Phil Lilley

Summer has settled in here on Lake Taneycomo; as evidence I offer the temperature today -- 98 degrees. After a mild winter and spring, we shouldn't complain very much, right? We knew this was coming. Good thing our lake water is cold -- I'd hate to be on a warm water lake fishing in this heat! Generation: The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has been running water a little in the mornings and then starting mid day, running it until about 8 p.m., as much as three units. Table Rock's level is down to 916 feet, so the flow is not due to high lake levels but for electricity with the higher power demand from high air temperatures. We may see more water running and for longer periods of time if this heat continues. The water coming from the depths of Table Rock is still about 46 degrees. Our guides are getting out on the lake as early as 5:30 a.m. and doing pretty well. Most are fishing something under a float. Below Fall Creek, Trout Magnets are tearing them up, fishing them five- to six-feet deep using a pink or pink/white magnet on a gold jig head. Don't move it very much because the trout like it stationary. If you don't get a bite in a minute, pick it up and move it. Use four-pound line, or two-pound line if the water clears and the fish are real picky. Photo courtesy of Captain Rick Lisek Micro jigs are working, too. Olive with an orange head and ginger are the best colors. A white megaworm on a jig head, pink or orange head is also good, or a white maggot with the same jig head colors. If you're fly fishing, fishing something under a float also works. Grey, tan or olive weighted scuds, #14 or #16; red, rusty or white zebra midge; #16 or #18, red, pink or tan San Juan Worm (micro or medium) with 6x fluorocarbon is best. If there's a chop on the water's surface, strip a purple, white or pink woolly bugger, #12 or #14 or a soft hackle, red, yellow or black #16 or #18. Photo courtesy of Captain Rick Lisek If you're throwing jigs, white is still right! Whether you are using them under a float when the water is running or throwing them straight, our trout are still looking for shad-colored things in the water, and it doesn't seem to make a difference where on the lake. Of course, up close to the dam is the best, but the guys have been picking up nice brown trout below Fall Creek using white jigs. White/gray is working just as well as plain white. Other colors are working as well: Sculpin, olive and brown and combinations with lighter colors like burnt orange, peach and ginger. Jig size depends on how much water is running (or not) and what size line you're using. If the water isn't running, ideally you're using two-pound line and throwing a 1/16th-ounce jig, even a 1/32nd-ounce jig in shallow water. As one unit kicks on, go to a 3/32nd-ounce jig and once the generation bumps to two or more units, go to an 1/8th-ounce jig. Don't automatically fish your jig close to the bottom. Try throwing it and working it close to the surface. Seems like early in the morning the trout are holding closer to the surface. Work it fast and jerky, too, because they have been chasing lures lately. You may get a lot of follows and short strikes, so keep working it fast and slow and see if you can get them to commit. Photo courtesy of Captain Rick Lisek Night crawlers have been the hot live bait lately, injecting them with air and fishing them off the bottom when there's no generation. The best area has been around Short Creek, off the channel to the shallow side of the lake. Powerbait Gulp eggs are good, too, using a white/yellow or white/orange combination. Four-pound line is fine with our water clarity, which is getting better each week. View full article

They wouldn't let me fish ?

Just feel like I need to catch you guys up on what's been going on with Ozarkanglers... After spending a lot of time and money building the content side of OAF, I've kinda let it go, for now. Let me explain. OA and OAF are 2 different websites, basically. OA is Wordpress and OAF is IPS (Invision Power Services). I re did OA about 9 years ago, replacing an obsolete version of the site. It took a lot of man hours to build and it takes a daily update to keep it up. I let it slide starting last year because I wanted to build OAF basically to replace it. Then IPS updated the forum and took out the ability to take a post and make it an article with one click, essentially copying it to the content side. They say they'll put that option back in, some day, but until then, I'd have to copy and paste it- duplicating it on the forum, which I don't like. Right now, Babler and myself post our reports to the content side (I showed him how) but everything else stays on the forum. I started doing some advertising for OA - mainly radio spots. I didn't want to drive people to an out of date site so I started updating OA again with posts from the forum. If someone posts a good report - with a pic - I copy it to OA. http://ozarkanglers.com . It doesn't take much time -- in order to keep people interested, I have to update it almost every day. Someday, I may do OA full time - who knows. I'd like to build up the commerce side of the platform and let members sell stuff on the site direct. Also want to do more live reports, seminars, interviews. There are a lot of possibilities. But I flat don't have time now... I live on a lake - I'm sitting in an office that floats and is right now rocking because a boat went by - and I haven't fished in a week. That's just wrong! But it's where I'm at right now and that's ok. Leaving for Boston to visit our newest grand baby today. Be gone a week. May be I'll wet a line - Caleb lives close to the beach. God Bless!

