Phil Lilley

Generation patterns here on Lake Taneycomo have been fairly consistent this past week. Our water has been off every night and morning, running in the afternoon until just after dark. The "running" part has varied a bit. Most days it's been about three units, but it's been as little as one unit. Trout fishing this summer has resembled a roller coaster -- it's been up and it's been down. Right now we're in the down cycle. Our lake water has cleared up, and the rainbows have gotten wise. Some anglers are still doing well, catching their limits early in the morning. Most are fishing with PowerBait Gulp Eggs and boating down to the Monkey Island area. Early is the key. Before the sun gets high over head is your best chance to catch your limit of rainbows. Fishing up between Fall Creek and Short Creek has been fair on air-injected night crawlers, but these trout are averaging a little bigger than the ones down lake. These might be rainbows that are swimming out of the Trophy Area. Four-pound line is okay, but two-pound is better considering our very clear water. I suggest anchoring your boat over on the shallow side of the lake (off the bluff side.) The water from the mouth of Short Creek up to the boat ramp is very deep along the docks, up to nine-feet deep. You'll be out of the boat lane of traffic and still catch fish. Plus there's not as many snags on the bottom. After the water starts to move in the afternoon, drifting Gulp Eggs from Lilleys' down past Cooper Creek has been fair. Jig fishing has been slow. When using either, the trout seemed be to just picking at the offering, not taking it aggressively at all. You'll get bites and maybe a hook-up, but the trout are coming off the hook before being landed. That's been my experience when throwing jigs. This video shows exactly what I'm talking about. Drifting and throwing a 3/32nd white jig, I "hooked" two trout on successive casts, both hooked in the side of the fish towards the head. This tells me they're slashing at the jig with their head, not trying to eat it. This happened to me again a couple of evenings ago. One thing you can do to help hook these tentative fish is pinch the marabou tail on the jig and make it shorter. If you're fishing with bait, let them eat it a little longer before setting the hook. Also in the evenings, our guides are boating to the dam and fishing a tandem of flies under a float. Depending on how much water is running, they're fishing an egg fly and scud combo, #16 gray scud and peach egg, using 5x tippet under a float any where from six to 12 feet deep. You want to set your flies deeper than the water you're fishing. Add a split shot to get the flies down. Best drifting has been from the cable below the dam down past the Missouri Department of Conservation boat ramp, then from Lookout to Fall Creek. I would suggest throwing a dark-colored jig against the bluff bank or out in the channel close to the bottom. Use either an 1/8th -or 3/32nd-ounce jig, depending on the amount of water running. If it's less than two units, use the smaller jig; with more than two units use the 1/8th ounce. I'd try sculpin, black, olive, sculpin/ginger or brown colors. I'd still try a white jig ,but white definitely has slowed down the last few weeks up close to the dam. You do have a better chance catching a brown trout on white, but you'll catch more trout altogether if you use dark colors. I am still on a quest to catch that trophy brown on a white jig down here around the resort. I've been going out in the afternoons and evenings when the water is running, working either a 3/32nd- or 1/8th-ounce jig in the channel or close to the bluff bank from Trout Hollow down past Cooper Creek. Here's a video of me catching a big, heavy brown the other afternoon. I didn't get a good hook set at all on this trout. I knew it after the fight began and tried to keep pressure on the fish. Sure enough, when pulling the hook out of its mouth, the hook tip wasn't even in the fish's flesh, it was stuck in its teeth. Last evening, I got out and fished while they were running only about a half unit. Fished an 1/8th ounce white jig from Lookout to the Narrows and the trout actually bit a little better than my last couple of outings. I caught some nice rainbows (image at the beginning of the report) and a couple of medium sized browns. I boated back closer to the resort before calling it a day. Fished in front of the old Riverlake and Sun Valley Resorts with a sculpin 1/8th ounce jig. I let it go all the way to the bottom before working it back. Caught 5 nice trout including 2 browns. It was a better than average evening!

