Johnsfolly

No just the mythology of the catch and fight!

Sounds delicious buddy! Post a photo please.

Mitch I would prefer 1.25 to 1.5". I cut my venison steaks to 1.5. Allows me to get a great sear and keep the center closer to rare.

I prefer to cook them still in the pod with a little white wine until they pop. Then mix them into a vegetable ragu🙃 Ok maybe not🤣

@Quillback i have tried similar gar baits that @BilletHead gave me when I fished Mingo. Had 7 hit but couldn't land one. I didn't let them get as wrapped as this guy was talking about. So I just pulled it out of their mouths. Have to try again👍

Sorry to hear that, but you guys have been catching some beauties for sure. Also for the most part 2020 has sucked!

Nice gorgeous brown trout! How many lunkers have you caught this year? If I only lived closer .

That sounds like a great time for sure! I can't wait to be that granddad myself. Probably a couple of years off from now until our granddaughter can reel in a fish. There is always hope that maybe we can even get her dad to like fishing . You can see how excited he was with his first salmon.

I believe that I may have caught the smallest mahi on hook and line. It was about 10 inches in length, my first pelagic microfish .

Congrats on the awesome Mahi buddy! Sea lions are bears of the sea.

… And it's not just fishermen in boats. Many times while fishing from the bank at the trout parks have had wade fishermen walk in front of me through the run that I was casting into. The worse ones are when they have their kids in tow and continuing to teach bad behavior.

Congrats @Lloyd and welcome to the Ozarks fisheries. I also fished a lot of lakes an ponds in the Northeast as I grew up (and am again back out that way) and found that the Ozark creeks and rivers have so much more to offer than what I have done in the past and am able to do now. I have said to a few folks that I fished in the past but became a fisherman in Missouri. Expand your travels and you will continue to be amazed at the fishing opportunities. Can't wait to see more successful (and even if they are not successful) trip reports.

Sharks are such a cool fish! With our failed offshore outing, I think that I missed my window to catch two species of shark including a dogfish this year. Dogfish stay local year round so I still have a chance to partially meet my 2020 goal.

That's when I think about tying on a 4 oz lead sinker and casting into his boat !

Its those dam microfish !

She must have one helluva guide ! @duckydoty can just flat out put folks on big fish !

Maybe one or two are black perch!

Awesome fish! Congrats to you both! I would consider those lunkers !

Maybe those are brim!

Squirrels were bad on our tomatoes. They would grab them and eat them while sitting on the bird feeder. Would love to have a squirrel season like MO that starts in May instead of Sept . Shooting them now is like grounding your daughter after she's had the baby.

Thanks Dave. Will depend on how often and when I am back in MO. I don't travel back that way as much due to changes in our business. I will certainly keep a possible trip in mind when I do get back that way. I also have to tussle with that pond giant that broke you off.

I still haven't come close to those annual numbers. I have averaged only 80 trips per year over the last five years with an average of 812 fish per year and only 38 trips per year the five previous years. Most of those trips were less than 4 hours of fishing time. The last five years has been spent primarily targeting new species either for the annual count or for my life list. I have averaged 65 species a year for the last five years and added 94 species to my life list in that same time. And yet there are so many "common" species that I have not caught yet, like any gar other than a Florida gar, or grass carp, goldeye, skipjack herring, flathead catfish, sauger, northern pike, burbot, any sturgeon species, etc.

I would say likely less than 40 people in the US have caught this fish on hook and line.

Sounds like an awesome trip. Thanks for the report.

Hey don't forget that there are actually three species of "rock" bass in MO, the northern rock bass, shadow bass, and Ozark bass. In most Ozark creeks, I would tend to agree with @tjm that spring and summer are when I catch most of the rock bass that I have caught in those creeks. But I also don't fish many of those same creeks in the late fall or winter. However, don't give up yet. There are spots that you can find actively feeding rock bass and shadow bass in the winter. You would have to travel a bit further to get to them. You might even be able to catch a brown trout as well.