Phil Lilley

54 boats in today's tournament. This was RAW's 25th annual contest with many original teams still fishing. John and Ray Rogers started their "Roger's Adventure Weekends" outing with the idea to have friends go fishing or hunting several weekends each year. This trout tournament is the only surviving event. Better weighs, better looking rainbows today. Lots of brown trout caught and released, it was reported. No legal browns. Results Board:

by John Neporadny, Jr. Those cold, nasty days in February can produce some of the heaviest stringers of the year while jerking a suspended stick bait on Lake of the Ozarks. "All the days I can remember in February where we've caught a lot of fish were always the nastiest days where you would almost freeze to death," says Marty McGuire, a Camdenton, Mo., angler who has finished in the money in B.A.S.S. invitationals held on his home lake and the owner of Marty's Marine in Osage Beach, Mo. While some fish can be caught on McGuire's Rattlin' Rogue technique on sunny days, his pattern produces its best numbers of fish and biggest bass in cold, windy and snowy weather. Water temperature also plays a key role in this pattern. The water temperature varies from 39 to 45 degrees in February. "The fish seem to be really biting on this technique when the water temperature hits about 42 degrees," McGuire says. Water clarity is also important, so McGuire concentrates on the clear water areas around the dam and in the Gravois arm during this time of year. When the water starts to warm in March, the technique then works anywhere from the dam to the 35- or 40-mile mark of the Osage arm. A low lake level, which usually occurs in February, helps pull the fish out of any shallow cover and position them on the deeper structure, making bass easier to pinpoint. Even though the fish are near deep water, McGuire believes 90 percent of the time the bass will be suspended less than 10 feet deep over the structure. The most productive structures for this pattern are bluff ends, pockets in bluff lines and points. McGuire has also taken bass suspended over brush piles in 10 to 12 feet of water or hiding in the shade under docks along the main channel. "You have to pretty well stick to the main channel," he advises. While his boat is sitting over 60 to 70 feet of water, McGuire throws his Rogue to bass that are within 5 to 8 feet of the surface. "Most of the time you can find them in schools where they are out there trying to get a bite of shad every once in a while," says McGuire. He knows he has found a promising spot when he sees dying baitfish fluttering to the surface. The suspending Rogue imitates the action of a dying shad. McGuire likes to throw what he calls a "Christmas tree Rogue" (black back, yellow and green sides and chartreuse belly) or a ghost or shad-color model. He prefers using the medium diver (4 1/2 inch) Rogue over the magnum model (5 1/2 inch). "You can catch bigger fish on the magnum, but you can catch a lot of 4- and 5-pound fish on that medium-size Rogue," McGuire says. "Most of the time when you catch 4- or 5-pound fish you're doing okay." McGuire works his Rogue on a fairly stiff 6 1/2-foot spinning rod and a spinning reel filled with 8-pound test line. He feels he can throw his lure farther into the wind with the spinning tackle. "The farther you can throw at the start, the better chance you have of finding the fish." Long casts allow him to position his boat farther from the shoreline, which becomes necessary since the fish will be anywhere from the bank out to 100 yards off the shore. An extremely slow retrieve works best since the water is cold and the fish aren't in a chasing mood. "Some guys say the retrieve is slow enough to where you can stop and drink a soda," McGuire says. "The slower you fish it, the better chance a bass has to eat it." McGuire never jerks the lure; he just slowly pulls it down to the strike zone and then lets it sit for awhile before pulling again. "Ninety-nine percent of the time the fish will hit the bait when it is sitting still," he says. Feeling resistance on your line when you pull the lure signals a strike. Fishing on a cold, miserable day in February might be well worth the trouble if you can pull that Rogue through a school of heavyweight Lake of the Ozarks bass. For information on lodging and other facilities at the Lake of the Ozarks or to receive a free 162-page vacation guide, call the Lake of the Ozarks Convention & Visitors Bureau at 1-800-FUN-LAKE or visit the Lake of the Ozarks Convention and Visitors Bureau web site at funlake.com.

I had to delete it. IPB did something in the last version that made the forum do stupid stuff - I was told to delete the app software. I did and it was fine. THEN I saw where IPB has their own app now! Ah... now I see! They want us to buy their app instead of Tapatalk! I got over 7 years in with IPB and can't change now for an app. Unless something changes in the future... Just checked - IPB app is FREE.

He's in Vegas... gambling all his tips away. Well, he and Becky are taking a well deserved break from the B&B and staying at some B&B's out there, plus going on a few sight seeing trips to see their canyons out there.

