Phil Lilley

That's some good fishing! There must be a bunch of rainbows at the Landing. Thanks for sharing!!

Yea- he's scratching his head about now...

I don't understand this post...

Fishing has improved. Less pressure and more trout stocked helps. I just posted a report. Hope it helps. They're supposed to run 25 mw all day tomorrow.

Weather change!! This is a good fishing thing. Cooler temperatures here on Lake Taneycomo mean cool breezes (and chop on the water!), a little rain, clouds and less generation in the afternoon, all good for fishing and fishermen. But what are our trout biting on? I won't lie, catching trout has been a little tough this last week. Our water is still cold and very clear. I believe the lake right now is full of trout, at least this upper part of Taneycomo. Shepherd of the Hills Hatchery has been stocking rainbows both last week and this week in preparation for the big holiday weekend. Weather and plenty of trout -- everything's coming together for a nice trout fishing weekend. There's been no generation at night into the morning every day for the last month it seems. Then generation starts most days about 1 p.m. but some days it starts mid morning and builds to 4 units by 3 p.m.. But with mild temperatures in the forecast, we may see that change to less generation in the afternoons. We will see. Yesterday, I found clouds and a nice south breeze as I boated up to Fall Creek mid morning. I tied on a olive micro jig using 7x fluorocarbon tippet with a #16 black Zebra Midge as a dropper 18 inches below the jig. I was fishing in about 5 feet of water so I set the small float 4 feet from the first fly. It wasn't fast action but I was getting a bite every 4 to 5 minutes. My breeze would come and go and my bites followed. When there was a chop, they bit. When there wasn't, not so much. I caught 8 rainbows, 2 on the jig and 6 on the Zebra. I missed a dozen strikes and hooked another dozen that didn't get in the boat. That's been a common tale lately -- lots of short bites and long ranged releases. Our trout are tentative when feeding, at least on what we're offering. I did not try 6x tippet so I'm not sure if it would make a big difference but it goes without saying, smaller tippet equals more bites. This shows the chop that was on the surface yesterday morning. Perfect! I got up below the dam Thursday morning for a short time. I only fished one place -- just above outlet #2. I offered a #18 red Zebra Midge under a very small float and fished it 12 to 24 inches deep. I had several very soft takes with only one hookup -- a small rainbow. I walked up to outlet #1 just looking at fish. What I saw was impressive -- quite a few 20-inch class rainbows cruising around. With the slick conditions, no wind and sunny skies, it may be tough to fool these big fish but I'd throw a sculpin at them if I had another chance. That or may be a big, ugly dry fly -- something they haven't seen much. The trophy area had been fishing fairly well and should be good this weekend because of the wind and clouds in the forecast. In the mornings, I'd throw what I threw yesterday -- a jig with a midge dropper. When the water starts, I'd fish a float, setting it deep with enough split shots to get your fly to the bottom using a #12 grey scud of a white San Juan worm. Guide, Jeremy Hunt had his clients fishing with what he calls a Gut Worm which is a big white San Juan. Even with no generation, rainbows were eating this fly. Jeremy would watch the big white fly and when it disappeared he'd tell the client to set the hook. It worked! Below Fall Creek, inflating night crawlers with air is catching some really nice rainbows from Fall Creek down to Lilleys' Landing. I'd stay off the bluff banks and fish the middle to shallow side of the lake. I'd also try that jig and float or a Trout Magnet and float. Fish them deep if it's sunny but only 4-5 feet deep if cloudy, early and late in the day. Photos courtesy of Capt Steve Dickey, fishing guide.

Speed of current and distance traveled - 15 minutes at least, may be as much as 25 minutes. Very hard to say. I think everyone, anyone who reads this would do the same . . . As far as CPR - there's classes online. I just took one for my coast guard license renewal.

That would be tough, Marty, for both of you to experience something like that. Life is fragile. Make good choices.

O-tay!

done

I have put in a request that the tree be removed. It's nothing more than a "sweeper" that's waiting to swallow another boater.

