Phil Lilley

Thanks guys. I might just get him going in a good direction with a camera body and let him take care of a lens. I know there's a wide range of cameras, lens and $$$ to spend. I'm sure we're looking for middle ground.

At Rockview Lodge, they had tons of fruit bearing trees including cashew trees. The fruit produced a nice juice plus the nuts. Now we know why cashews are so expensive! <object width="640" height="505"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGk20tfRvrA?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6"></param><param'>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGk20tfRvrA?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGk20tfRvrA?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="640" height="505"></embed></object> This is an interview with our native Guyanese guide, Milner, talking about the Harpy Eagle. <object width="640" height="505"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ol_3lKO6owE?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6"></param><param'>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ol_3lKO6owE?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ol_3lKO6owE?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="640" height="505"></embed></object> Other videos of the 5-month old bird we watched for a couple of days. <object width="853" height="505"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTLMo2ymDuo?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6"></param><param'>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTLMo2ymDuo?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTLMo2ymDuo?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="853" height="505"></embed></object> <object width="640" height="505"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsmYnVt-m6Y?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6"></param><param'>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsmYnVt-m6Y?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsmYnVt-m6Y?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="640" height="505"></embed></object> <object width="853" height="505"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nv7ZiZ5xeK0?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6"></param><param'>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nv7ZiZ5xeK0?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nv7ZiZ5xeK0?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x2b405b&color2=0x6b8ab6" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="853" height="505"></embed></object>

Here are a couple of links to about 300 images from our Guyana trip. I think everyone can access the facebook pages... if not, let me know. http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=342974&id=503474464&l=e69f2cc687 http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=342995&id=503474464&l=cf658c2cb7

As far as fishing reports... I should have one up in a couple of days. This is a slow time and not many ppl fishing- at least the ones who write reports. Not sure what Babler's been doing lately.

Humm... not sure exactly what you mean. Zero units is no generation and one unit is about 3 feet of water, or less if they're running less than one. Have to refer to the water level. As far as depth, again I'm confused by the question. You can still fish with one unit pretty easily. Depth depends on how far you wade out in the water. No generation- most places won't be over your butt, depending how far your butt is off the ground.

Thanks Thom. We had 4 spotting scopes in the group counting one of the clients and 3 guides. We used our cameras to take pics through the scopes and it worked fine. I used my Optio to even take video. Barry has a decent scope but doesn't like to take pics through it. He uses a camera now- I just wanted to get him an upgrade. I will look into the adapter though. That's a route I may take next time.

Hey guys. My bro-in-law is an avid birder and I want to get him a good, light weight camera this Christmas. On our trip to Guyana, the zoom feature seemed to be important since we couldn't get real close to the birds. One of the guides had a Canon 20x zoom but said they came out with a 30x zoom recently. Sounds like that might to what a birder needs. Want to spend about $500, more or less. Thanks!

Didn't get to go fishing... unseasonal rains muddied up the road too much and ppl were getting stuck. We didn't want to miss our plane yesterday to Georgetown so we went birding instead. After we flew to Georgetown, we headed to a river outside of town. Six of us jumped in a 16 ft wooden boat with a driver and guide and headed out to find the Hoatzin (pronounced Watson). Cool river, not too wide and stained a dark brown but not muddy, thick vegetation along the edges with lots of birds and Haller monkeys. Guide said there were piranha were there. Saw fish rising... wanted my fly rod!! Next time. Got up this am at 2 (midnight central) after a few hours sleep. Marsha and I stayed in the same room, same bed that then President Carter stayed in back in the late 70's - Cara Lodge. Drove an hour to the airport, made our connections and now we're back in the good ol' USA. Lots of other stories to tell, pics and vids to load. Will take a few days to get around so... be back in the Ozarks tomorrow. the Hoatzin

Another beautiful day on the tropical savana... cloudy and in the upper 70´s, breezy and cool. I´m surprised how mild it is here, but it is fairly humid all the time. Not as many bugs either, except for the mites or chiggers that got us all earlier in the week. Lots of new birds today- and add a Capuchin monkey to my list. We going fishing tomorrow am on a close river but they told us this evening that the road is muddy and slick from rains the last couple of days and the neighbor´s truck got stuck today so we can´t chance the trip, get stuck and miss our flight tomorrow to Georgetown. We were going to rent a couple of canoes, use hand lines and pieces of beef and chicken to catch piranha. Next time perhaps. It´s so nice to have internet here... way out in the middle of no where.

