Phil Lilley

Last Sunday 11/15, I headed to Arcadia, MO to hunt with long time friend, Paul Crews. He has a nice, small spread and a "hunting cabin" in the woods. I only wanted to kill a doe. I'd take 2 if given the chance. But I didn't want to kill a buck. It was Paul's land and he was hunting a big buck. I don't care about horns. Sunday evening, Paul had me sit on the ground inside a wooded area. Saw nothing. Monday morning, we hunted the opposite corner of the woods because the wind had shifted. I sat on the ground again looking slightly down a dip -- very brushy conditions which I'm personally uncomfortable with. I like open fields but Paul said they were holding tight to the woods. I had 2 does run by me at about 30 yards... way too quick for a shot. Then another - in and out of sight. Then 2 more does came in on my left, about 50 yards, but laid down in a thick cedar grove. They'd get up and mill around but lay back down -- no shots. Too much brush. It was getting to be about the time to meet Paul -- 9:30 am. He had already shot a doe and had it back at the truck. So I pulled out my grunt call and gave it a couple of quiet blows. Nothing. A few more, louder. Nope. Then one last blow as hard as I could. Didn't sound much like a grunt. But nothing was moving them. I was sitting there thinking about what to do next when I caught some motion to my front left. A buck came out of a thicket and was headed right at me. 70 yards - I got my gun up and had a front-on shot but I could only see 3 points -- big points -- on each side. I could not see brow tines because of the brush. He came on, looking around for the buck he had heard, stomping his front hooves. I'd look down my scope, then over the top, trying to identify him as a legal buck. He came within 30 yards, turned slightly right and showed me his side. You couldn't ask for a better shot. But was it legal? Did I want to take it? It was a big bodied deer for sure. I decided to pass. He turned away a little -- that's when I saw his tines. It was a nice 9 point. He saw me move and he bolted on, blowing at least 8 times as he went. FAST FORWARD to this past Sunday, 11/22. Back up to deer camp for another try. I went back to the same corner -- where all the action was, but this time I sat in a ladder stand. I was up about 15 feet. There was a bar extended from my right to left to keep me on the stand and it was a nice gun rest. About 7:30 am, someone just to the west of us shot 4 times. It was obvious he was shooting at something running and chances are he didn't hit it. Ten minutes later, I heard a crash and saw a big buck enter the brush from the west. I could see plenty of points on this one so no question I could shoot it. He paused long enough at 70 yards for me to get the gun around and on him, but it was a straight on shot which I didn't want to take. He trotted from there right at me, not stopping till he was directly below me. I could spit on him!! He stopped, looked to the ladder, then his head and eyes followed the ladder up right to me!!! What's the deal! His tongue was hanging out so he'd been running -- probably the same deer that had been shot at. He started at me for I bet 4-5 seconds. My gun of course was still pointing from where he came, above the bar! I couldn't move. And I thought for sure he was going to blow and go... but he didn't. His tail flickered, he dropped his head and turned and trotted off to my front right. This was my only chance. yes I'd kill it because it was by far the biggest deer I'd ever seen in the woods... body and rack. He was majestic and I know Paul would be proud to see it down. I had to lean back as far as I could to get the gun barrel below the bar... and as the point of the gun passed the metal bar, it ticked it ever so slightly. And yes, he heard it and yes he bolted - like he'd been shot at. I really don't feel cheated at all. I loved the experiences equally and wouldn't trade them for any successful hunt anywhere. We left the next morning for some crappie fishing. We are very blessed!

A little of both... but I did not get a deer last week so... I'll have to start a new topic and share my big buck stories.

Sorry - a bass have to be 8 pounds before we give a catch and release award out... may be next time

I've never owned one. But I'm in the market. Any suggestions? Favorites? Thanks

I attended the crappie show here in Branson a couple of weeks ago - there I saw some really nice, adjustable screen mounts for mainly the livescope setup. Problem is I didn't write any of the manufacture company names down. I'm wanting an adjustable mount for the bow screen setup. Any suggestions?

Patience. We really wanted to see what it was more than landing it. But Paul got its head in his crappie net 😀 and I helped get it in the boat.

Across 40 to 65. Pretty simple. The north route is ok too. About the same time.

We fished the Spring River side yesterday from noon till dark. Found them on the drop off mostly in 19 feet of water on the bottom. Kept 10 keeper crappie from 12-16 inches, couple of white bass. They flat head was 44 inches, snagged in the tail. That was fun. And what is this?

