Riverwhy

mjk86, I completely agree. Just like a few hundred years ago when scientists argued the world was flat to keep on the kings payroll the current crop of scientists argue man made climate change to keep getting the government grants. Just as free thinkers eventually prevailed to prove the earth is round , I am sure free thinkers will eventually prevail and prove that climate change is a constant process that it is way bigger than the egocentric human race likes to admit. Let's concentrate on clean water and clean air and not divide the public for the sake of a government grant or a carbon tax profit.

Climate changes are a natural part of this old world. If man has an effect I think it is minimal. I would like the current crop of politically biased scientists to concentrate on our real trouble spots. Clean water and clean air should be our focus. We could get a groundswell of support for a clean enironment. When we take our eye of the ball for political reasons and try a feel good approach of moving all carbon production to China and India so that we can pretend we love the environment we hurt real efforts to control pollution. We all have lots to learn about how our climate works. In the mean time I would like to see everyone work together on our real sources of pollution.

I appreciate the report

Now don't get a bee up your shorts boys. i'm happy fpr you and your microchips. We all know the clear deepwater lakes can be tough without them in the summer. I also whole heartedly agree than many if not most can not fully understand the technology they have on board anyway. Bit don't assume that the fellow in the 14 foot fishing boat isn't doing his share of catching.

The art of fishing is slowly being displaced by the science of catching. Underwater spear fishing, underwater cameras, multiple sonars and graphs have revolutionized catching fish. The ebb and flow of fishing is fascinating. Our grandfathers and some of our fathers grew up meat fishing and while many of our generation starting out in their footsteps many of us mellowed and began to see fishing as a way to connect with nature and fishing became more important than catching. The trend toward fishing is now being replaced by the need to catch fish by any means available. While our grandfathers used worms, minnows and traps to accomplish their goals our current crop of fishermen are driven to use technology and science to insure a better chance at catching the fish. I wonder if some day we will fly small drones over our back forty so that we can see where the deer are feeding and we can then hop on to our high speed four wheelers and quickly hop off and shoot the largest buck. I find it very similiar to technology fishermen. As a point of clarity I do not want to limit my technology driven bretheren. i simply hope that some day they find the peace of mind to become fishermen rather than catchers of fish.

I would recommend the smaller size Shimano Stradic C14 1000 reel spooled with a good quality clear 4 pound momofilament. 6 foot to 6.5 foot ML spinning rod. No need to spend more than $75 bucks on the rod. Small blue floating Rapala's, wee crawdads of various colors, roostertails of various colors, small crappie style tube jigs with 1/32 oz jig heads, and beetle spins. If you can pop for another outfit, I recommend the exact same rod and reel spooled with 6 to 8 pound clear monofilament with six inch purple curly tail worms and watermelon baby brushhogs. Listen to Chief Grey Bear.

We put in Sunday morning at 7:00 A:M and quickly motored to a bluff. Second cast with at a grey and black hot-n-tot my fishing partner hooks a large fish. He finally gets him to the edge of the boat and we see it is a large walleye. Three times to the boat and three times he peels off line back down to the bottom. The fourth time up was the trick and we netted a walleye just shy of 24 inches. My fishing buddy is 62 years old and declared that it was more exciting than his first buck. Later down the bluff I picked up a small walleye on a purple worm with a pink tail. The remainder of the bluff was fished without a strike. Motored over to a shallow point and slowed to a crawl to look at the water and to check my depth. Noticed a few shad hopping out and decided to throw a couple of times. Caught a largemouth on the first cast on a rooster tail and proceded to spend the next three hours trolling down the shallow side of the bank catching dozens and dozens of largemouth. It made little difference what we threw. I caught 5 largemouth in five casts at one point. Everything from a roostertail, hot-n-tot, small gunfish (my favorite because of the top water strikes), beetle spins, small crank baits and finally even a pass through with a big white spinner bait. The biggest bass were only between 17 and 18 inches but the volume of 13 to 15 largemouth was really endless. We added a couple of 12 inch crappie and a nice channel cat to the days catch before we called it a day at noon. Norfork has kicked my tail more times than I would like to admit but Sunday was finally my turn. I can't figure how a cool front with a northeast breeze could turn on the fish.

One of the best trolls in a long time.

Great post F&F. I typed up a full page response over the weekend but just deleted rather than post it because you just can't get a point across to special interest groups. I hope with all their faults the MDC can see past the special interest groups and try to keep our waters free from any more restrictions.