Wasn't sure I wanted to be the first to post this... since I was directly involved. But I'll comment. They were trying to free fly line in the tree just upstream from the first island below the dam. Corp was releasing 210 mw or 4 full units are the time. They made several attempts to free the line, only to release more line into the tree. They admitted after the fact that they should have cut the line. On the last try, they pulled in to the tree, beside the tree while 2 of the men tried to pull the line out. That's when water rushed over the side of the boat, flipping it, rolling it under the tree. There was one angler fishing at outlet #2. He saw everything. As soon as the boat rolled, he ran up and used the EM phone to call the Corp powerhouse and told them to shut the water down. They did. He also called 911. Gary went into the water and went downstream. The other two men were trapped under the boat, one was pinned briefly. They both managed to get out from under neath the boat and up onto the boat which was above water, up-side-down. That was a miracle in itself seeing both were in their 70's and both with health issues. They had to force their way underwater to get out from under the boat. One man said he had to go under the tree, under water again, to get where he could get up on the boat. One man, who had been in the water, pulled his cell phone out and to his surprise, got a signal. He called my daughter, Megan. We were in our house- I listened to her repeat what he was saying. I got, "We're in the water" and 'we're just below the dam". I rushed to the dock, informed one of our guides who was dropping off some vets, grabbed some rope and a dock hand and headed up in my boat. The guide beat me- his boat was faster. He was holding on to Gary who he found in the water face down and unresponsive. We were just in front of the MDC boat ramp. It took all three of us to get him in my boat. He was very heavy and his clothes were slipping off. Once on the deck, I started CPR. They drove my boat to the ramp where one EMT was waiting. He took over CPR. More emergency personnel arrived. Me and an officer jumped in a boat someone brought up from the resort and headed up to retrieve the others stranded. We found them on top of the jon boat. The water had dropped considerably and there was little current. They were unhurt but cold. EMT's worked on Gary for may be 30+ minutes. With no response, they stopped, but when they did, they got a heart beat and blood pressure. So they took him to Cox where he died shortly after 10 pm. Gary was a Franciscan priest from the St Louis area. I visited with him earlier that day. He was a very nice guy and everyone from St Louis loved him. He attended at the Healing Water meetings there as support.

It was a "Barry Good" event... A little hot late in the contest but everyone seemed to have a good time. I'll post some pics and results later today. Getting ready for our Healing Water event today.

I revised the article a bit. Clients caught rainbows between 12 and 19 inches with 2 rainbows measuring 22 inches (the were taped). The group had a contest for the longest rainbow for the trip. Had a few others 20-21 inches so good rainbows were caught for that size of creek. I didn't know grayling grow so slow... Peter said the 16 inch grayling could have been 8 to 10 years old. They can live up to 18 years. I didn't fish on the float trip. Peter and I fished a couple of half days before the guide days and caught some grayling and rainbows.