Trying Gimp. Having a hard time creating a file I can use. Can't "save as" to any file that's excepted online (FB YT)

It appears Table Rock has turned over enough that the water at 130 feet deep has DO adequate enough to not need the injection of liquid oxygen. The tanks are empty so all we’re getting it put TR water. Last night they bumped generation to 100 mw. That means they’ve lifted restrictions. DO levels were between 4-5, and rising a bit. Good sign. I know TR hasn’t turned over completely. It’s going to take more cold windy weather. The DO should continue to inch up in the coming weeks. This is very early for TR turnover. Someone pointed out that the USGS College of the Ozarks monitoring station was reading 1 ppm DO. I asked Shane Bush about it and he thought the gage is off. No way DO could be dropping AFTER coming from the dam and traveling 5 miles down lake.

I've used PS for 10+ years but only use 2% of it's tools. I can't see paying $20/month for it when I don't use most of it. I bought a new computer for video editing and need to add the image editing product. That's why I'm looking. I'll look into these other products - thanks.

I'm looking for an application for editing images. I need to edit in layers as well as simple lighting and tint adjustments. I'm not necessarily looking for free... just something other than Photoshop. Any suggestions?

I'll be there Thursday night.

The generation pattern on Lake Taneycomo has been consistent for several weeks now. Operators at the dam are running between 1,800 to 3,700 cubic feet of water per second 24/7, which is about a half unit to a full. Water temperature is still 58, but the clarity is much better than it has been. Dissolved oxygen content is holding steady at about four parts per million. We've had some incredible November weather with one exception -- a cold rain and high winds over the weekend. But we've back in the 60's and even 70's afternoons this week. Trout fishing below Fall Creek remains very good for most people. Anglers are drifting night crawlers and Power Bait mostly and catching good-sized rainbows. Early mornings, dam operators are not running quite as much water, so you have to use small weights to get down your bait -- a lot of times just a small split shot. The drift rigs we sell only go down to 1/8th ounce bell weights, which is sometimes too heavy to use in slow current. Stay towards the middle of the lake to avoid snags. Trolling big spinners or medium diving crank baits has caught fish, too. I've seen several boats out coming in with limits. This is a good way to catch a big brown trout, too. I've found the best direction to troll is downstream if there is current. Flicker Shad are good to troll as well as big Rooster Tails. Most of our guides are deer hunting right now, so it's hard to get a good report from them. But I would imagine they'd be fishing the Berkley pink worm under a float and drifting down lake from our place (Lilleys' Landing.) Early, set the float at about four feet, dropping it to as much as seven feet as the sun gets up over the water. Dockhand Blake Wilson has been doing One Cast lately and doing pretty well on a couple of things. He's fishing the San Juan Worm under a float in the Trophy Area, as well as a scud, and catching good rainbows -- but the catch has been spotty. Pink on the San Juan and tan and gray on the scud (#12). Guide Bill Babler dragged a jerk bait last week and caught some trophy rainbows. He used a shad color 606 (suspending) from the cable below the dam down past Fall Creek. Blake tried it and did really well drifting them in the Trophy Run stretch while 4.000 cubic feet per second of water was running the other day. We drift these suspending jerk baits using a drift rig and a 1/8th ounce bell weight. The jerk bait should be suspending and a medium diver. We've tried different colors and the shad style seems to work the best right now. We sell cheap jerk baits in our shop -- cheap because we do tend to lose a few. We do take the front hook off the bait and leave the back hook to reduce snagging as much. Warning! We have had to talk to some boaters lately about anchoring in current. Even though only one unit of water has been running, certain areas on the lake can still be swift, especially along the bluff side from Trout Hollow up lake. I warned a gentleman a couple of weeks ago about anchoring off the back of a rental jon boat in fast current. He had to cut the rope to free himself after trying to pull it up -- and in that effort, the boat came dangerously close to being swamped. View full article

