top_dollar

I hate how almost every drum I catch on a hard bait pins its mouth closed by just sucking in the back treble hook.

Good work. Stick baits have not been working for me lately. Seems like the only bites I can get the last few months have been crappie jigs. With the exception of this drum on a wart.

Fishing sucked everywhere for me this weekend. Very humbling, almost to the point of embarrassing lol. Fished the LM @ valley park, and at simpson...nothing but muddy boots and a few lost crankbaits. Fished @ busch and absolutely got skunked @ 38, 33, and 27. Quit and went home. Finally found a bit of success at one of the smaller lakes in terre du lac with 8 small bass, 1 crappie and 1 bluegill, bummer though i was crappie fishing.

It's a good thing I can walk/bike to a few of my local fishin holes!

Only trout. There are several dead catfish floating around the bank, as well as a few sunfish. No bass. I used to catch little bass and panfish pretty well out of horseshoe lake, but its dead now.

I'm off work Friday and Monday, had a 2 night float planned, but it got flooded out. I'm gonna hit a few feeder creeks on the lower Meremac, and then head up to Busch and get some crappies. Ive been unsuccessfully fishing Carondalet park the last few weeks. I have no idea how to catch a fish out of the boathouse lake, and I'm pretty sure everything in horseshoe lake died out over the summer. I'm getting some practice i guess.

That's correct, but clearly BPS doesn't make as much money from SPRO lures than they do from bass pro brand crap, so it would be stupid of them to carry less profitable merchandise.

This is the logical result of 40+ years of legislation that incentivizes corporate consolidation. Investors in these companies do not care about quality, or selection, or your favorite lure.

Not surprising from Mrs. Ross.

I've seen guys checked at the following lakes: jefferson lake in forest park, busch wildlife lake 21, and the union city pond.

great job on the weight loss, that is quite the feat. I am also on the overweight side of things and need to trim up a bit. Nice to meet you as well!

Probably both. Although I would think the joke is pretty obvious because as far as I'm aware no organisms can migrate through fiber optic cable. To be totally sincere....I couldn't care less about any Chinese flu, and nobody in Missouri should either. Its just something for everybody to be afraid of, like terrorists, and the govt taking your guns. I never leave Missouri, and I typically avoid people, so there is a pretty low chance of me getting it. So until there is a Chinese crappie virus that spreads from my local crappie to ponds to me its not something worth being afraid of. The population of Missouri should be much more concerned with chronic diseases due to being overweight, sedentary, smoking and drinking. This disease wont kill or harm many people from Missouri, but diabetes, cancer and heart disease sure will. Lets start a topic about the benefits of regular exercise and proper eating. That would be some great info to provide.

You guys....seriously this thing is dangerous. Its time to be afraid. I heard it just evolved even further and can spread through the internet. Wash your keyboards!

Man that is just awesome. I wanna get down there In the winter sometime. Seems to me like the north bluff from the bridge to schooner would hold a bunch of fish during the winter. I'm sure it would be pretty humbling when I'm used to catching fish there in the summer but I'd love to give it a shot.

Yes its a very old pic. I took it as a kid on a fishing trip with my dad and grandad. I've been looking for it ever since. Thanks for the info.

Did that place used to have this sign? or still do? This was my favorite thing ever when my dad took me fishing as a kid, but i cant seem to find it when im down there anymore.

Any of the major brands have good options around 200$ IMO. I've got a med lite st croix eyecon, and a fenwick elite tech med lite. I like both of them, I probably prefer the fenwick because the handle is super comfortable.

The stretch and the float of mono make it useful for me with a jerkbait. Also when crappie fishing 2-4# mono cannot be beat. You simply cant cast a 64th oz jig without the right rod/reel/line setup and part of that is 2# mono. The best I have found is that trout magnet S.O.S. the 4# trout magnet line will bend out a #4 owner light wire hook, and it's super thin and very manageable.

I'm a mono guy all day with a jerkbait. Nose down is fine, but I'm convinced I'll get more bites with that bait sitting as horizontal as possible, so I weight it that way. A 5'6"-6' med heavy fast rod with 8-17# mono gives you the best all around jerkbait action in my opinion. If you use a stiff rod with braided line your jerkbait will dart back and forth like crazy and you'll get lots of bites, but hooks will pull out with bigger fish. Too soft of a rod and you won't get good action on the jerkbait. The semi-stiff rod and mono gives me the best action while keeping all the fish buttoned up. Braid has its advantages, I doubt too many guys are flipping heavy cover at table rock, but 65# braid is the way to go tossing jigs/worms and frogs around swampy areas. When I'm tossing a weightless wacky worm, high vis braid is the way to go so you can see the line move, I do use a 10-15# FC leader though. Also anytime you're throwing a small single hooked bait a really long way, the braid will allow you to set a hook better if the fish bites it 100 feet away. Although anymore, the jigs I pour use owner needlepoint hooks, which arent letting go no matter what. So I use a med light spinning rod with 6#fc, or even a light power spinning rod with 4# mono. Another huge braid advantage is trolling crankbaits. I love to troll with 9ft downrigger rods spooled with 15# metered braid. The thin diameter allows maximum depth. The lack of stretch gives you good hookups 200feet behind the boat, and the metered braid allows for perfect distance management. The 9ft parabolic downrigger rod gives you the cushion needed to not pull out hooks I tend to agree with the thought process though that if the fish doesn't care about the hook, split rings, and plastic bill it probably doesn't care about the line either. They are pretty dumb animals. That said, the line can certainly affect the action, depth, and rate of fall of a bait so it certainly does matter.

The lower Meremec from valley park to the Mississippi has got the be the ugliest stretch of river in the state. Plenty of fish...but its gross!

Big river above leadwood.

I fillet all my fish. Everything else just goes into the compost to drive the dog insane.

Bass taste pretty great to me. Generally, IMO, bluegill and crappie are much easier to catch, taste about the same, and are more plentiful/sustainable (in terms of biomass/acre of water). That said, as was mentioned before, bass in a small body of water tend to be quite prolific and will require some harvest. Also, massive fisheries like the huge reservoirs have fast growing bass populations and can handle significant harvest. I agree with the bias of not cutting a smallmouth bass, but really I only feel that way about large smallmouth in the rivers where there is just not that many fish. I have no problems cutting a smallmouth out of table rock or stockton, if its a 15-16 inch bass its going on ice no matter what brand.