jimithyashford

I figured with the rain and cooler temperatures that fish might be biting yesterday. I went to the bridge over the James on far south Campbell just north of Nixa and fished the pool under the bridge. I cast a little rooster tail out in a fan pattern, about 6 casts and retrievals. Then did the same with a crank bait, then the same with a yellow jig. Rooster tail was a fast strait retrieve, Crankbait was retrieved fast, then pause, then fast, then pause. jig was retrieved in small hops along the bottom. No bites. And Al Agnew....I WISH I KNEW! This is driving me nuts man. I've taken to watching youtube videos of angling tips, and trying very hard to replicate the methods, lures, and fishing areas shown in those videos, but I certainly have not replicated their results.

Ok so, I was not creating this thread in order to troll. I was not trying to be silly, stupid, or an idiot. I was expressing my frusteration at having gone to a place that was supposed to be as sure a thing as you could possibly hope for, and having nothing to show for it, also I was commenting on this mind boggling behavoir of putting bait directly under a fish's nose, and still not getting a bite. I don't understand where the ire of some of these replies is comming from. If catching trout is so easy and obvious to you that my observation and frusterations and questions seem silly, then I dunno what to say, must feel good to be so blessed. Now I have gotten lots of suggestions about lighter line, and that seems to be such a constant suggestion that I guess I will have to give that a try. I was using 6lbs clear line, I guess I'll switch down a few pounds. However, when I first got the advice to use lighter line, that seemed really bizarre to me since the primary trout fishing method, fly fishing, by design uses a big giant ultra-thick and super visible line. So when THE prime trout fishing method fishes off a shoe lace, and people tell me my 6lbs clear line was too thick....naturally that confuses me and would cause me to ask more questions. That all makes sense right? Not trying to troll, just trying to catch some fish. And to those who gave practical and helpful advice, thank you.

I can't tell who the troll is? The person saying some people's aren't meant to fish? I don't really buy that. I'm sure a bass can't the who is on the other end of a crankbait diving in front of their face. And yeah! very funny on the "getting off cheap" when I pay by the pound. I don't really wanna go to some private place where they practically put the fish on the hook for you. I would much rather go out to a lake or river and catch fish out of the natural population. I'm not averse to effort, I've spent a lot of hours bushwhacking and wading. I used to think that I just wasn't about to find fish, and that was the problem, but seeing my bait roll off the tip of a trout's nose as he ignores it tells me that's not neccesarily the case.

Yeah, taking the skunk as a lesson seems easy at first, but I am on my....gosh...lemme try to estimate without exagerrating here..... I am on probably about my 20th skunk this year, broken only by one 3 hour trip that did net me one good Bass, and a 5 hour trip that got me one small rainbow trout. I mean....20(ish) trips, hundreds of miles driven, dozens of hours on the water, hundreds of casts....2 fish? I don't even wanna try and estimate how much money I've spent landing those two fish, I'd probably make myself feel ill if I did. Stabbing the darn fish with a spear looks more and more attractive every day.

Someone at the bait shop recomended lighter line to me. I didn't have any lighter line to switch out to, but I am 100% sure I saw people catching trout on fly fishing rigs with these big ultra-heavy ultra-visible orange and neon-green lines. I know they have a short header of a much thinner line, but still, Trout didn't seem to be too picky about biting at flies with a shoe-string of a line comming right up to within a foot of the fly.

Well, I didn't intend to launch a massive discussion on the topic, but still interesting to read. I appreciate angling as a leisure activity, as a sport. But I also appreciate harvesting wild fish for the table as an objective. They are two distinct goals that can sometimes happen to coincide. I can also understand why casting a line feels adventurous and sporty to some folk, while getting on a snorkle and diving spear in hand feels adventurous and sporty to other folks. What I am is a fella who likes to line fish (although I appear to be miserable at it) but who would also like to go out from time to time with a reasonable expectation of bringing something home for dinner. I am just looking for a way to actually enjoy fishing and sometimes bag a meal rather than spending countless hours impotently casting.

Spent 5 hours at Bennet Springs trying to trout fish. I did manage to catch one small rainbow trout, which I gave to another angler who was cleaning his catch since one small trout is too little to make a meal of. I figured fishing in water swarming with thousands and thousands of mass-stocked fish would at least yeild a productive and bad-streak breaking day. But it did not. I did catch one fish, but it hardly felt like a satisfying trip.

The thread title there is a bit of a joke expressing my frusterations. I know they aren't impossible to catch since I did catch one. I spent about 5 hours at Bennet Spring on Saturday starting at 9am. Some might thing fishing in a stocked trout stream brimming over with thousands of fish would be cheating.....well it didn't do me much good. I fished a little pink ball powerbait thing, a brightly colored rubber jig that I fished both on top and down low, and I fished grasshoppers caught beside the road. I caught one small rainbow trout on a grasshopper, no other bites the whole time. Since one trout was too little to do anything with, I gave him to another fella I saw cleaning his catch. The frusterating thing was that I could clearly see the trout, and I was passing my bait/lure right in front of their faces. In fact, more than once I actually hit the trout in the face with my bait and literally drug the bait across his nose, and they just wouldn't bite. If I cast my bait right into their face and they still don't bite I don't know what else I can do. I could only have been more accurate if I cast the hook directly into their lip. I saw plenty of other people out there with full stringers, so I dunno what they were doing different, but I just could not catch stinking trout out of water packed full of them.

