Johnsfolly

Good luck Daryk! Post photos😉.

The stocked portion is about 1/2 mile long. Saw about 15 fishermen from that spots I could see. I think that they may stock twice or three times until end of March.

The brown that I posted was 17 inches and about 1.5 lbs. I had seen one well below the CA access that was probably 22 to 24 inches and maybe 3 lbs. That fish spooked at everything even a bait that drifted from well upstream of it.

Beaverdam Creek - 05Feb23 We live on the Eastern shore of Maryland which is the Delmarva penisula (Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia). The Delmarva penisula is an ancient delta formed between the Susquehanna and Delaware rivers. The temperatures are buffered by the Chesapeake bay and the Atlantic ocean. We actually have warmer year round temperatures because of this effect than the western parts of VA and MD. Our soils are mostly sand. The creeks are low gradient creeks with low flow rates and tend to be more swampy. The waters have high tannins from the pines and oaks. Several species of trees are evergreens, like magnolias, american holly, etc. I am only aware of four spots on the Eastern shore that are stocked with trout. I had fished three of them, Tuckahoe creek, Unicorn Branch and Shad landing pond, previously. I saw that they stocked the Beaverdam creek, the fourth location, on the second of Feb and I headed down on a nice day to try for trout. Party cloudy skies and mid to high 50's. I focused on the section of the creek below the pond spillway. I targeted that spot figuring that the water would likley be deeper, highly oxygenated and hold more trout. I found a man and his grandson fishing a pool on the creek not far below the spillway. (most of the green shrubs and trees are holly) His grandson had just lost a decent stocker that had broken his line. The pool was split by a fallen tree. There were a couple of guys fishing just below the spillway. I ended up fishing the upstream side of that fallen tree. I started by drifing microjigs below a float in the run above the pool. Nothing. Tried without the float in the pool, but again nothing. Losing time, I switched to the treble hook with the Bublegum Power eggs and the orange nibble. I cast to the eddy side of the flow above the tree and the bait would drift below the tree. I got a slight bite, then nothing, then I picked up the rod and it bit again. I landed my first trout of the day. I nicked its gills and offered the fish to the man and his grandson, but they didn't want it. I sacrificed him and decided to catch a couple more for dinner. At this location you are allowed to keep five. I caught two more above the tree. At that time the man and boy left. I then caught two more below the tree from where they were fishing. The last trout from that pool was the largest of the day (12.75 inches and fairly thick; all ranged from 10 to 12.75 inches). It wrapped itself into the line from my other rod. As I landed it I got my other line out the mix and the fish was still wrapped in line. Turns out that I caught the fish that the boy lost earlier. I confirmed that when I cleaned the fish and found their hook with the white Powereggs that the man said they were using for bait. I fished a little bit longer in that pool then tried a couple other spots downstream, but didn't catch another fish. I headed home with enough fish for dinner and a sucessful trip at a new trout spot.😁

Congrats on a great day! As you said you read what was going on and found new hot spots. Your bait definitely matched what they were feeding on.

Looking at the maps, I don't think that I have gone beyond the last big river bend upstream of the cemetery. Some of those thin water areas just above the CA access and below were on bedrock and extremely slick. Did not enjoy that at all. I have only fished that river a few times. Well over 4 hrs from our house in Columbia.

This is what I am referring to in my posts as zone 3 or pool 3. Well below the old dam in the park. I would wade upstream from the conservation area parking off of rt F. So from this pin down to here

It would. Lots of options out there, especially with LED lighting. Lots of guys on this site use grow lights and may share their opinions.

I've caught most of my MO browns in the Current river (I should probably put together a post or two😉), but as mentioned have caught some in the Niangua not far from where you guys fished in the park. Closer to you, the red ribbon section of the Meramec river used to have decent brown trout. However, I've heard that fishery has been in decline over the last decade. I haven't fished it since about 2008, but even then several of the good holes had filled up. Taneycomo is much farther away but has great brown trout fishing. Maybe @JestersHK can give you a lift on one of his turn and burn trips. He does guarantee one fish😁!