You mean Artist Proof? Or doing something else? When he gets back from vacation, David will get me all the details and we'll get this going.

You can fish below Hwy 65 bridge with no trout stamp and catch and release. There's good trout fishing down lake from the Landing to Rockaway Beach although I would not call our fishing lately good. Fair is better. You can rent a boat from Lilleys or Scotty's. Can't speak for Scotty's but we rent rods and reels for trout fishing.

I don't trust drags...

Mic system on my camera isn't the best. In editing the video, I turned up the volume as far as I could. I enhanced the brightness when I turned the camera because it darkened the fish against the white sky. Wasn't thinking about how it would look on the video at the time.

When buying the framed print, with flies mounted in the frame, you can pick what flies you want- you could even send the flies you want and David will place them in the frame. I think. He is in Montana right now. I'm trying to decide what to order to sell out of the shop which will save on shipping costs. If he sends them from his location, the shipping will be higher for one piece, of course.

Not sure if David has ever done a painting of a lake or bass... probably could. But you better be ready to shell out the bucks to commission a painting!

This is the painting. No customizations.

Those that know David's work will appreciate this new painting for Lake Taneycomo. He's done many painting of famous rivers all over the country. I wanted him to do a painting for us of Lake Taneycomo. Here it is. We will be selling signed/numbered prints soon, framed and unframed. Prices have not been set yet. Stay tuned! ~~>> Think Christmas Gifts <<~~

I use Vanish 2 pound which isn't as thin as mono. Other 2 pounds line Trilene - I have to be more careful.

Generation patterns have held true here on Lake Taneycomo the last week, although our daytime temperatures have not. We've had nice hot days and nice cool days, but I don't think anyone is complaining! Our water has been off most mornings and running hard in the afternoons and evenings. Some days a half unit is running in the mornings, then the flow is cranked up in the afternoons, but there's no rhyme of reason for the difference. We're taking whatever is given to us. Trout fishing has been getting better each week from the lackluster "catching" we experienced in June and early July. I believe the sole reason is the Missouri Department of Conservation is stocking rainbows here in the upper end of the lake again. In June, they were stocking the lower lake, and not many trout were finding their way up here , which made finding fish a trick. But it's all good now . . . as much as fishing can be. Our guides have been doing well mainly early in the mornings, taking their clients down lake to the Landing area and fishing Trout Magnets under a float. Steve Dickey says they're using pink and cotton candy colors seven- to eight-feet deep, still using two-pound line and catching good numbers of rainbows. They're also stopping and catching them close to Monkey Island all the way up to Cooper Creek. I'm still finding a lot of rainbows across the lake from the public fishing dock at Cooper Creek, especially when the water is running. These rainbows vary in size but are schooled up behind some downed trees against the bank, holding in slow water. I'm catching them by throwing 3/32nd-ounce jigs up in the eddied water and jigging back fairly quickly. The colors I'm using are white, brown and olive. I bet you could use a jig and float to catch these fish too. I fished this morning in the Short Creek area. I threw a 3/32nd-ounce jig and changed colors several times, but didn't get a bite, so I switched to a jig and float. That's what the fish wanted -- something hanging from a float. They didn't want to chase anything. In the video, you see I'm fishing about seven-feet deep and fishing the middle of the lake. The chop on the water would be great for 10 minutes, then it would go slick, but it didn't seem to matter. I caught fish under both conditions. I used a 1/50th-ounce brown jig with an orange head on two-pound line. On the third fish I caught, I noticed that the marabou had completely come off the jig. I wondered whether the marabou had come off before the rainbow bit the jig or after, so I didn't change out the jig but I threw it out. Crazy! I missed a strike!! Then I hooked a fish. . . on a bare hook! One of my guides told me once that he sometimes will start with a bare jig hook and fish it until he started not catching fish. Then he would start putting "things" on the hook like pieces of plastic worms or chenille (yarn). He uses bright-colored heads on his jig heads, too, brighter than my orange head. I wasn't sure I believed him, but now I do. When the water is running, I've done well using a white 1/8th-ounce jig from Fall Creek past our place (Lilleys' Landing), working the middle of the lake (not the bluff.) I'm either catching or I'm not. They're either biting good or not at all. One day last week, I made a drift and caught a dozen brown trout (video) but I haven't been able to duplicate that drift since. When the water isn't running, in the morning, fishing Powerbait anywhere between here and Fall Creek has been good. Chartreuse or orange paste has been the best followed by Gulp Eggs in white and orange. The bigger trout, including brown trout, are coming on night crawlers, either drifting or fishing them when the water is off. Most of our guests are using four-pound line and doing just fine. In the trophy area, our trout are a little more picky so we're using two-pound line to catch their fish. Early in the mornings, flies or jigs under an indicator is best. Good flies include #16 Zebra Midge, black, olive, rusty or P&P, #14 dead orange or gray scuds and #16 black or red soft hackles if there's a chop on the water. Trout are also taking an olive 1/16th-ounce jig thrown straight with no float on two-pound line. If you're working the area between Lookout and the Narrows, you'll find there are stretches of water where you won't see a lot of trout and others that are loaded. Do I have to say it -- fish the areas where there's lot of trout!