So I have a buddy who I was relating my fishing difficulties too, particularly my inability to catch any catfish, and be promptly pulls out his phone and shows me pictures from a trip where he easily landed several very large catfish along with his buddy, and they had a number of other fish too, walleye I think, I didn't get a good look. I asked him how the hell he managed that and he told me he got them spearfishing and gigging at Table Rock. He and his buddy had a speargun and a gigging spear that they swapped between and they just used a basic snorkel and goggles to dive. It looked like a heck of a haul. So then I go online looking for information about seasons and regulations and stuff, and I get the definite sense that most anglers view spear fishing and gigging as some terrible unsportsmanlike blight of a practice, and I just wanted to get your opinions on it. Obviously I understand that Spearfishing is a non catch-and-release practice, so you wouldn't go stabbing away at things like bass, but if you're looking for a few fat cats or walleye for the table, is there any reason it's not a good practice? I've also heard it's pretty much the best way to try and get Gar and the only reliable way to get suckers.

Why would it be hard to stay out? Any good advice would be welcome. So, I haven't had a chance to go fishing again since that one fish I did catch, but I did float the Jack's Fork from Alley to Eminence last weekend. I got a chance to snorkel and dive in some of the deeper spots and I was happen to see lots of nice fat bass just sitting there, tucked down into holes or behind rocks out of the current. Visual confirmation of lots of bass in the water, but I was with friends and we weren't fishing, so I just enjoyed the diving and went on past. Maybe I'll float that again and fish it.

Yeah, after I got that surface strike I cast out and retrieved quickly with the same lure several more times in kinda a fan pattern. When that wasn't getting anything I switched to a crankbait and did the samething. After that is was starting to get dark so I packed it up.

I caught a fish! I was out for 4 hours and I only caught one fish, but it was a good fish. A big smallmouth. Well I dunno if it was atually "big" or not, but it seemed like a monster to me. I was wade fishing down near river cut golf course. Now here's the thing. I saw the reference to the Ned rig, so I fished the Ned rig the whole time. I only got the one bite, and that bite landed me the nice big fish. But it was only 1 bite in about 3-3.5 hours. I was pretty much casting it out at all of the likely spot, letting it sit for a few seconds, reeling it in with a few little hops, letting it sit, repeat. That wasn't getting anything. In fact, the fish I finally caught took the bite when I was just fast-reeling to get the lure back in cause I thought my cast was bad. Now it was late in the day, and since the sun was low and hitting he water at an angle, I could see the water was absolutely full of fish, and there were several nice fat bass swimming around. So I continued to fish that hole for another 30 minutes or so, putting that jig right in front of their noses, and nobody else was biting. So at least I now know a hole with fish, but I dunno why I couldn't get them to bite. And ozark trout fisher, I appreciate the advice and the positive attitude, but I am way past fisherman zen on this. If I wanted to go enjoy playing in the river and not catching fish, then I would just go play in the river. And I think if I usually caught fish and only occasionally got skunked I could be happy with an afternoon outside and call it good, but I am a long way from that kinda equilibrium. But hey! After about 20 trips over the course of 2 months... I finally caught a respectable fish!

Quillback: I keep thinking of giving up on the James near town as well. The problem is that I hate hitting the road for long trips and eating up a whole tank of gas to get skunked. That has happened to me 2 times so far this year, nice long drives out to Lake Stockton only to walk away empty handed. So I resolved to get my technique down here locally, in waters that are practically along my commute, so that I wont be wasting my time on those longer drives. So I have fished Crieghton many many times now, and I have fished a half mile streach of the James down by River Cut golf course, and I am comming up empty handed as well. So part of me keeps saying "there are no fish in this darn water. Give up on it." but then another part of me says "Other people catch fish here, so you are just doing something wrong and you're just gonna waste your gas if you drive out somewhere." See my delimma?

I might have to try this NED lure, it looks easy to rig. So how do you retrieve it? Just let it sink and then hop it along the bottom?

Well, that was a bit of a disater of a trip! Almost comically so. I started up upstream wade with a rooster tail at about 5pm, at least I didn't get totally skunked, I did catch a couple of small sunfish. Then I got my rooster tail snagged on something too deep for me to go unsnag it, and I was forced to break the line and leave it. So I switched over to a very small crankbait minnow I have. I did catch one weird little bottom-sucker fish just cause the crankbait snagged him in the side. He was a funny looking little fella. So I head on upstream and get to just below the water intake station when I get my crank bait snagged in an overhead branch. It's snagged good and I can't get to it. So I'm tugging away, hoping the limb will break before my line does, when I slip on those algea covered rocks, jam my knee, fall in the water, and the line breaks at which point my crank bait just falls out of the tree. So at least I got my lure back. At that point I threw in the towell, just went right up ovee the bank and across some property owner's yard to get back to the road (I was too peeved to care, but I don't think anyone was home) and limped back down the road to my car covered in mud and with a hurt knee. So when I get back to my car, I left a crawfish trap in the water (I had planned to fish longer) so I went down to retrieve it, and when I pulled it, a big ole bass flashed me his brightly colored side. He must have been hanging out around my trap eating the crawfish that were going in. Like the river just wanted to let me know there are big bass in there, just not any for me. I feel like sisiphus.