Agree.

by John Berry One of the major events on the fly fishing calendar is opening day. This takes place at the Catch and Release section below Bull Shoals Dam. This is arguably the area of river that holds more big fish than any other and it is the main spawning water for brown trout on the White River. Every year the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission closes it down from November I, through January 31, the next year, to protect the spawning browns. During the spawn the brown trout do not eat. This means that, on opening day, these large spawned out hungry browns get fished over for the first time in three months. Due to the quality of the fishing, it can get a bit crowded on opening day. A lot depends on the water level. If we have low wadable water, just about every angler in the area shows up. In addition, serious anglers from outside the area show up. The best spots always seem to be taken and you will probably fish a bit closer to other anglers than you would like. One time I scheduled my opening day fishing trip to begin at day break. I got there really early and as I was donning my waders in the parking lot I noticed several anglers walking up from the river. I struck up a conversation with them and learned that they had been there since midnight and had done very well. This taught me that if you are going to be the first one there you better start pretty early. On high water days, the crowding can be just as bad. It seems like every boat on the river is jockeying for position. This is where the White River Jon boat comes into its own. A drift boat is a one way trip and unless someone wants to row upstream and come back through the section you will only get one shot at it. A White River Jon can make drifts through it all day long. Sometimes it is an anything that floats kind of day. This is where anglers show up in any form of water craft. The most common is a bass boat. They are great casting platforms but are not perfectly suited to our river. The problem is that, if you are running back up to the dam to drift through the Catch and Release Section, in a boat with a two hundred horse power engine, you will have the tendency to put the hammer down and make the run at fifty miles an hour, like you do when fishing in a bass tournament on a lake. In doing so, you kick up a big wake that can be a serious nuisance to your fellow anglers or create a dangerous situation. By going that fast you can also hit an obstacle. Several years ago the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission added a lot of fish habitat. This is either large rocks or large logs. With the constantly changing water levels, these navigation hazards are clearly visible or just beneath the surface. It is much like navigating through a minefield. Last year my wife, Lori, and I went to opening day. We didn’t arrive until late in the morning. I talked to some of my fellow guides to see how they had done. They had done well fishing on the Baxter County side and had landed several nice browns but nothing huge. I launched and decided to fish the opposite side of the river, as it had not received as much pressure. Lori was fishing with a Y2K under an indicator. I was running the boat and was too busy doing that, to fish myself. As luck would have it, we were fishing close to the bank, when she hit a big trout. It took a few minutes to land it. It turned out to be a twenty four inch male brown. She caught it on the first drift. Lori caught several more nice trout that day but nothing equaled the first. If you have never tried it, you need to give opening day a try. I will be there!

Low rainfall affects so many aspects of our lives from farming to fishing. Here on Taneycomo, as a tailwater, water moves and flows less during these times, which in return affects our food base and trout growth. During low-flow periods, freshwater shrimp don't do as well, and, thus, our trout don't grow as fast as they would if the water were running. We're hope we are on the tail end of a long drought and will see lake-filling rains this spring. Winter time is usually the best time to fish for Taneycomo trout, but this winter has been the exception. We've had nice, calm days, with no wind and high sun -- not the best conditions for catching any fish. We are also not seeing the nice, medium-sized rainbows we saw last winter. Instead our rainbows have been on the small side. Even in the lower trophy area, the average size of rainbows has been quite a bit smaller even as closer to the dam we've seen much bigger trout. Fly fishing below the dam with the water off has yielded some of the best fishing on the lake recently. If there's a chop on the water, strip woolies, cracklebacks and soft hackles. Also strip a sculpin, crawling it on the bottom. If there's trout midging or feeding on midges in the film or on the surface, use a dry as in indicator (adams, renegade) with a zebra midge (rusty, p&p) as a dropper 6 to 18 inches deep. Around the outlets and at the rebar chute, drift a sow bug, scud, egg fly or a san juan worm. Down further from the dam (from the conservation department boat ramp to Fall Creek), zebra midge under an indicator fished a little deeper has been working very well, hitting pockets of rainbows and a few browns in this stretch. Also try a miracle fly under an indicator, as well as a micro jig (olive, black, tan). Some of the guys are using 7x when the sun is out, but 6x tippet should catch trout if you don't want to go that light. Below Fall Creek, use a white PowerBait Gulp egg above a night crawler. This was a good technique yesterday when no water was running and should continue to be good without generation. Air-injected night crawlers are always good. Jig and float using either a micro jig or marabou jig. Marabou colors are brown/orange head, sculpin/orange head, sculpin/ginger, black or pink. If water is running, throw an 1/8th-ounce jig and work it off the bottom. White is working well in the trophy area as well as brown/orange, sculpin or black and below Fall Creek use sculpin/ginger, brown, black and pink. Again, if water is running, throw a stick bait, medium size in silver, gold or rainbow style against bluff banks and around docks. The following report was submitted by Darin Schlidknecht: I got out for just a couple of hours while the water was off. There were just a couple of other anglers out there which was nice to have some room. Most of them were either fishing the outlets or rebar. I fished about half way between outlets one and two, it was just me and one other guy that whole stretch. I like standing on top of the rock piles so I can see the fish around me and sight cast at them. Usually this works great but right now the water is a little dirty so its not as fun. I used two different flies the whole time. The first was a yellow Miracle Fly on 6x tippet under a Palsa. The fly needs to be as close or on the bottom of the lake to be effective. Most of the time the strikes are very light and dont even pull under the Palsa. The fish suck it in a spit it out really fast so you have to be on your toes! The second was a #16 Rusty or Harvester midge on 6x tippet under a Palsa. This was the best fly for that day. Most of the fish I caught and saw were small. The other guy that was fishing in the same area I was had come into Lilleys earlier that day and I set him up with the midges and that is what he was using. He managed to catch a 21 inch fat female rainbow along with many other small ones. ~~~~ Here are a couple of videos I shot this week while the water was running:

I'll save my salmon belly...

Crappie, white bass, WALLEYE, suckers, catfish. Heck Duane might even bring salmon from Alaska!

You know... I get interested any time I hear about crappie. I hear from friends who are catching them and I even know the spot and how to catch them. But do I go? Nope. Too busy. And if I fish, I need to fish here on Taney so I have some sort of idea what the trout are doing for our guests. So... I love to see and hear you guys are catching them. Your honey holes are safe from this crappie fisherman! Till March and April that is...

http://www.ozarkanglers.com/beaver-tailwater/ I have a Beaver Tailwater section on OA but after sfiser's comment I'm not if my info is up-to-date.

What do you think about having a big fish fry sometime later this spring? Not sure where or when but it'd be tons of fun! Preliminary thoughts... Mid day on a weekend or towards evening on Sunday? Stay away from prime fishing times (mornings) and tournament days (Saturdays). Not going to pick a time that EVERYONE can make I know. Have to be after the crappie run so we'll have plenty of fillets! A central location, preferably close to a boat ramp. Any ideas?

Level tells you how much water is running on the phone call. Levels and megawatts on the website charts.

We were flattered... Excited they're coming in to our airport this spring.

What kind of area did you find them in? Flats, bluffs, main lake, cove? Not asking spots, just general.

2 or even 3 units. It looked like 3 at the dam face. They can run all 4 units but only run them at, say, 25%. If you want to know HOW much water, need to note the water level.

You can hear it... it was howling today at the dam. Straight up lake. White 1/8th oz jig, worked it behind the boat downstream. Missed 90% of the bites. Did float a miracle fly under a float and only caught one small one. Only had an hour or I'd try other stuff.

They're hard up for news/calendar events...

They had just increased to 75 mw, about 1.5 units. Perfect for jig fishing.

Where did you fish? Or would you rather not say.

That's Jackson. He was my dad's dog from my daughter's female chocolate lab. After dad passed, I inherited him. He's 18 months and loves to get out in the boat. He's NOT like his mom (Darby) who has almost pushed me in the lake several times trying to get at the fish I catch. Jackson likes to lick them once or just check them out and then loses interest. He likes staring at blue herons till they fly.

Yes- yesterday from 4 till 5ish. One drift from cable not quite to the boat ramp. Yes running same pattern today. I love it! But I have appointments all day and probably wont get out. I used a white 1/8th oz jig on camera. I caught 3 rainbows and one brown before I turned the camera on. After I turned it off and was going to start up and go in, I had a brown/orange jig on another rod and threw it 3 times - caught 3 rainbows. They were just all over it. No shad in the water- saw no evidence of shad. They always like white in the winter (and spring and summer). Just like the seasons (winter, spring....), I like it when they change up generation patterns. It's fun to get out and fish it when they run water after not running much over the weeks.

Agreed.

Nice to see you, Bill!! We need to get together.

Has this topic run its course?