This has been an incredible trip so far. The ecosystem in this country has been spared by both the natives and from outside development for the most part so if you´re wanting to travel and see untouched cloud rain forrests, birds, monkeys and other animals, you should consider Guyana. I knew very little about this country befor taking this trip but I do now. I love the people and the forrests. We have stayed in some pretty cool places, off the beatened path for sure. Highlites so far... the Harpy Eagle is #1 by far. It was a young bird on a nest deep in the forrest, about a 45 minute walk from the road. We watched the nest for 9 hours yesterday hoping the mom would bring a sloth or a monkey to eat... and again for 3 hours this morning but she was a no show. At the juvinile´s age, she probably only comes very 4 days. Got some great pics and videos though. Did see Haller, red faced Spider and Saki monkies on the walks in and 2 days ago 3 of us saw a Jaguar on the road, a VERY rare sighting. We are up to over 160 species of birds, hoping to add many more in the next 2 days here on the savanna. We are staying at Rockview Lodge... look it up. It is a nice place for sure. Very unique story. Be home Sunday. See ya!

I wasn't going to post this cause cause I could be gone for a week and no one would notice... but there's some issues that have been brought up on old images not loading so... I'm in Florida right now, leaving for South America tomorrow for a nature trip. I'll be home on the 20th and will take up the task of the images. Dan will watch the board for me. Be blessed!

Heading out to SW KS in December for pheasants.

The water was too inviting this morning- had to run up and see if they were interested in a jig. Running just over one units when I got up there. Tied on a 1/8th oz sculpin jig and didn't change all morning. Hooked the first rainbow on the bank below #2- jumped- fought hard. Beautiful 17 male all colored up with a hook starting to develop on it's lower jaw. Next drift caught a nice 18 inch rainbow above the island. Made several more drifts but didn't get much below Big Hole cause they didn't bite downstream on the first drift. Caught 6 rainbows, all decent trout. But they just weren't that interested. Went on down to Lookout and worked the bluff bank. Caught 2 more making the morning total 8 rainbows... 7:30 - 9:15 am. Steve Dickey said they did good drifting scuds from Lookout down this morning. Here's some pics I took on the way up.

I'm looking for good sites, fishing but necessarily fishing, for ideas. I'm looking for: Good looking- eye catching. Easy navigation - easy to find stuff. Creative ways to link to blogs, personal sites. Host personal pages for members. Creative advertising format, not gaudy. Any other new and upcoming gadgets. Thanks.

4 p.m.

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Great post and report! Thanks!!

http://www.naknekrivercamp.blogspot.com/ This is a blog Jim Johnson started. Wanted to point to the part in it about his wilderness Rafting Trip on the American. $2495 is very reasonable for a trip like this.

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Met some friends up at the dam this afternoon- they promptly left to take a nap. The boys are getting old! I stayed, walked up above #2 outlet and tied on a soft hackle and proceeded to have some fun. I had just as much fun missing takes as I did hooking up actually. I had numerous rainbows chase my fly, their heads coming all of the way out of the water trying to slurp it up only to miss... or I missed. Had one hit so hard it snapped the line- I had no chance. If the wind blew, I got bit on almost every cast. When it died down, I'd still get bit but it would take a few casts. They wanted it short strips and fast. Best flies were olive or red, #16 soft hackles. 6x tippet. I crossed to get out of everyone's way and fished till about 5:30. Walked down to rebar cause there was a crowd - ended up being my buddies. They'd come back out from their nap and were fishing. They caught a few small ones but nothing much. Short vid of a big midge hatch will be posted shortly.

Opps- was that a secret fly???