I was using 4, but I've switched up to 6.

Lol, well thanks for the sentiment. I mean I hate to come on here and just sound like a giant complainer, but by the time I had joined this forum I had already spent the first half of the summer winging it with no success, and my lack of success continues, so I am getting to the point where I pretty much question everything I'm doing cause it's just not working. Today I am going to get in the water at the upper end of Creighton with a little rooster tail and wade up stream doing one pass at every eddy and one pass near every structure until I hit something. If I get all the way up to where Pearson creek enters the James with no bites, I will switch to a crayfish on a hook and wade back down tossing it into every eddy and near every structure and let it sit for 30 seconds until I hit something. If I make it all the way up and back down like that without a single fish.....then....then I dunno what. I guess I am done with that water in that case.

Yeah, I am getting pretty frusterated by the whole experiance. If I didn't like being outdoors and in the water in general I think I would have thrown in the towel by now. I will be going out agian after work today, spend a couple of hours in the water, see what happens.

I just had another weekend of being stymied. I was on my way out of town for a big fishing trip far south on the James, but I had a blowout, had to switch to my little donut tire, and ended up just fishing local waters right around Springfield. I bank fished Lake Springfield for about an hour, then went up to Crieghton and wade fished downstream from Creighton for about an hour, then went to the top and wade fished upstream from Creighton all the way to where the Pearson Creek runs in. I used a little rooster tail, also a very small crankbait minnow, and also the ole crawfish on a hook. I didn't even get my normal fare of a couple of baby smallies and some sunfish, I got absolutely nothing. Total bust for about 5 hours of fishing. I am starting to be convinced that there are literally no fish....in the world. They are myths made up to serve as some kinda of Grecian afterlife pennace for me. Also, it occured to me that for all of the fanfare this crawfish on a hook method had, I've tried it about 5 times now and it has not gotten me a single fish yet. I had one good strong hit on a crawfish once, that pulled the crawfish off the hook and didn't get the fish, but that was the only bite I've gotten. I dunno what's up or what I'm doing wrong.

Those both seem like very viable options. I was alos considering the Upper Jack's starting at the Baptizing Hole (just down from blue Spring campground) and wade fishing down to Jam-up cave. This late in the summer it should be good wadeing and I think the fish would be more concentrated in the holes. Also there is the benefit of the best scenery in the whole darn state, BUT, I've never fished the upper Jack's fork and I don't really have a good sense of how good the fishing would be there.

I will be waking up nice and early Saturday morning and heading out to fish pretty much all day. I am limited to bank fishing and wade fishing. I would very much like to get on some bass and crappie, and if I get tired and want to sit and have a lunch or rest a while, being in an area with viable catfishing would be a nice bonus. So, if you had a free Saturday morning and could get to any water within about 2 hours of Springfield for a whole day of fishing, where would you go, what would you bring, and how would you fish it? I have heard Taneycomo suggested enough times that I am giving it a serious thought, but can anyone suggest a specific spot? I don't wanna blow my whole morning hunting an unfamiliar lake for a good spot ya know? Also I've never fished Trout before, but I'm willing to give it a try.

I don't remember where in the state I was, but a few years ago me and a friend pulled into a little RV campground spot to get some road snacks, and the guy running the place sold home-made flies. We got to talking to him about fishing and he pointed to a large mounted bass over the counter. He said that on the back end of the campground there was a large pond where you could paddle little boats and fish if you had a paid camping spot, and that the Bass came out of that pond. He extolled the virtures of the fishing pond and said that since they don't advertise it, it's not that heavily fished. He said that we were welcome to come back and if we just wanted to fish it would be $6 a day to just head back there and fish. We never went back and I don't remember the spot. BUT that got me thinking, there must be plenty of good stocked ponds in the area, maybe ponds that people don't want widely advertised but that a nice quite young fella wanting to introduce his GF to fishing might be able to get day access to for a small fee? Does anyone know of anything like that?

They taste pretty much identical to lobster. I know they are typically thought of as a cajun food, but I prefer to prepare them similar to how you would other shell fish, with lemon and butter. Also just about any recipe that calls for shrimp can be subbed in with Crawdad tails to pretty awesome effect.

Here are a few more pics to give some better size context. And I am not a small person.

I caught this fella at Creighton on Monday. He was way bigger than any fish I've caught this year. 9.5 inches from tail to claw tips. A "wingspan" of 11.5 inches with his claws wide to the sides. He is a Longpincered Crayfish. They are tied with on Texas species for the largest species in North America, and this is a particularly large specimen. He was delicious.