Just so everyone knows... I don't catch fish every time out. I threw a jig today from 3 till 7 and didn't catch one brown. Only caught may be 6 rainbows. Fished hard too. Also - I fly fished - threw a dry (stimulator) from Lookout Island to the Narrows against the bluff bank this evening and didn't have one rise. Water could have been running just a little harder - for both jig fishing and fishing the dry.

I'm not sure what our browns are eating but it must be filling... Every brown I've caught this summer is busting a gut. Growth rates must be off the chart. I made one drift yesterday, working a white jig about as slow as I could stand and caught a dozen browns. Two were this year's stock but the rest were 15-inches-plus. I went in to download the videos- my camera's battery was low. Went back out 45 minutes later, made the same drift and didn't get a bite. Figure that! I don't catch as many fish on a white jig but I can't lay it down. Better chance to catch that brown of a lifetime.

I fished it a couple of times. Did well on midge clusters and tiny midges like griffith's gnat. Also #20 and #22 trout crack (scud) worked real well. I heard throwing big stuff worked because the fish there are used to seeing tiny flies. I stripped some big streamers in the rapids and caught the best trout of the trip- up and down the river. I also threw jigs below the fly water and caught some great fish. Lot less ppl down out of the fly water too.

NEVERMIND! They changed their minds... The forum will be online tomorrow. No migration needed.

Forum will be offline tomorrow, Friday, July 18th. My provider is moving data from one server to another. Sorry for the inconvenience! Should be back up first thing Saturday morning.

I was going to say before I read the posts about GW - I believe being cold or hot has to do with body fat! Let's enjoy this awesome weather and leave GW and politics out of it.