My recent trip to Alaska was a working trip. My friends scratch their heads and ask, "How can a trip to Alaska be working, when it comes to fishing?" Well, when you help guide a group of eight clients on a four-day, three-night float trip down a remote river, that's work -- albeit the most fulfilling kind for me! I was invited to the Denali foothills by a good friend, Peter Mathiesen. Peter and I met one day in 1984 in front of my office here at the resort. He drove up, got out of his Toyota Four-Runner and introduced himself as a writer, and representative of a magazine called "Hunting and Fishing Journal." He wanted to know if I wanted to buy advertising. My reaction was, "I have no money!" Peter and I talked fishing . . . yes, we hit it off. And, yes, Peter could talk -- and still can. He is one of the most knowledgeable people I know in the field of hunting and fishing gear. And his resume proves that out. He has worked as Field and Stream and Outdoor Life's editorial staff, F & S's gear editor, radio producer and still writes actively for many publications. And he just finished his first book, "Tales of the Alaskan State Trooper," due out next February. Five years ago Peter and his wife, Sandy, picked up from St. Louis and moved to Talkeetna, Alaska. They've never looked back. He still writes while Sandy teaches as a professor at the business school at University of Alaska in Anchorage. Peter has also teamed up with a local bed and breakfast owner and operator, Tom Redmon, to take visitors fishing on the many rivers and creeks in the Talkeetna area. Tom and Renae Redmon own Talkeetna/Denali View Bed & Breakfast outside of Talkeetna. As a bush pilot, Tom flies people in his wheel plane to see the mountains and glaciers in the area. He also drops anglers with professional guides like Peter near small rivers and creeks to fish. When Tom booked the group of men on a four-day, three-night float trip which admittedly was a big venture for them. They had not had a group this large before, especially taking them on a big float trip like this. They needed help, and Peter called me. Preparation for this float trip started weeks before. Tom ordered and received hundreds of dollars worth of camping equipment including big dry bags, sleeping bags, air sleeping mats, filtered water bottles, waders and fly rods and reels to add to his already large inventory of outdoor equipment. Days before, he planned all the meals, started packing dry goods, cooking utensils, cook ware and cook stoves. Propane, tents, chain saw (which came in handy), camping shovel, two stand-alone canopy covers and camp tables were also packed. And all that gear all had to fit into four rafts and a Soar (inflatable canoe) for the trip down the Peters. I don't think Tom knows how to pack light when it comes to food. And good food it was! We ate well -- rib eyes, salmon, pork steaks, eggs, bacon and hash browns every morning. And we needed it as hard as we worked getting down the river!! Peter's Creek is in a gold-rich, famous area, best known for its gold rush back in the late 1800's into the early 1900's. The Petersville Road, which we drove out on to get to the river, was started in 1917 to give miners access to the mines in Dutch Hills, the foothills of Denali. We started Tuesday morning by shuttling a vehicle, with trailer, to our takeout. It was a private access, "off the map." Peter's all-terrain Yamaha made the rough,two-tire lane road look easy, although I don't know how it climbed out of some of the holes we drove through on the two-mile off-road trip. Peter and I hiked back out, past a couple of side paths to cabins and a small air strip hidden back in the woods. Peter said he found this place on Google Earth. We made the trip back up to the headwaters and the public access there. It was close to a man's gold mine claim -- and he came down to see us off. Peter said back when they started using the access, the old miner would come down and give them the "evil eye." But once he found out Peter wasn't interested in his gold, or gold prospecting, he warmed up to his visits, even showing Peter his operation. I wish we would have had time to engage him on this trip for an interesting tour. The rafts were already inflated as we packed them full of equipment and provisions. Some pushed off and headed out. My raft and two clients stayed and fished the area at the access. Dan and Rod both hooked and landed their first grayling. Then Dan landed a small rainbow. I had tied on an Elk Hair Caddis for Dan, and the trout were taking it in the fast chute we were fishing. After wearing those fish out, we started our float down the Peter's. Tom set camp up about four miles downstream on a gravel bar. We worked our way through small water, dodging sweepers and rocks, stopping and fishing places where fish would be holding up. One fly the rainbows seemed to like was a Dolly Lama, a streamer tied with rabbit strips with a cone head. Peter had shown me how to work the fly by simply casting it close to a cut bank or brush then pulling it out while shaking the rod tip. It really worked well, especially fished out of the boat by my clients as we maneuvered around structures. I hadn't camped out in years. The smell of the campfire smoke brought back