Johnsfolly

The Fishes of Missouri stated that the MDC stopped stocking northerns in 1974. In the 90s may have had some naturalized populations in borrow pit lakes or ditches along the flood plain around the Mississippi in Clark and Marion counties. Looking at the distribution map in the guidebook there were pike collected in the Osage near bagnell and near the Maries river confluence. Those collections could have been done anytime from 194t to 95. I'll see if I can find out if there have been any recent collections of pike in the state.

Don't know if you would have a slide rule.

It is really hard not to say forget our plans, I'm fishing Taneycomo this weekend. I hope that all of you that make it down enjoy the time that you spend with each other and catch a bunch of fish.

By the way Hank does dry age meat in his beer cooler which hangs above his homebrew beer.

Got to meet Hank Shaw in KC last night. Really enjoyed his talk. Seems like the kind of guy you can move the dry aging elk ham in his beer cooler to grab one of his home brews and sit and talk about hunting, fishing, and cooking. Really relatable guy. I felt a little inspired by his talk, but have not been real successful securing red meat from the field. So I had to find something to do with a pound of store burger. So I diced half of a medium yellow onion and a carrot and sauted them in olive oil. Minced three cloves of garlic and added the burger to brown. Then added diced roasted red peppers and some of our pickled chanterelles (Hank Shaw recipe). Once meat was browned I added smoked paprika, powdered garlic, thyme, two tsp of brown sugar, 3 tbsp ketchup, tbsp dijon mustard, and 2 tbsp tomato sauce. Salt and pepper. Allowed it to simmer to incorporate the flavors. Turned out to be a pretty decent sloppy joe.

I don't seem to catch enough crappie to get that much slime. Ok I rarely ever fish from a boat. It seems to me a cooler with ice would be a better way to keep any crappie. Keeps them fresh on the bank and I would imagine on the boat as well. Just a thought.

Norm Great to hear about your recovery. Keep up the fight!

Welcome back to MO. As you can tell by the posts there are no trout in Missouri . No reason to even bother trying for them here. After fishing Colorado, I would love to hear about any fishing you do down at Blue Springs.

Congrats Dan! Great trip. Did you catch any walleye last Dec? I know that you are getting into the difficult time of year to make your goal. Keep up the good work on those walleye. Just a few more months to go.

Tonight was comfort food. I made a meatloaf with a more southwest flavor by adding smoked paprika, garlic powder, then chili and cumin powder. Served with mashed potatoes made with sour cream and bacon horseradish dip instead of milk. Little salt and pepper to taste.

PW I couldn't think of a better place to get lost than on a stream loaded with fiesty and beautiful brown trout. Congtats to your navigation misfortune! Great pix even that pig of a rainbow took a nice photo.

QB I hope that you have a quick recovery!

Ham I thought that the Browning Airstreams were the only Power Poles needed on your boat .

Congrats those are great looking brown trout! I would always like larger if fewer fish especially if they are the ones that you guys caught on this trip.

Tofu Not dogs!

Been fishing other waters. Will get to the Current to fish in Jan or Feb.

Mitch Most guys did fish jigs exclusively but some of us threw jerkbaits and other lures. I don't know if anyone fly fished.

I may get a lot of eye rolling when I make plans for these trips, but I still am able to go. She puts up with a lot. Who else than a good woman would support the 2500 to 2700 miles I have travelled and food / hotel costs for me to go after trout all over this state and now in Arkansas. Unless we have to make plans soon, I'll get back to you later this month once I get through our big glut of work before Xmas.

Do you think that you will still be able to meet me down there in Jan/Feb? Does your wife zero out your account at the end of the year ?

One of the guys that I work with has these stocked in his farm pond. I still haven't been able to get over there to catch one. Congrats on catching one of those guys! I think that they are pretty cool looking.

That's a nice rainbow. Now that I have seen and fished some of that water, I can better appreciate that fishery. Seems like it's managed well. You should let the fisheries guys know that they are doing a great job!

Phil Sounds like a great deal and I do have to get down to Taney to try to catch a brown and finish my trout goal for this year. Unfortunately we already have made plans for that weekend and I will not be able to attend. I look forward to living vicariously through the posts from the event.

