Sam

It's funny, I run into "post nazis" on this website more often than anywhere else. We had a thread recently on the Upper Bull Shoals forum where it was reported that fishing was good below Powersite Dam just before the big freeze. The weather turned real cold before anyone could check it out, so guys got to talking about all kinds of interesting stuff re: Upper Bull Shoals. I enjoyed it and learned some good stuff, but we got jumped all over for "off topic" posts - even though NOBODY wanted to brave sub-zero temps to find out how the heck the fishing was below the dam and report on the "original" topic. As far as I'm concerned, this is the place to talk about outdoor sporting activities on Tablerock. Mostly that'll be fishing - but if conditions are such that one of the regular fishermen gets in a good hunting trip there, I'm real glad to read about it.

troutgnat - The glass beads where the color shows brightest have paint inside the holes. Often, though, I leave the bead unpainted and just let the twine color show through. I use various weights. The 1/16 and 3/32 oz. sizes use one, or two, nickel-plated brass beads. The 1/8 and 1/4 oz. sizes use 1/16 or 3/16 oz. bullet worm sinkers drilled out a little to 5/64" so the hook and twine can go through. I like the fact that the smaller sizes are lead-free, since that's the coming trend in lures. I'm stuck with lead weights for the heavier ones though, as tungsten and brass are too expensive and stainless steel is too hard to drill.

troutgnat, those look great! I love using a Roadrunner tipped with a minnow or half-nightcrawler for walleyes, and just like you, I slow-troll 'em. I've never tried making my own RR's though - good job! During this awful cold spell, I've been making jigs too. I've been making jigs that use a glass bead for the head (I like the way those bend light - a cat's-eye marble effect), and I've moved the weight back on the shaft of the hook. That makes the jig sink more level when it's paused, and I think they're coming out real good. I've been making some of these for crappie and white bass, and others in "crawdad" colors for casting up against chunk rock banks for bass and big perch. Some are in purple colors for when the white bass in the springtime James River run get in that purple mood. The ones in this picture are all 1/8 oz. jigs, but I make them in weights from 1/16 to 1/4 oz. Hey, this keeps us involved in fishing while the weather's bad - and we'll have our jigs to use when it gets better. Great minds think alike.

Yeah, I heard that on the news last night. I know the bridge needs to be replaced, but I hate to see the old things go. You know they'll replace it with a modern concrete bridge with no overhead and no character at all, like the new one they built at Riverdale a few years ago. I figure Green Bridge will be the next to go. I remember my grandpa taking me fishing there about 1955 - we caught a bunch of fish but the snakes finally ran us off. Things change.

Boy, that opens up a whole new can of worms (not the best analogy, I guess, worms). I'd say a record fish ought to be caught using a legal method on hook and line, so that guy in SoCal who accidentally snagged a 25 lb. bass was right in not trying to claim it as a record. But the law is different in different places. Fishing with live bait (minnows) is legal here in MO, but illegal in some states. So, would a record bass caught on a minnow here be OK while the same size fish caught the same way in CA wouldn't count and it'd get the angler a ticket and a fine? Even worse, how about if someone in Arkansas SPEARED a record bass? Spearfishing for bass is legal in many AR lakes, but I don't think a bass caught that way should count as a record. If what a fish was caught on determines whether it's eligible, that could get real complicated in some places. On many California lakes it's illegal to fish after dark - so would a record be disqualified for that? The biggest bass I've ever caught were from hooking baby bullfrogs through the nose and swimming them over lily pads - would those fish be ineligible if one of them was a record? I'm back to what eric1978 said, "I don't care about the world record at all". I just like to see bass that big and know they exist.

I don't care about the record either, but it's interesting to see what a 22 lb. bass looks like. I'm sure that picture's the closest I'll ever get to seeing one. So far as record fish only coming from native habitat, that's not gonna work. If you think about it, the native bass habitat here in the Ozarks has been changed enormously. Before the lakes were built, bass were in the White, James, Kings, and all the other rivers and creeks - but they didn't grow to anywhere near the size or numbers they do in the reservoirs. Building dams and creating big lakes changed everything, and that's just as artificial as stocking bass in far-away places where they never existed before.