good memories of our family camping in Colorado as a kid. So did the frigid air as the sun dropped behind the mountains, dipping down into the 40's. Nothing like my family was experiencing at the time in the lower 48 . . . humid and 95! These were big chunks of coal that dotted the shore of the river. Tom told me some of their past clients had not believed it was real coal. He would light the rock to prove it, and most times it would burn all night long. After a fairly good night sleep and a great breakfast, we set out for day number two. I guided Tyler and Macrum. Tyler is from the Chicago area and is in sales. Macrum is a retired engineer and lives near Washington D.C.. It was still mostly cloudy with a little rain. The fish were not as agreeable about taking flies as the day before. This section of Peter's isn't floated by many people. In fact, I think we were the only ones who have floated it this summer. We saw no signs of humans. Matt, one of the young men who guided with Peter and myself, had floated the whole 26 miles just two weeks prior exclusively to cut out any blockages on the river so we wouldn't have to portage our boats. But on the second and third day, Matt cleared seven new blockages. That's why we carried a chain saw -- with extra gas, oil and chains! The group caught rainbows and grayling, measuring between 12 and 19 inches, fairly regularly, on a variety of flies and styles of presentation. Dry flies were doing pretty well, using Stimulators and Elk Hair Caddis. The Dolly Lamas caught mostly rainbows in the runs and breaks behind rocks and logs. Behind what salmon spawning beds we saw, we were ran beads and egg flies. The contest for the biggest rainbow was a tie -- there were 2 rainbows that measured 22 inches. Tom and James set up shore lunches for us each day, rowing ahead of us and picking a nice gravel bar to pull up on. I know we guides were always ready for lunch after rowing all morning. At the end of another day, a new campsite was welcomed. Rowing three men and gear through the obstacles on the small river was a challenge for me. I hadn't rowed in years, although it all came back quickly. The physical part I enjoyed (thanks to years of continued gym workouts.) The campfire, dinner and soft air mattress in my tent completed a restful ending of a wonderful day. After we floated by the biggest log jam we encountered, the river was jam-free. The river's characteristics changed a bit, too, opening up to be a wider river with more boulders to dodge. Another emerging creek added more water which was nice, too. But navigating the "boulder fields" was challenging, to say the least. Both apprehension and anticipation were expressed in the group concerning the possibility of bear sightings -- or confrontations! But to my surprise, we didn't see any animals on the river. Only occasional prints appeared in the sand -- which were often times very fresh -- but no sightings. These wolf prints were as big as my hand -- and very fresh! The only salmon we saw in Peter's Creek was an occasional pink salmon or king salmon. Most of the kings had already spawned and died. The last day of floating was a little tough on catching. I guided Chris and Zach, a father and son from San Diego. They hooked both grayling and rainbows on eggs and dries but not in good numbers. I did work on their fly casting technique and hope that the improvement I saw will encourage them to pursue more fly fishing together in the future. We finished the trip at the takeout, thankful that the all-terrain vehicle Peter and I had stashed in the woods was still there. We started tearing down the rafts and hauled them up the two-mile trail to the road. All in all, our anglers were happy with the float trip. The weather was typical Alaskna weather with a mix of cloudiness, little wind, light rain at times and moderate temperatures in the 50's and 60's. The comraderie was unmatched. Friendships were forged and stories written that will be told over and over -- about the fish that got away, about who caught the biggest rainbow, the bear and wolf prints in the sand and the refreshing quiet of the remote stream away from the hustle and bustle of our "real" lives back in the lower 48. It was a blessed trip. From right to left: Dan, Zach, James, Macrum, Tyler, Peter, Rod, Joe, Chris and Tom. Tom Redmon not in attendance. ~~~~~ Additional Links: Hear Peter read one chapter out of his upcoming book, Tales of the Alaskan State Trooper.

Confluence of the Talkeetna and Susitna Rivers in Talkeetna, Alaska. It's owned by the city of Talkeetna.

You think you're fees are high... And they're doubling next season.

I do love this place... and the people here.

I'd call for reservations. Anytime- but PM or email me first.

The original post didn't say this is good for the months of November, December, January and February. Need to PM or email me before you call the office for reservations!

I carry a couple of types of Sculpin at my shop. Leonard ties some and I have some tied by Brad Wright. Brad's are pricey... both work pretty well.

On my way to Amchorage. Guiding out of Talkeetna for 2 weeks. Will post reports.

Mdc stocked at Cooper on Monday!

No time for a show... but thanks. Yes- white still is the color, for browns at least.