All the more reason to measure them and throw them right back.

Good points. This app would measure fish pretty accurately so if you had more than one that would measure almost exact, you'd take a close look at it. The honest factor works in any tournament... we pay for a polygraph guy to come in once in a while to keep the fear factor there. It's a well spent $300. Cell phone service- that's one we haven't addressed. I bet it would keep the data on the phone till you were in coverage, then upload.

Top 5 I think could be added - or count all bass caught - total inches. There's an app like this in the works.

What if there was an app that allowed you to create your own tourney, measure your fish and upload it to the icloud leaderboard? Make holding, traveling and weighing fish obsolete.

I've been watching, sharing and using these videos for some time now. As I watched this last one, Ecclesiastes , I thought of some of the conversations and views of some members here. So I thought I'd share it. All their videos are well done, interesting and thought provoking.

I took the delete button away... because I had one member delete a ton of his posts before he left the forum. I didn't think that was right since there was a lot of other postings in those topics he deleted too.

If you need help... I can process and upload it for you. I just have to get the sd card out of the camera.

That's a good poke - 168 yards with a 7 iron! Congrats. I have one - a pitch and putt, 125 yards with a wedge. The guy I was playing with wasn't even looking... to this day he thinks I put the ball in the hole. Told him I'd have to have done it before we started playing... it's a fun game - just like fishing.

I've asked someone... waiting for a email back. You tried Stillwaters?

At least 15k. Two hours of gates.

Just wanted to provide you a heads up that we have been approved for a special operation (Spillway Release) from Table Rock Dam on Monday afternoon. The total release (Generation and Spillway) could exceed 15,000 cfs depending on what the power needs are Monday afternoon. The gates will be open for approximately 2 hours (3:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.) on Monday June 13th. This operation is being conducted to "Wash Out" our stilling basin so we conduct an inspection of the stilling basin. This is normal procedures and operations but know you might get several questions from the public. If you know somebody who would like to see the dam with the gates open, they will have about a two hour window to do so Monday afternoon.

Look at Angler's Outfitters (Chuck Gries) on facebook. He posted wading the last few days and doing very well. https://www.facebook.com/Anglers-Outfitters-369647935417/

This event will have nothing to do with this weekend's schedule. In saying that, I'd be surprised if we see any down water - no generation. It'll probably be 1/2 unit most of the time which is wadeable, but not ideal. Weekend schedule will be out later this afternoon.

Welcome back!!

Shad run!!!!!!! More walleye too! May be.

Just got this from MDC as a "heads up". There will be a stilling basin inspection at Table Rock on Tuesday. In order to flush out the accumulated sediment in the basin so the divers can see the structure, the spillway will be opened for about 30 minutes on Monday afternoon between 3 and 5pm. We will have high power releases concurrent with the spillway releases to help prevent water temperature problems.

Update - after the high water in January, 2016, things have changed BUT not the general channel. I looked at the map I created and these are the things I see that's changed: 1. No real change at Fall Creek except the "bar" is now out in front of the dock shop at Fall Creek Marina. There's no bar out in front of the creek anymore except for the pile of rocks at the mouth. 2. The Narrows is much narrower and the flat there is much shallower. Some days when the water is off, some of the flat is out of the water completely. 3. Lookout area is the same. It's non passable during no generation unless you have a jet. 4. The Chute is much different. No generation - it's more narrow and faster current. At 704 feet, you better be in the channel because the flat on the SW/upper side will get you - shallower. 5. Everything above the Chute is the same.

What you don't see in the photo is his son. http://www.kswo.com/story/29682944/farmington-father-son-catch-83-pound-catfish

Stuff like this should be reported to the tournament officials. May be they won't care but it's worth a try. Before my tournaments here on Taney, I tell the guys "tournaments" get a bad name because of bad boating practices. If I hear too many complaints, I just won't have any more tournaments. The name of my business gets mentioned in these complaints and it's not worth it to me to get lumped in with bad behavior at these tournaments. When writing about these experiences, you should name the tournament - and the organizers and sponsors. If it gets back to the sponsors, they might think twice about sponsoring tournaments.