We've caught a bunch of sculpin in the park. I haven't tried for them below the park. I've caught rainbows and brown trout in pool 3. Really didn't look for or try for anything but trout. Further downstream near the Conservation area, I've caught stonerollers, rainbow darters, hornyhead chub, Duskystripe shiners, Southern red belly dace and rainbows. Saw skittish browns and northern hog suckers, and either redhorse or white suckers. I did eventually catch some bluegill and longear sunfish well downstream of the CA access.

@Quillback congrats buddy! That's an awesome walleye!

Livie has a shirt with the phrase "If it has a name it's a pet. If not, make Jerky!"👍

I agree that Dinty Moore is a pretty good canned beef stew. Always have a can or.two in the pantry.

Which is funny coming from Andy Reid who has always been poor at clock management.

Probably not all the parks. Doesn't RRSP have a dam/spillway at the end of the park? I have fished the roaring river below the park and the variety of species is not a great as the Niangua, which Bennett's freely flows into below the whistle bridge.

For folks that only fish for trout in the parks, I bet they would be surprised at the variety of fish in the parks. Surprised that you didn't get a striped shiner. Still looked like a great time!

@Quillback you got out and found some fish at least enough to make you feel like you were fishing instead for just boating around😉

That's a definite possibility especially with the high gas prices.

@Ham and @FishnDave sounds like a great time. I do miss the C&R season in the parks. Usual pretty empty of people and full of fish. Congrats on that banded! As you mentioned they are common but not abundant. Dave Don't remember if you have caught brown trout in MO yet. You were pretty close to some opportunity for browns in the Niangua. I used to catch a few there pretty regularly.

Thanks for info. That is the feed we have been using. We just switched to another local hand mixed feed.

That happened to our black bantam rooster. I always thought his comb looked like baby gums😆. @Terrierman We have two roosters that we are willing to part with ourselves. Even if we did want your, we don't live within travel limits 😉 (thank goodness)

I miss my black silky. I seem to recall that @N9BOW was raising or raised silkies.

Unicorn Branch - 01Feb23 This was not a trip to a new trout site, but just a recent trip to one of the stocked creeks near us. Last year I fished this creek within a week of the stocking and found a pattern using a Trout magnet minijig with an orange body drifted in the current seams both upstream and downstream (creek photos from that trip) and landed 10 trout in ca. 90 mins. Water flow was much less on this trip, but I tried using that float and microjig technique. NOTHING😒! I put on a piece of redworm and caught only a couple of bluegill and this BGL x pumpkinseed hybrid. So I wasn't going to be skunked, but still no trout. I tried some other microjigs with and without the float and still no trout. As it was getting dark I moved to the other side and used the same Powerbait bubblegum egg with an orange trout nibble bait on the small treble and split shot. Cast to a spot between two seams. Didn't take too long to get a solid bite and I landed my first trout of the evening 😁. Light was fading fast. Made a couple more longer casts to another seam and landed another hybrid sunfish. My last cast was back into the spot where I caught the first trout and landed my last fish of the night - another rainbow trout. Definitely not the action that I was hoping for on this trip, but had fun, had my license checked, and caught fish.

https://dwr.virginia.gov/blog/angler-catches-unique-golden-largemouth-bass/?utm_source=mailchimp&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nftf&utm_content=nftf_fishing_february2023

Just a funny river story that I may have told on one of the forums previously. One of Sue's uncles was bear hunting up in the mountains of PA. It was later in the afternoon and he saw a big bear and shot it. It went up and over the ridgeline. He found it about 100 to 150 yards below the crest of the ridge. This was 300+ lb bear. So instead of trying to drag it back up and over the ridge, he rolled it down to the bottom which had a small river. When he got to the river he floated the bear as he walked down stream until he got to a bridge crossing more than a few miles downstream. It was now well after dark. So he went up to the roadway to flag down some help. A couple of conservation officers saw him and pulled over. They mentioned that they were searching for a lost hunter and asked whether he had seen anyone that might have been lost. He told them no he hadn't seen anyone else. He did ask if they could help him get the bear up to the road and they did as well as offer him a ride back to his camp. As they were talking on the way to his camp they soon realized that he was in fact the "Lost" hunter that they were looking for that evening.