Ryan Miloshewski

How is it now? From July 8th until the day of the tournament 8/20 it was lights out every morning for me. 7-8 fish average each day and then 5-6 in the evenings. Day of the tournament it was flat out tough.

I didn't take any pics but I agree with your sentiment! It's such a beautiful area.

Fished below the park beginning of August down to Baptist and caught the heck out of them on hoppers. Never saw another fisherman either. Love that area.

I have a bunch of young males this morning. They are fighting over the three feeders I have..typical.

I'll hijack this instead of starting a new topic. But fishing with a hopper on Taneycomo right now is unreal. I can almost guarantee a 20+ inch fish, or multiple, every morning. They are looking up hard and munching. I came down last Saturday with my family but didn't really get to start fishing hard until Monday night. Went with my sister in the evening to fish jerkbaits. I ended up catching that large brown on one of Duane's 606 baits. Ate it and only fought him for a couple minutes before he was in the net. A quick tape and pic and he was charging back to the depths. He was angry. I wish I would've gotten a girth because he was a fatty. Oh well! Called it an evening after I landed that fish. Next morning I got out early, around 6am, and fished the hopper until 9am or so. Landed 9 fish. The first fish that ate was a 24-inch brown. Subtlest eat you'd ever see. I set the hook and realized what I had. I was able to corral him in the shallow water and away from the tree just downstream and got him in quickly. A quick length and pic and he was off to bless another fisherman. I was by myself so I didn't get a great pic, but he really looked like a White River fish. Long, slender and a big ol' head. So my last fish Monday night was a 24.25" brown and my first fish Tuesday morning was a 24" brown. Unbelievable! I don't know what I did to deserve it, but I am grateful. Went out with @dpitt yesterday morning to introduce him to the hopper bite and it was on yet again. I landed 6 fish, two being over 20-inches, and he lost three and landed one. He still needs to get the hang of it . We had a lot of fish refuse yesterday..thinking they may be getting a bit wise. Changing hoppers has been effective, especially when doing multiple drifts. I made a perfect cast and was saying out loud "come on, reward me!" when a 21" fish took the hopper. It was the highlight of the morning. My taxidermist is down now and we fished yesterday evening with the water running and slammed them again. He's new to fly fishing and kept saying "man, I love this." Don't we all, Tim! We will be fishing the tournament tomorrow and I am hard pressed to not go up and throw the hopper. We shall see. This is a great testament to this forum. I've met and fished, and become friends with so many people on here. Truly a great place to share and banter. If you are near Taneycomo and want to have an incredible day fly fishing, tie on a hopper and let it fly!

First brown was 24-inches on a hopper. Rainbow was 21.5-inches. Second brown was 24.25-inches on a DD SS jerkbait.

Thank you @Johnsfolly! I have been down at Phil's since last Saturday. I'll share some pics soon, but have landed quite a few trophy fish. Been a great week fishing!

I believe it's Shane Bush's plan/strategy coming to fruition. The reduction of stocking rainbows over the last few years is showing its benefits..quickly.

#saynotoeuronymphing 😉

I really want to do this..what are the cons you've experienced. I love Jackson. Such a cool town and area.

There are some logs at the mouth and it shallows up. With the crowds nowadays you're going to be idling through that area anyway.

Good reminder and hope you recover well. I'm with @snagged in outlet 3, Simms shirts with a hood and gloves every day in the summer. Look like the Elephant Man going out in public but it really saves me, and hopefully will later in life as well. The sun zaps so much out of me and when I was younger I did not respect it enough.

Finally got to do some serious trout fishing for the first time since March, and it did not disappoint. Went down to Taneycomo to fish with my grandpa and cousin John last Thurs/Fri and we caught a lot of 16-19-inch fish with the usual suspects on gear. They left Friday morning so I decided to fly fish and I landed 8 fish on dry flies that morning and Saturday. Landed two over 20-inches and multiple right under. It was a blast. Motored down to the White to fish more dries with my buddy Stephen Balogh. He and some guys are renovating the White River Trout Club and they let me stay there. It is really nice and a good location right across from Cranor's. They are catering to fly fishermen and it is going to be awesome. I think it'll give others a run for nicest destination on the White for fly anglers. The sulphur hatch was unreal. I've never seen anything like it. When they started coming off it looked like it was snowing bugs. Pods of 15-20 browns were concentrated in holes just gulping. Problem with so many bugs is your cast needed to be perfect. They didn't have to move to eat. Basically had to drift your fly right in front of them during the thickest part of the hatch. We landed a lot of 17-19" fish Saturday afternoon on the sulphurs and Sunday morning on hoppers. Finally on Sunday evening I landed a 23-inch brown on the sulphur. Perfect cast, drift and eat. Fishing Taney most of my life, it was an amazing experience watching those browns eat a size 18 sulphur and a size 10 hopper right on the bank. The subtlety of their eats is mesmerizing. Oh, and I finally was able to meet @snagged in outlet 3 on Taney Saturday morning! Only reason I knew it was him was when we were chatting he said he started fishing at 4:30 am.