Yahoo News is running this International Game Fish Association picture of Manabu Kurita who caught a 22 lb. 4 oz. largemouth out of Lake Biwa, Japan last summer. After six months, the fish has now been certified as tying the 77 year old world record for largemouth bass. Wow, Japan's a cold country - I wonder why bass would grow so big there. Here's a 22+ lb. bass and a blond-headed Japanese guy in the same picture, a couple of real rarities. http://i632.photobucket.com/albums/uu41/Ozark_photos/capt_d722a77fd1b7488d889794f4bee583.jpg

I'd say we're not going to get a Pothole fishing report until the weather turns to something a little better than the North Pole. Still, we can't talk about anything else here while we're waiting. Nope, that wouldn't be right. I wonder how the fishing is at the Pothole.

My boat and motor aren't in the same league as you guys, but I sure like my rig for what it is. I got a new 50 hp 4-stroke Suzuki a couple of years ago, and what an improvement that was from a 40 hp 2-stroke. I sure like not having to add oil to the gas, my gas mileage is 4 times better than it was, it runs quiet, and it trolls down nice and smooth. I can only go 30 mph tops, but that works for me. On a fishing trip, I usually only fish a 3 or 4 mile long stretch of the lake but I fish it in detail working every little spot with the kind of habitat that's producing. For me, that usually works better than doing a lot of running. When big boats come by at high speed and keep going, I always wonder how many fish they're passing up while looking for other fish somewhere else. Lots of 'em, in my opinion. I figure for every boat I see tearing by to get somewhere 15 miles away, there's another boat 15 miles away haulin' to get to where I'm at.

Well, I wonder how the fishing is at the Pothole. If Phil and Bill try it this week, with the warmest day all week supposed to be 28 degrees, they're a lot tougher than me. I don't want to catch a fish that bad. I guess we can't talk about anything else here while waiting to find out, 'cause that would be "off-topic". Gee, I wonder how the fishing is at the Pothole. Wishing everyone here a healthy, happy, and safe New Year filled with lots of good fishing - and, my apologies for the off-topic holiday sentiment.

Well, I said 'way up there that I was looking forward to a Pothole report and I'd get my boat out of mothballs real quick if I heard a good one. Since then, nobody's posted a fishing report who's actually been there - so we got to talking about trout, stripers, yellow perch, ramp access, fish species in B.S., stocking programs, and how stripers and blue catfish gobble up stocker trout. Interesting stuff to gab about with other fishermen, I thought. So, OK, back to the original subject - but it's kinda hard to talk about how fishing is at the Pothole if nobody here knows.

Just last night I came across what I think is a great article on lure colors. It deals with how fish see colors, and how colors are changed by different depths and clarity of water. I've read this about three times now, and I'm sure going to keep the information in mind when I'm making or buying lures. http://www.midcurrent.com/articles/science/ross_color.aspx

Congrats on having a wife who knows enough about fishing to buy you a high-quality reel. I've been married a long time and if my wife ever bought me a reel (which she wouldn't) it'd probably be a Zebco made for little kids. A bright yellow one, most likely - she likes yellow. On the other hand, she breads and cooks the best panfish filets I've ever tasted - so it all works out.

