Johnsfolly

Great looking flies BH! I have a buddy that got excited about my musky and he wants to tie a fly that matches the crappie crankbait we had success with on that trip. This fly might fit that bill. Can you size this fly up maybe to 5-6" to make this more musky sized?

With the warm weather and the unusually spring like bite we were getting here in Feb, that made the last day of Feb into a frenetic fishing day for me to try to finish out my goals for the 2016-2017 Missouri fishing season. Of all of the goals that I had made one that still remained was catching 100 crappie. I also had to complete a fishing challenge that I had with my daughter. So here is how the day went. I usually get after crappie in the traditional spring bite and often again in the fall if there is mild weather. Usually by October and some years by November I no longer actively pursue crappie. I know that there are guys on this forum that have success throughout the year on crappie. Most if not all of them fish for crappie in a boat and not the shore like I do. As of this November I had caught only 51 crappie, a mix of white and black crappie, and had resigned to not meeting my goal of catching 100. Then I fished below Truman dam back in Jan and caught a couple of whites. Still not very likely to catch 47 more fish before the end of Feb. That was before this unnaturally warm Feb occurred. So I started catching crappie again and with enough numbers to warrant trying to complete my goal. So that led up to yesterday. After fishing with my daughter on the 23rd and again on the 27th, I was just 17 fish shy of my goal. My daughter and I had already agreed that we would fish in the afternoon to finish our ongoing bet for largest and most fish. We also agreed that any fish that I caught while fishing without her would not count in my total. Knowing that there would only be a short window in the afternoon/evening to catch more crappie, I decided to head out to the lake in the morning. I got on the water around 6:20 and fished until 7:40 am The wind was coming from the southwest and picked up the longer I stayed at the lake. I caught one bluegill (confirmed that this was not a redear sunfish) and 8 crappie. All were caught on 1/64 oz jigs of various colors. Now I had to work through the day with the idea that I only needed 9 more crappie by the end of the day. I had a major birdnest on my reel as I left the lake and called my betterhalf to bring over another reel or a couple of spools of 4# P-Line fluoroclear line so that I could replace my reel or re-spool my line. Oh and I needed her to bring them to my work before lunch. She granted my request and I was off to the lake again at lunch to fish for 25-30 minutes and get a few more crappie. The wind was really picking up with gusts of 20 to 25 miles per hour. So I had to fish a tightline from the dock and dock ramp and no float to keep my jigs in the right spot. Again a variety of colors worked with the same 1/64 jig head. I was getting bit, but it was one bluegill after another. I was running out of time. I dropped my jig closer to the bottom and have a heavy thump on the line. I set the hook and landed my 9th crappie for the day. I got a couple of more bluegill and four more crappie before I had to quit and head back to work. After tallying up the crappie and my bluegill catch, I was just four crappie shy of my goal and had caught 699 total fish since the 1st of March 2016. I also had a plan to target a pond that I knew had hybrid sunfish to try to catch my 50th different species for the year (I do count hybrids and subspecies in my tally). I was getting more anxious as the day drug by. Finally I was headed out to the pond. First cast and I had a sunfish blew up on my float, I gave it a twitch and I set the hook. I landed my first hybrid sunfish. Based upon the size of the mouth and the coloration of its fins suggested a bluegill and green sunfish cross. So now it was off to get Livie and head back to the lake for the continuation of our fishing challenge and hopefully the completion of my crappie goal. I mentioned at least six times in the 12 minutes that it takes to get to the lake from my house that I will be agitated and anxious until I catch that fourth crappie. We headed down the dam and the wind is from the west/south west and the brush pile is northeast of me. I make my first cast and get hung in some unseen brush. I opened the bail in hope that the wind would blow the bait off the branches and it did, but now my bait is behind the pile. Then I get a strike, but I don't set the hook to prevent from getting hung again. I let the bait drift around the back of the pile and I get it back. Ok now for the second cast. I get bit on that cast and reel in the first crappie of the evening. Next cast I'm hung again, but this time the hook is stuck in the wood. Meanwhile Livie has casted a couple of times without any action and now just missed her first strike. Her casts start near the pile but they get blown too far off the brush to a spot where there just aren't many fish. We are both frustrated and we move further down the dam. Livie is seeing small fish and one or two crayfish and really wants to try to catch them with her hands. She is a very good hand fisher, but WE ARE HERE to CATCH CRAPPIE! Livie and I both switch colors. Livie gets three strikes but can't get a good hook set. I missed two myself and then get my second crappie of the evening. I see that she is really frustrated and scared to get her bait hung in the brush while casting due to the constant wind. Also she is now three fish behind in our contest and has not yet landed a fish. Also she really wants to hand catch one. So we agreed that if she were to catch a fish with her hands that she would win all bets. She tries, but the water is too cold for her to be patient enough for a fish to swim near her hands. I suggest that we go to one of the docks and tightline the baits. So we practically run to the dock. Did I mention that I was getting anxious and possibly running out of daylight. Once at the dock Livie is getting bites, but still hasn't got a fish then she lands a small bluegill. I follow that with my 99th crappie of the year and then I got another thump and set the hook on this small crappie, Number 100! Pressure's off. Now it's fun to fish again. I mention that these two crappie were right near the bottom to Livie. Livie drops her bait lower and misses a strike and then thump - thump we have a crappie double. After this point Livie caught one more crappie and I ended the night with 7 total and 103 for the year. Though it was great to meet this goal. It really was the memories of this trip and the time I got to spend fishing with my daughter that I will remember most. It's been a long way from catching one of her first crappies on this lake to now.