99% of copperhead bites on humans are dry bites (no venom injected). Wonder if they gave you something you didn't need (wouldn't surprise me)?

I used to do research on Timber Rattlesnakes in Eastern Kansas. Relocated them from a hibernaculum that was set to be destroyed by a new Target and tracked them via transmitters. They are easily the most docile venomous snake I've been around. Only issue we had was a pregnant female took up residence under the deck of an old lady near the place we relocated them. One day we were following the signal and it kept getting stronger and stronger near her house. Walked up to the yard and there she was basking in the lady's flower bed, with two copperheads right next to her. We grabbed the TR and the copperheads went down into the lady's foundation. Clearly they were using it as a den. We told the lady and removed the TR but couldn't get the copperheads. We found tons of Cardinal and finch feathers in her scat, so she was laying out by the bird feeder and nabbing a meal. We had a few snakes like that, with affinity to human structures, from the group we relocated. We ended up getting published internationally in the International Reptile Conservation Foundation's quarterly journal in 2011. You could be 5 feet from one of the snakes and they'd just sit there trying to blend in. Eventually most of the transmitters died or we removed them. It was really eye opening and definitely made me appreciate snakes a lot more. Here are some pics from 2010 I believe.

Awesome timber rattler. Always amazes me what snakes can take down the hatch.

Awesome pics. You know what streams you hit? I really like the ones up by Coon Valley. Going back to the Driftless end of July again this year. Really is an awesome place. And you are not wrong about the Cow Parsnip. I wore long sleeve everything. Luckily, it's cool enough up there to not overheat.

Big Ed is the man! Earlier this year John Neporadny and I got him to take his jet boat down to Taney. He's addicted. Well, I guess he's more like Medium-sized Ed nowadays. What an incredible trip!

Found this pic I took in 2012 right above Outlet 3. Not great clarity but I'm sure things have changed. Would be interesting to see if there's a difference. If we get low water, one of us guys should snap a pic from the approximate location and compare.

Used to fish Chain of Rocks all the time! Miss that place. Caught lots of sauger, walleye, wipers and whites there as a kid. One Saturday in February these good ol' boys were doing a massive fry. They were frying anything that swam in the river. I walked by and they said "hey kid come try this." I said "I'm good." "No, try it." So I eased over and had one of the best pieces of fried fish I've ever eaten. No idea what it was, but boy it was good.

Jealous of your fishing, DJ! Wish I could join you. Isn't it weird how the night bite goes? Can be dead for hours then they turn on for 30 minutes and hold on. Or vice versa. It's fun. That is definitely some type of nest raider so good riddance. I prefer chupacabra though..

The clarity is very subpar in plastic lenses compared to glass. And the distortion in plastic lenses is greater than glass (which has zero distortion). And the UV protection is lower. I was a cheap sunglasses guy for a long time and then I got the Costa glass lenses and I will never go back, in terms of fishing that is.

Whatever you do, get glass lenses. I have Costas and like them. Everyone is saying the Bajio's are really good, though. May have to get a pair soon. I have a blue tint for fishing and an amber for driving/whatever. Just avoid plastic at all costs.

I'd say a gut hooked fish with the line clipped has a higher chance of surviving than the ones released by some of the people handling them. Boga grips splitting their jaws, dropped on the hot boat, tailing gloves, etc. I'd bet a lot of money a lot of those trout released and "swim off strong" don't do so hot.

When I was on the White guys were chumming with liver and drifting with them. Pretty common practice, which I did not now. Saw a bunch of liver buckets trashed throughout, too.