November 4th Fishing Report Generation has been anyone’s guess. They’ve ran it most mornings but not every one… ran it most evenings but not every evening… even running it at night but not every night. No pattern to hang your hat on. Their online schedule is pretty right on but you can only get that a day ahead. It was a windy, cool one today. I got out a little in the afternoon and boated up to the trophy area with a couple of gals who are staying here. I wanted to try to get them into some fish on a fly rod. The wind was tough! Anchored on the flats at the narrows and tied on a soft hackle for Pat and had her cast with the wind (upstream) and strip away. She caught 2 small rainbows. On the spinning rod, I tied on a micro jig, a zebra midge, a scud—even a jig and couldn’t get anything going for Megan. The wind was really whipping up around. I usually do pretty well in a hard wind and I did see them feeding on the bottom but we just could get anything hooked. I threw an olive pine squirrel I had on my rod from the other night and they’d only chase it. Bait fishing has been very good lately. Fishing off our dock has picked up the last week. The size of rainbows stocked has gotten bigger—couldn’t have gotten any smaller!! Night crawlers have done fair but it seems Gulp is doing better in orange and yellow. But night crawlers up closer to Fall Creek have been the best, shooting them with some air and floating them on off the bottom. Those micro jigs in tan or olive have been super above Fall Creek but the scuds fished on the bottom have been king. If they’re running some water, you need to get your scud to the bottom. To get your fly(s) to the bottom and keep them there, use about one-and-a-half times the depth of water you’re fishing under your indicator. I generally use about 9-feet of tippet under the float when they’re running one unit. When I use scuds, I use weighted scuds. A #12 scud will have 7 wraps of .020 lead wire. But if that doesn’t get the scud down to the fish’s liking, I’ll pinch on a small split shot about 18 inches above the scud. I want that scud to drag the bottom. I’ll also use a San Juan worm as a dropper under the scud 18 inches or a Zebra Midge over the scud 18 inches. If I use a Zebra, I won’t need a split shot because the Zebra has a tungsten head, plenty of weight to get it down. Scud colors: gray, brown, tan, olive, orange. When it’s bright out, I generally use scuds tied with UV material. San Juan worm colors: red, pink, brown, tan and white. Zebra Midge colors: black, red, olive, green with gold or nickel heads. Below the dam there’s lots of activity- under the water and around it. Lots and lots of big trout- both browns and rainbows are up there vying for quiet spaces, which are in short supply. There are hoards of anglers looking for “the big one”, “Walter” as my friend, Megan, today said. Leonard showed me an articulated fly he caught 20 or so rainbows on yesterday with the water down. It was basically 2- #4 brown woolies wired together with a few rubber legs sticking out. Some of the big ugly streamers we’ve been trying at night are getting some attention too, according to some of the guys I’ve talked to. These supposedly “night time” streamers are catching trout during the day. I guess the trout are getting bored of the #20 scuds they’re seeing. But in reality, most anglers are going to throw these monsters, they’re going to throw the scuds, midges, soft hackles, cracklebacks and San Juans and do very well I’m sure. Night fishing has been hit and miss. Monday night would have been the night to go—rainy and nasty—but Sunday night wasn’t. I went Sunday night and almost got skunked. It was nice, warm and very calm and the trout just weren’t in the mood to tangle. That’s how night fishing is. You pick your night and hope for the best. It’s usually feast or famine. Mona Cheri, who was fishing with her husband Duane, caught the most fish stripping a cone headed olive pine squirrel really slow, crawling it across the gravel. I guess they were picking it up and she was nailing them. You really must try all the retrieves you can think of when night fishing—that’s the key. The right strip will win over the right fly every time.

Got an answer from Shane- I asked him about the 06 sighting. Unless it was positively identified as Didymo by Dr. Rhodes at MSU or another phycologist, I seriously doubt it was Didymo. More than likely it was filamentous algae. Dr. Rhodes took some samples back in 2007 I think and did not detect any presence of Didymo. We also took some samples this year and I'm happy to report that no traces of Didymo were found. I know that the samples were good because lots of other types of algae traces were found (none known to be harmful though).

I asked Shane about it spreading from below Beaver downstream and he said didymo doesn't like warm water so it wouldn't spread through Table Rock. I know ppl said they saw it at KOA a year or two ago but MDC checked and said it wasn't. May be they saw something that looked slimy and thought it was. Did they show it to MDC? As for it being at #3 in 06, I have no idea. I'll ask.

From MDC - To date, we have not found Didymo in any waters in Missouri. It has been found in the Arkansas tailwaters (Bull Shoals, Norfork, and Beaver). You'll have to research it in Arkansas to find where it may be found there. May be Little Red Tailwater. But it's not in Missouri - NOT in Taneycomo. If you're fishing only in Missouri, you don't have anything to be concerned about.