Dan Knowing your situation, I am very impressed that you were able to get this Feb walleye. I can't imagine how much you would have had to negotiate to get the water time and then not get a bite when you were able to get out earlier in Feb. I hope that you are able to get more time in March to get on the water. If not, keep up the positive attitude and scour the reports to find the best spot to better your chances to get bit. You know that the bites will get easier, because you have a lot of success on the spring and summer patterns. Rooting for you in Columbia!

Great bass Donna! Crongrats! Looks like a Ned rig in its mouth. Can't quite make out the color, green pumpkin maybe? Glad to hear that Champ let's you reel in your own fish. Good luck in the tournament.

Dan Great job on your Feb walleye and it is a nice one! Congrats on your perseverance on getting this difficult bite! I know it had to have been a mental challenge to keep at it. I hope that you are able to get back out there tomorrow or this weekend and get your March walleye!

Livie and I got out again this evening. I started fishing with crickets trying for a redear sunfish. I thought that I might have caught one the other night, but called it a young bluegill. I haven't caught a redear this year and I want to make sure that my fiftieth species this year was a confirmed one. I didn't know what the fishing was going to be like after the cold spell. The wind was beating us up and we got hung up and broke off. Livei did catch one decent bluegill. So we headed down lake to try for crappie. At this point we had the same wager, $1 biggest fish and $2 for most fish. Livie had one bluegill so far to my goose egg. So she was way ahead on both categories. We fished by the dock. First cast Livie caught a tiny bluegill. Now I owe her a hug for the small fish. I know we really play for high stakes. I make a cast past the dock and get bit by a crappie. I'm on the board. Also it was larger than her bluegill. So with one fish the tides turned. Now it's a competition. As Livie mentioned it's not a competition if only one is competing. The fish were in the deeper water off the dock, So we moved onto the dock. Still was a tough bite. The weather did us no favors, but Livie got one crappie and two bluegill and I ended up with four crappie and the largest fish. Instead of calling the competition, we are going to carry it over to tomorrow night. Tomorrow is the last day of my 2016-2017 fishing season. So it's only fitting to carry our competition on the last day that I am trying to finish my goals. Still need a new fish species, possibly a redear or maybe a bluegill/green sunfish hybrid and now just 17 more crappie. So here are some photos. Oh and it did rain on us, but we soldiered on for another bite. My first crappie and only fish up to that time. Lucky for this one we weren't keeping any fish tonight. Livie trying to get another one.

I took my betterhalf on a overnight charter trip out of Key West (back when we were without children). The trip was a 72-hour trip headed towards the Dry Tortugas. At anytime that the boat stopped you can fish. I hardly slept and fished a lot. Sue would offer go below to get some sleep. It seemed liked every time she went below the moon would come out. OK It was the same guy that would undress while she was down there. She really started to hate this guy. We caught a lot of snapper, muttons and yellowtails. It was definitely a memorable trip.

I never let it bother me if she catches bigger fish. The more that she is interested then the more I get to go out. By the way the photo is her holding a king salmon that she caught in Ketchikan Alaska back in 2008. She caught four of the five North American Pacific salmon on that trip, king (Chinook), silver (coho), pink, and a chum salmon. Her chum salmon was the largest salmon we caught that day. I of course caught the smallest, about 7 inches in length about 5 inches longer than our herring cut bait. I saw the rod twitch and began reeling it in. It wasn't a spectacular fight. The guide thought that we might have weed on the line. Of course my betterhalf will always talk about the guide and I talking like little school girls about hunting and fishing while she had to watch the lines and reel in the fish. He had a great Tred Barta bear hunt story when he guided Tred. Below are some gratuitous photos from the trip. My son was not too happy about his bleeding coho. My oldest with a pink salmon. Our little Livie tomato with a pink salmon.