This weather is pretty sweet, isn't it?! We keep thinking that any day now it's going to turn into a "normal" summer and become blazing hot, but it hasn't yet! One real nice thing about this cooler, drier weather is that there's no fog on Lake Taneycomo early and late in the day. Some like the fog, but I like to fish early and late and don't like driving through a wet, cold fog. That's just me! Generation hasn't changed much over the last couple of weeks. If anything, the volume of water run in the afternoons changes. On hotter days there is more generation, and cooler days less, but always some into the evenings. Most of the time, the water is off by the 10 p.m. The water temperature is still hovering around 47 degrees, but the lake itself warms up as you get farther down lake, into the 70s below Rockaway Beach. Trout fishing this week has improved much in our area, and I think it's because the Missouri Department of Conservation and the Shepherd of the Hills Hatchery folk have stocked rainbows a little closer to home. We saw quite a few small rainbows caught off the dock this morning and others brought in from boaters to be cleaned and processed. Should be some fish fryers going the next few evenings here at the resort! The best bite of the day has been early in the morning before the sun comes up. When the sun hits the water, fish go deeper and are less likely to bite. That's why most of our guides insist starting their day at 5:30 a.m. It's not that you can't catch fish in the middle of a sunny day, it's just that it will be much slower than mornings and evenings. My two-pound line rule still applies. If you want to get more bites, use two-pound line, or 7x if you're fly fishing. Our water is still very clear, and with the water running every day, the fresh water coming in the lake keeps it clear. The only time four-pound line is okay to use is when generation starts in the afternoons and you're drifting in current. Fish have less reaction time to strike your bait, less time to notice the line. I took Lincoln Hunt out a couple of mornings last week jig fishing. Linc is a long time friend of Lilleys' Landing since he started coming as a youth with his family from Dallas. Now he's a teacher in the Dallas area and spends several weeks in Branson during his summer break hanging out at the resort, sometimes working for us while also playing golf and fishing. He's a fly fishermen at heart, but I forced a spinning rod in his hands and told him to cast a jig for a while. We started at Short Creek and worked our way to Fall Creek, staying on the shallow side of the lake and throwing to the middle. Using two-pound line and 1/16th ounce olive jigs, we caught a total of 34 rainbows in a couple of hours. It was the best jig fishing trip Linc had ever experienced, he said. Fishing guide Bill Babler took some clients down to the Branson Landing area a few mornings ago, and they caught 38 rainbows on a pink/white Trout Magnet under a float six-feet deep. He also uses two-pound Vanish line when fishing with Trout Magnets. There does seem to be an abundance of rainbows from Rockaway Beach through the Landing up to Monkey Island. It was pointed out to me that Scotty's Trout Dock has reported trout fishing to be "excellent" in that part of the lake (K.C. Star newspaper). Gulp Powerbait Eggs in white, orange and pink have been catching fish pretty well in these areas, either plain or a hook and fished on the bottom or put on a jig hook and fished under a float four- to six-feet deep. Air-injected night crawlers have been doing really well off our dock the last couple of days, so I'm sure they'll work up and down from the dock ,also. Tom Burckhardt of St Charles, MO, celebrated his 60th birthday this week at the resort with family -- and some great fishing. He texted me a picture of a rainbow he caught this morning on "his first cast." He was throwing a sculpin 1/16th -ounce jig against the bluff bank across from the resort. Then he called me as I was typing this report and asked if I wanted to see a big brown he had just caught. Sure! He brought it in... What a beautiful brown! He caught it in the Trout Hollow area on a 1/32nd-ounce sculpin jig under a float 10-feet deep. I told Tom I wasn't surprised at all by his catch, but I was surprised at how he caught it. The water was running at barely a half unit, so there was current. He took his trout back up to the spot where he had caught it and released it. He's back out searching for more big trout, so we might get another story and fish pic inserted in this report. A lot of the rainbows being caught above Short Creek are full of scuds (freshwater shrimp). That's an excellent indicator of our lake's health. Scuds are the best food a fish can have with high protein content. When we have a lot of scuds, we soon have lots of big fish! So drifting a fly that looks like a scud is a good thing to do! Try a #10 gray or orange scud tied on either a drift rig of just at the end of your line with a split shot to push the fly down to the bottom. Drift it down the middle of the lake when the water is running. Of course, you can use this above and below the mouth of Fall Creek.

Carry on.

http://www.adn.com/article/20140707/no-world-record-482-pound-halibut-caught-southeast-alaska-jaw-dropper

Nice write up... added it to the main site. http://www.ozarkanglers.com/blog/2014/07/12/big-fly-rod-popper-build-step-step/ Thanks Marty.

Little plug from the KC Star CATCH OF THE WEEK honors! http://www.kansascity.com/sports/outdoors/article706658.html#/tabPane=tabs-7c97d09a-1

Glad you're here!