Yes, at times I've caught some white bass-size fish, mixed in with the white bass, that I thought were probably small Stripers or maybe hybrids. Until I catch a full-size Striper, though, I won't say I've caught one out of Bull Shoals. Wishing everyone here a Merry Christmas, and a Happy, Healthy, and Safe New Year (hopefully filled with good things for our families and some great fishing trips)! - Sam

Rob, I'm sure that's right. In the lakes, though, I think "perch" go deep in the winter and it'd be real hard to target them with tiny lures. I know I never catch them in the winter, and I take it as a sure sign of SPRING when I catch the first "perch" up near the bank. Hey, this thread got me thinking about the amazing variety of fish in upper Bull Shoals (and all our local lakes) and wondering how many different species I've caught there. Here's all the ones I can think of, and any additions or corrections would be appreciated. Sometimes I'm not too sharp on species' names. Largemouth Bass Smallmouth Bass Spotted (Kentucky) Bass White Bass (I've never caught a Striped Bass, that I know of) Walleye Black Crappie White Crappie Rainbow Trout (I've never caught a Brown Trout there, yet) Bluegill Green Sunfish (Black Perch) Bluegill/Green Sunfish hybrid Rock Bass (Goggleye) Yellow Perch Various small Sunfish (I don't know the different species of those) Channel Catfish Flathead Catfish Blue Catfish Black Suckers Yellow Suckers Redhorse Suckers Buffalo Drum Carp Bowfin Gar (I think there are a couple of different gars) That's an amazing 16 species of "game fish" plus 2 more that are in B.S. but I haven't caught, plus the suckers I enjoy grabbing in the spring, plus the little sunfish and 4 species of "junk fish". That's without even trying to list baitfish - shad, chubs, and so forth. Have I left any species out?

No telling what's in Bull Shoals. A couple of years ago I was crappie fishing a deep bluff with flooded trees down by Mincy, using a crappie jig, and I caught a 19" rainbow trout. Maybe Arkansas stocks a few big ones and the fish came up from there, or maybe it washed over Powersite dam, traveled for miles, and survived several years to grow that big - I dunno. I don't buy a trout license, so back in the lake it went.

For years I didn't understand how folks in the north country caught "perch" when ice fishing. The "perch" around here (bluegills, sunfish, and such) go dormant in the winter and you can't hardly catch one when the water's cold - so that didn't make sense. Then a friend in Wisconsin sent me some ice fishing pictures, and I saw it's yellow perch they catch. Last January I caught a 12" yellow perch out of Bull Shoals while crappie fishing. The guy in Wisconsin says they're real good eating, and I kept it so we could taste one. Yep, they're REAL good - long, thick, firm, white filets just like a walleye - maybe even better than the crappie I had on the same plate. I hope they do take off in Bull Shoals and get bigger, I'd like to bring some more of those home.

I'll watch for your report on the Pothole. I've got my boat all winterized in the garage - gas line disconnected and motor run dry, Stabil in the gas tank. But, that could get undone in a hurry with a good Pothole report.

Mmmm, mmmm, Forsythian - fried garfish. Gotta love the banana on the fishing seat, too!

I think I like the new format. In Internet Explorer some of the features wouldn't work, so I exited and came back in Mozilla Firefox. That fixed it! Test-posting a photo:

Mike - I'm more of a crappie fisherman than a bass fisherman, but in looking at that Razr Rods website I see they have a full line of American-made spinning rods too. Also, their home page shows a guy with a big ol' string of slab crappies - that's my kind of thing! I'm surprised to see that they're located on south Kimbrough in Springfield - about 15 miles from me. I wonder if they manufacture rods there, or if that's just a shipping center. Do you know? If that's where they make them, I'd sure like to stop by and see how it's done - especially if I'm thinking of investing $189. in a crappie pole.

I'm looking through my fishing pictures from 2009, and they bring back lots of good trips and good memories. My favorite, I think, is this one. I took my 10 y.o. granddaughter to the James River and she was having a ball catching good-size white bass on a Roostertail. When grandpa caught this 5-incher, she thought that was funny and wanted to record the moment.

That's the way it oughta be, and I'd probably fish tourneys if they were like that. If I say I caught a 15 13/16" largemouth, then that's what it was and I'd have myself to live with if I stretched it by even 1/16th. Anyway, I could snap a picture of it laying on the ruler. Best of luck to you and your club.

You know I'm here.