Quillback Great job! Think of working the bank as continuation of your rehab program. Bet that trip was a lot more fun than what you were doing at PT.

I have to say that tonight was just fast food. I still have an hour and a half to get home from my fishing trip. Tomorrow night should be a better meal.

We just finished the following: Tako salad Uni, hamachi, maguro, sake, suzuki nigiri Maguro sashimi Miso soup Soft shell crab, spicy tuna roll Avocado, cream cheese, tuna, smelt roe roll. We weren't cooking. In fact most of this was not cooked at all. May miss this place.

Buzzards gotta eat, same as worms.

Now pull them pistols. Real slow. So that I can count the Haaaiirs on the back of your hand.

I would always put a movie with Chief George in above High Plains Drifter. "All I have is a piece of hard rock candy. But it's not for eatin'. It's just for lookin' through." "I'm glad you stopped me when you did. I might have killed her." "They call us "civilized" because we're easy to sneak up on. White men have been sneaking up on us for years." so many good lines: Captain Terrell; "Not a hard man to track. Leaves dead men wherever he goes." Granny Hawkins: "They say you're a hard put and desperate man, Josey Wales. They're goin' to heel and hide you to a barn door. You know what I say? I say that big talk's worth doodly-squat." Alt time favorite line of the whole movie: Fletcher; "There's another old saying Senator. Don't piss down my back and tell me it's raining."

Looks like a good trip. You'll find that there are many of us on this site that really enjoy small water multi-species trips. Keep posting!

So here is my parting shot of the 2016 2017 small game season. this is the doe cottontail that lives in a brushpile in our yard. and Yes she is only about 12 to 15 feet from me when I was taking this picture.

Just means that Billethead will have to tie articulated baits in a rainbow trout pattern to fish the striper spawn. You know that the large brown trout in the river are already eating rainbows.

I will never admit to being the boss in the house. I know better than that. I am trying to figure out, which of my many goals I want to try and get done before my fishing year ends on Tues. Fish the Current to try for 5 more brown trout and catch my 300th brown trout in MO. Fish the Tavern creek/Osage confluence to catch a spotted bass or redhorse sucker either of which would be my 50th species since March 1 2016. Hope that the cold hasn't shut down the bite and hit the lake to try for 21 more crappie to catch 100 for the year. I know these are serious decisions to make. Of course I will help with the shelves first.

Yes dear.

What did Jeff Foxworthy say " you might be a redneck if you would rather fish than have sex." Now I have always considered that there is a redneck mindset and that I often share that thought process. I'm not sure I totally agree with him, but I don't mind fishing first if you know what I mean! Of course one of my other favorites is "You might be a redneck if you ever rested your fishing pole on a "No Fishing" sign."

After 22 years of marriage and 10 years of cohabitation, the bedroom would be the last place that she would look for me .

Wow so this is how is its going to be. It's a good thing that that my betterhalf doesn't listen to you guys. Also I could always use the ladder to get into my bedroom window if she does change the locks.

After the successful night last night, I was able to get out again at lunch today. The wind was whipping the water surface. I couldn't keep a bait in a good location. So no bites with the float. Did catch one crappie going without the float. Not the numbers that I was hoping for. The wind died some this evening and I got out with my daughter Olivia, aka Livie. Again I headed for the fish attractors that we could reach from the bank. We had a small wager, $1 for largest fish (could be luck) and $2 for most fish (more related to skill and luck). I had on the black and green 1/64 oz jig under my float and she was fishing a bumblebee black/yellow jig under her float. I caught the first fish, a white crappie on my first cast. Then another on my next cast and another of the following cast. Livie was struggling on getting a good cast and following drift with the slight wind and skirting the brush pile. I then caught a bluegill and three green sunfish including this chunky one, which was the biggest fish of the night. So at this point Livie has only caught one crappie at this time. So we switched spots and she started catching one crappie after another. I broke off and lost a lot of time retying. So she was catching up pretty quickly. Then it just became how many fish can we catch before we lost enough light to still see our floats. Livie caught 9 crappie. I ended up with 10 crappie, 3 green sunfish and one bluegill. So I ended up with the largest as well as the most fish. The joke was that no matter who lost the bet, we would have to ask mom for the $3 to pay the other person. The real win was getting out and catching some fish with my daughter. Hopefully we don't get the really strong winds this weekend and we can get after these crappie again.

Good luck on your NFOW trip. Expect to hear about big trout coming to hand and those that got away. Show us some of the beauties that you catch. Hopefully you can land some nice browns as well as rainbows.

Here I thought that football season was over. Not on the Meramec! That's a great fish! congrats on your personal best!