Thanks to Aarchdale on his post on the crappie he was catching last week. The pictures really got me in the mood to catch some. Got out for an hour on Thursday and caught some mostly small bass. A couple on a jig but most were on 3.3" Keitechs. Focused on the steeper banks Friday, we got out around 9:00 after watching a bit of the Masters. Still on the steeper banks we started picking up a crappie or 2 on the same 3.3" swimbaits. When we would catch one, we would stop and cover the area and would pick up a couple more. Also isolated pole timber would also hold a few but we couldn't catch more than four on one spot. Lost 4 HUGE slabs at the boat as I forgot to put the net in the boat. We took a break for lunch and returned with the net. Wonderful afternoon for mid November and had a good time with the bass turning on in the afternoon. Same stuff, steeper banks and 3.3" swimbaits. Lots of SM and spots with only 1 or 2 small LM. Found some more crappie off a main lake steep point but only ended up keeping 12 after the early losses at the boat. Best thing is we never caught a short crappie. all were 12 - 14" and most were over 13". Saturday had about 45 min in the morning until the rains came. I was able to catch a bonus 21.5" Walleye for the basket on the same swimbait. Went out again in the afternoon and continued to catch a few more slabs in the same spots we caught them on Friday. Since the first basket was fairly full from the Friday fish and early walleye, I added the 9 more to a 2nd basket to all be cleaned on Sunday. That evening the front came through and thought the house was going to blow away around 3:30 Sunday morning. I went down to start cleaning the fish around 9:00 and... SOB! the basket with 12 slabs and the walleye had the line severed by the wind on the dock iron! I just use trot line cord and I guess it rubbed against the dock all night in the wind and sunk! After a call to my bros to help, we were able to find the basket with a naked jig head and then made a homemade grappling hook with a big treble, padlock for weight and dropped it down to retrieve the basket! Totally made the weekend as I was so bummed to have those fish just sitting on the bottom. All were still good and got several bags of filets for a future fish fry. All and all great weekend and beautiful weather for mid November. I'll be down Thanksgiving weekend and may be able to see if the crappie are still there and maybe catch a few wiggle wart fish. WT was 62-63 all over. View full article

Fun...

Good thread. More people should join in. It’sa good subject to talk about amongst friends. I’m 62, no history of heart issues in family for which I’m thankful. Very active in younger years and ate what I wanted including a lot of soda. Have always disliked water. 2007, I found myself at about 230 and very out of shape. I got my feet wet going to Alaska helping a friend with a fishing camp and wanted to really get involved but saw that I needed to really change my lifestyle. Lost 45 pounds and worked out, got in shape and stayed there for about 9 years. Slowly slipped back but not all the way. Never gave up basketball but stopped watching what I ate. Started Cross Fit a month ago. And Marsha and I started the Keto diet. Went through sugar and flour withdrawals but now feel really good although I’m still struggling with drinking enough water. Would like to lose about 30 pounds. I’m at 205 down from 210. Will keep you updated on this diet. Not convinced it’s the healthiest but it may be good for us individually. Need to watch the blood pressure. Also need to go in and have a full blood work panel done. It’s been way too long.

Our water cleared up a lot today. Back to normal I'd say.

Our trout fishing here on Lake Taneycomo has been pretty hot.... and cold. One day it's really good, and the next it stinks. I don't think you can blame anything but the fish themselves since some days they eat and some days they don't. Generation has been consistent for the past week. Dam operators have ben running from 1,800 to 3,700 cubic feet of water per second, which is about a half unit to a full unit during the day and night. Water temperature is holding at 58 degrees, and I'd say visibility is about two feet. The lakes are dropping about .1 feet per day, so there's no reason to think this pattern will change anytime soon. We do have a weather change happening today. A little rain and then cooler temperatures and probably wind into the weekend. This should cool Table Rock back down but not enough to cause it to turn over. We need some pretty serious, cold temps and lots of wind to do that. When the trout are feeding, they're taking all things drifting, mostly on the bottom using a float, or with no indicator at all. In the Trophy Area, they're eating scuds, eggs and worms. Our brown trout are actively spawning close to the dam, so both species, browns and rainbows, are eating egg flies and beads. The San Juan worm is working in several colors -- tan, cerise, brown and pink. The fish are taking either the thick or medium sizes, non-weighted. I mentioned beads, and we are starting to carry the Trout Bead, a brand that's been around for many years. The company offers plastic beads from 6 mm to 14 mm in size and in a ton of colors and shades. We suggest the 6 mm or the 8 mm bead, although even the 6 mm is bigger than an actual trout egg. We peg the bead no more than two inches above either a bare hook or a fly. You can use a drift rig and an 1/8th-ounce bell weight or just add a split shot above the bead about 24 inches. Scuds are still about the best thing you can drift and catch trout -- even big trout. They're taking tan, gray, brown and olive flies from a big #12 size down to a small #18. Because of the dingy water, I'd suggest using the bigger sizes. Our anglers are still catching some really nice rainbows below Fall Creek on night crawlers, drifting them on the bottom. These rainbows are swimming down from the trophy area where they've grown big, protected by the slot limit there. I have a few good days working a marabou jig, mainly 1/16th-ounce, both in the Trophy Area and down below it. White is still working, especially after the flood gates were open for 24 hours last week, but it's cooling off, at least for me. Black appears to be coming on strong, may be because of the dingy water.

Pretty cool. Livescope... sure is fun.

Anyone regardless of age needs a trout stamp if they are fishing on Lake Taneycomo above the 65 highway bridge. You can fish below the 65 bridge without a trout stamp but you cannot possess or keep trout. Catch and release only.

Gates are closed

Report came in - big rainbows puking up shad being caught below the dam this morning.

Me for sure. I'll talk to Duane.