I slept on one of the cots and do agree that it was hard to sleep on, but the rest of the accommodations were great.

There isn't much that I can add except that this was a great time with a great bunch of guys. I got to fish with WoundedOne and Terrierman on Friday. I have never fished the White and have to say even with the five trout that I was able to boat on Friday I was truly impressed. WoundedOne and Terrierman were putting fish in the boat. So it wasn't because of few fish, the numbers were due to my fishing, weight and color combos that I was using. I was certainly undergunned for the fast and deep water. As I wade fisherman, an 1/8 oz jig is just something you end up leaving in the boulders on every cast. Once I got the bait down to them, I was getting bit. We found a great riffle that consistently had active fish. Four or five passes through that riffle put a bunch of fish and many doubles in the boat. What a special fishery. After a great meal with a metric ton of food great conversations and solving all of the world's problems, it was out below Norfork dam with Ham and Micropterus the next morning. Phil had caught a walleye and they boated cutthroat trout as well. I was hoping for a chance at a cutthroat and possibly a brook trout or walleye as a bonus new species for 2016. They were to run one unit that morning that never happened. So with the low flow, I was able to fish my 1/32 and 1/16 oz jigs with some effect. The lack of real flow resulted in fewer fish, but they were larger fish being caught and none of them were passing powerbait. Ham and Micropterus were getting it done and even I landed a real nice rainbow by the docks on an olive and black 1/16 oz jig. . When we got into the catch and release section, the narrative changed from chunky rainbows to variety. I landed my first cutthroat (Marty they stock Snake river cutthroat) and it was my largest fish of the day a 15.5" fish. I was pumped. This was the 46th different and my 19th new species of the year. Now I will credit that I was fishing one of Ham's Airstream rods at the time. So maybe a little mojo wore off on me. Micropterus landed a very respectable brook trout and lost what looked like a nice brown in this same stretch. Soi we had encountered all four trout species on this morning's trip. Ham had to get back to set up the smoker and put on ribs for a fine dinner later that night. So at Ham's suggestion, I fished the confluence of Dry run creek and the Norfork for brook trout. I had three hits with one definite brook hit and landed a small rainbow with some parr markings that got me thinking I might have caught a brookie. No other hits and Micropterus and I had lunch and met Ham at Rim shoals for the afternoon trip. Started to rain, but that didn't slow down the fishing. This section was definitely on this day a numbers area instead of size. As a wade fisherman fishing small water once you make a pass through a riffle, pool or run, you are likely done. So fishing a run and catching fish over again and again on a big river is definitely a different experience. We had a lot of doubles on the day and just missed a couple of triples. Ham and Micropterus can correct me later, I believe that they caught 30 and 25+ fish apiece. I ended up with 18 rainbows and I even caught a 7" brown trout. I ended up with three species of trout and lost the fourth. There was a bunch of good conversation and trash talk throughout the day. It was a great day on the boat regardless of the cold and rain. My best baits were olive / ginger and brown / ginger 1/16 and 1/32 oz jigs. I only caught one rainbow on and F11 hand-painted Rapala jerkbait. Sunday I am now obsessed to spend an hour or tow trying again for a brook trout at the confluence of Dry Run Creek/Norfork river. On the first strike I turned a brook trout as I could see its fins clearly before it threw the hook. I also had a heart breaker when I cast a chartreuse microjig in front of an active brook trout and had the knot slip as I set the hook. That fish wanted to eat. It kept going after each new bait I threw at it but it wouldn't commit fully. I found out from Ham later that I could have drifted a red worm in front of it and possibly landed that trout. I'll keep that in mind for next time. One the way home I stopped at the crossing of Bryant creek and fished a size 14 hook with a bit of red worm. I had a lot of interest with small minnows, but with the larger hook couldn't catch any of them. The larger minnows weren't too interested. I did land one duskystripe shiner, which was my last fish of this trip. The only problem is that you just couldn't get to fish with everyone on one trip. I would have loved to fish with Duane and Phil, or LittleRedFisherman and Grizwilson or N9Bow and Richard. Still I really had a great time!

Congrats to all! That's a great looking fish! I'm still at work at 6:30 pm trying to get the work off my desk to be able to get down there tomorrow.