I appreciate the responses. If I can get out in the next couple of weeks I'll report back with the results of the new tactics.

We tried a silver hot-n-tot, a Kastmaster, and a silver rattle trap without success.

I made a recent trip to Lake Norfork and noticed some pretty active fish feeding on the shad schools. We caught a few nice white bass under the schools on a white rooster tail and a couple of nice largemouth on a Zara Spook. However, my success ratio was fairly limited considering the time spent fishing these schools. Are there better methods right now to trigger more strikes?

I am very impressed. I caught a few nice fish this weekend in the heat but your results are amazing.

I put in at 6:45 A:M at a public access on my favorite ozark stream last Sunday. Around 2:00 P:M a family of 4 floated by drinking sodas. I took out at 6:00 P:M without seeing another sole except for this nice family. Smallmouth fishing was a little slow on numbers but pretty decent on average size. Goggle eye fishing was very good and I even landed one just shy of 11 inches. My point is that you can still find a little peace in this world but some streams have been lost to the party crowd.

Mark Twain is relatively clear and crappie fishing remains good. Went ouit yesterday and we each caught a limit of crappie. Mostly 10 inch to 11 inch fish. We did have to weed through several smaller fish but I never mind that problem. Most of the fish were caught 10 to 20 feet deep in 45 to 50 feet of water against either wood or the bridge piers. All fish were caught on minnows. The bite was very light and hard to feel. Great day to be on the water.

I just hate too read that. I trotline a couple times a year and I strictly follow the regulations and only harvest 5 or 6 fish a trip. it should not even take regulations for a real fisherman to know you need to check your lines regularly. I check mine every 2 or 3 hours and then pick them up early in the morning. It gives a bad name to the guys that respect the fish.

I caught a 36 pound big head carp on Sunday fishing with a rogue. After much teasing I cleaned the beast and I'm going to send him to the deep fryer. The flesh was much whiter than a regular carp.

I very much appreciate the otter education I have recieved on this post. i had worried that a family of five otters eating ten pounds of fish a day or over 3,000 fish a year out of a small section of stream could effect the smallmouth and google eye populations. I now realize it is the stringers of six fish kept by anglers that is doing the real damage. It's also refreshing to hear that otters are part of a healthy ecosystem while humans are not meant to be part of the enviroment. i just wish otters could get acclimated to eat asian and big head carp.

No doubt that heavy pressure from catch and keep could impact the stream in the photos. You may love the otter but 2 pounds of fish a day per adult otter is way more problematic. We are on the same side on the smallmouth issue so I don't want to argue. I absolutely love those fish. The best sport fish we have in my opinion. On the couple of streams I fish the most it sure seemed to me that the quality of the fishery declined when the otters appeared.

OTF, I have not eaten a smallmouth in years but I do love a skillet of google eye and sunfish a couple times a year. I am not for a mandatory CPR but I certainly would like to see the length limits and creel limits tightened. The question in the post was "Why Does Fishing Continue To Decline In Our Rivers?". So, folks might like to watch the otters frolick on the bank and they may like watching their cattle graze on the river banks while they watch from the back deck of their house that use to be timber but these are the reason for the decline and not the fellow with a bucket of minnows.

I completely agree. These types of stringers and much larger were commom in previous decades. Fish harvest by humans is not the variable hat has changed. An otter will consume around two pounds per day of fish and crustaceans. Add a whole family of otters in a stretch of a stream and imagine the carnage. Human harvest doesn't even register on the scale. Otters and stream degradation are our mutual enemies.

Thanks, I found this useful

The reintroduction of otters, cattle grazing beside and in the stream, and gravel deposits due to the effects of logging and clearing are the real culprits. The yahoos keeping small fish make me angry but they are not the prime suspects in our decline in quality stream fishing.

Conservation versus preservation is a mater of lifestyle, heritage and a little philosophy. Short fish, over limit fish and poaching is not favored by either side.

Spear fishing and utilizing a high dollar graph are very similiar. You really can not compare a fisherman who relies on experience, instinct, water levels, weather conditions, amd lure selection and presentations to the spear and high dollar graph fishermen. It is two different forms of recreation. Both methods are legal and fun for the fisherman. Imagine if you are deer hunting in a large forested area and try to find the best location and select the best ammo and rifle and then compare your results to a similiar hunter who uses an aircraft to locate the deer in the forest. I would rather hunt without an aircraft spotter and I prefer to find my fish without a spear gun or a high dollar graph.