimberling all the way up here i know for sure of two major tourney won within five miles of the eagle rock bridge one being an flw tourney anthony gagliardi (owl creek) and the other being heartland championship marty conrad (hump/island) within view of the ER bridge it just doesnt get the attention that the other parts of the lake get. and i can see why i myself have blanked up here several times but ive also caught my personal best 8.49 between big m marina and owl creek. also i believe gagliardi was swiming a grub in the dead of winter and conrad was fishing a tequila sunrise big worm in the dog days of summer just goes to show its good all year round

does anybody know what lester was doing during the open derby they talked like he was making a pretty long run maybe kings or way up the white i couldnt find anything on bassmster as to what he was actually doing baits,depth, LOCATION etc. i know he didnt have the winning pattern but he did have a fith or sixth place pattern i kinda consider this end of the lake to be my "home" because its the end that i live on. so was just wondering if anybody was actually at the weigh in that may have heard or actually know i just thought it would be interesting to know

i got on a bluff end pocket pattern up around the sk area on sturday throwing a strike king xd6 in a gizzard shad color just grinding the bottom in 10 to 13 fow had a good limit maybe 13lb give or take a pound seemed like the fish would eat it just as the bait was starting to reach its full depth potential and just starting to not be in contact with the bottom any longer tried to slow down hoping to get a better fish on a jig and they seemed to get smaller that way i did try going all the way to the back of a pocket and nothing back there for me so i just stayed on the ends and just inside the mouths and the fish seemed to all be mostly on the outside must of had something to do with that cold snap where they could retreat a little faster it was kinda slow but it worked

x

when i was a kid we used to do alot of trot lining for a 16 ft flat bottom boat with my dad and uncle, well we spend most of our time in the upper rivers catching catfish. and sea doo's and ski boats would come within 20 feet of us making waves and tearing up the water. i don't know how many of you have ever been up the river in a 16ft flat bottom but it dont take much of a wave/roller to come over the side of the boat especially in the upper reaches of the rivers. anyway we always tied three sinker rocks on our trot lines needless to say uncle steve was kinda hot tempered in his younger days especially when us young kids were in the boat i cant count how many ski boats were hit with pound and a half rocks they always managed to find their way back to the big water to do their playing. i now have moved on to prefer to bass fish more and have one of those larger boats with a 150 on it i know what its like to be the "little guy" and i always use the utmost concideration when up that far i dont crowd and up that far i always idle b/c i been right where that guy is

i was simpy unaware i just always thought it was 18 thats all

am i wrong in thinking that the LEGAL length limit on a walleye is 18in? and is that state wide or does it vary from lake to lake? i just remember reading that when i was a younger and if it has changed i surely was not aware of it. just wondering b/c i been reading on some of the other forums on this website. and some people are claiming to be catching some really nice 15 in walleye on some of the other lakes up north in missouri and how good they are going to be on the table. either they changed the length limit and im unaware or if you want fish to eat there apparently isn't any rules and regs.

not to mention "about a dozen" thats more than ones limit

dark of the moon in april cut shad you gotta catch them fresh though up the rivers channel cat should be spawning or getting ready too a guy can really slay them on the flats