Buzz

Yeah, as hot as it is right now winter trout fishing sounds good. I'm looking forward to opening day of C&R.

Yeah, Chief and I got into a few leeches a couple of weekends back. They are some nasty little critters. I don't think I'll wade that stretch for a while.

Great article. Congrats.

You guys are killing me. I wish I could have made it but The wife had different plans for me. Great post and congrats to all.

I was thinking that it may be inconsistency in the writing technique also so I decided to run 3 posts of an author that frequents this site. It turned out to be 3 posts and 3 different author comparisons. One was Ian Flemming and one was Dan Brown ( didn't recognize the other author). I don't really put a lot of stock in it, but it is interesting. I'm sure it is set up to recognize certain algorithms and as in anything our moods and excitement dictates how we write.

Nice fish guys. Anyone would be happy with a day like that.

Don't forget to bring a few hoppers with you. I've had some great days in August and September with them.

I finally got back down to Roaring River to do some serious fly fishing and I wasn't disappointed. I started at about 7:AM in the Fly only zone. I managed 8 fish in the first hour out of one hole all on tan and red zebra midges in fast water. I moved downstream and caught several more fish from fast water. After it heated up, which was rather early, I switched to a crackle-back and used it for the rest of the day. Don't get me wrong, I did try a few other dries, including a hopper which I caught 2 and missed a couple, but nothing on the others. I fished it dry and caught a bunch of fish. When it slowed down I started swinging it and stripping it back. It's amazing how the attitudes change when that fly is zipping by. I fished the last 2 hours in this way and caught a lot of fish, missed a lot of fish, and had some great blow ups. As hot as it is you really have to be aware of hydration. I didn't move too far from the truck today and as needed I would head back and chug a bottle of water or Gatorade and then head back to the water. There really isn't a lot of shade down in the Fly only zone and it really heats up fast. And I didn't mention that at about 1:00 pm, when I started to get really hot, I headed to the C & R area and waded for about 2 hours, caught some fish and cooled off in the river. BTW, that is a really cool section of the river to fish. Totals for the day: 35 fish landed with about 20 missed opportunities. Biggest fish was about 2 lbs., but it was a blast as always to fish this river.

Well Trav, like I said it's something to play with. I might try and put in a couple of paragraphs of an established writer to see if his name would come up.

http://iwl.me/ IWL = I Write Like My wife found this site somehow. It's sort of fun. I used a couple of my OAF "New Topic" posts, because I don't really have anything else. I did have one that was compared to the writings of James Joyce. Give it a try and see what you find. I'd like to see who you write like.

I was wondering what that was all about.

That is interesting. I guess I never really thought about them perching in trees. Up until a couple of years ago, my Dad and Mom had one on thier place at Shell Knob. I only saw it cross the road. They are very cool looking birds.

Glad you're back Dano.

I also feel it is only a small amount of cash to put out for something I very much enjoy. We enjoy 2 streams which are stocked frequently during the cooler months. I also fish the parks during the C & R season, so it is so much easier to just get it when I buy my regular license. Plus, if you happen to catch the next state or world record trout in Missouri it could come in handy. Buy one, don't buy one. I won't lose sleep over it. Although, it is about the only money that we spend that we know where it's going.

I really like Amy Lee and Evanescence. I especially like the re-release of the Seether song "Broken" that she did with the band. I haven't heard any of her solo stuff since she left Evanescence but, I'm sure it will be good. Evanescence now has a former "American Idol" singer Carly Smithson ( I think is her last name), I have yet to hear any of thier new stuf. Still waiting.

Thanks for the reports. I think I would have had a coronary when that Muskie tried to take the head off of the catfish.

Thanks guys. It was fun and I'm looking forward to more of the same. The fish in the picture pulled like a horse and made several good runs. It is understandable why people love to fish for smallmouth with a fly rod. I can't wait to hit a few different creeks this summer. It is definitely addicting.

I haven't been able to get out and fish for the last two weeks and it's really been bugging me ( pun intended). Anyway, I got off work pretty early so I decided I would hit a little creek near the house, but this time I would leave the spinning rod at home and only use the fly rod, which is the same way I broke myself of it for trout too. Don't get me wrong, I've cauaght quite a few Smallmouth and largemouth on the fly rod, but I just lost a little confidence in it lately. On with the fishing. I knew I only had about 45 minutes to fish before I had to meet my wife for dinner so I didn't have too much time to play around with a lot of different flies. As luck would have it, just as I was getting the rod laced up I saw a nice smallmouth chasing minnows in the shallows. So I tied on a small Clouser and made a few casts. On the third or fourth retrieve I had a decent brownie follow it in, but didn't take it. I flipped it back out ahead of him and watched as the fly disapeared. A nice 12 inch brownie and my first on a clouser minnow. Very cool. After a few more casts without any hits I decided it was time to try a new fly that I had tied a few months back, but had yet to try. It was an olive colored Kreel Craw-Dad. After about 3 casts I finally figured out how to work the bait and how to read the line for a bite. I caught 3 nice goggle-eyes pretty quick. I then decided it was time for the smallmouth, so I made a much longer cast to a tree limb near the edge of the bank and caught a small 10 inch SM that jumped clean out of the water when I set the hook on him. After a few more casts I caught another Sm that was a little bigger. Now I'm starting to like this fly. After a few more casts with no more action I decided to move upstream a bit. After about 10 casts I hooked into the biggest fish of the day. I didn't measure it but did get a quick pic with my cell phone. If you guys like bumping the bottom with flies you should look into the Kreel Craw-Dad. It's an easy tie and it does produce. I think I've gotten my confidence back.

I guess this subject is one of the main reasons I am a C & R fisherman. Now don't get me wrong, I am all for good reasonable and understandable regulations, but if you try to remember all of the different regs for all of the different species it gets a liittle bit scary. Not very many places have the regs posted and they are obviously different on several of our streams and rivers. So, I'm just going to stay strictly C & R except for a catfish or two. Maybe the MDC should spend a little bit more money on education of the masses. Commercials on both TV and radio, and maybe a billboard or two. Let the people who don't already know about this precious resource, know about the slow growth rate.

Gary, I would attend a meeting or two if it was a little closer to home.

Siusaluki, there is a good supply of baitfish and other aquatic insects,the fish are not starving. It just seemed odd that the crawdad population was so limited. I know it's not a requirement for smallmouth survival, just another part of the food chain. It just seemed rather odd not to see any.

I agree with you both on this one. And although I know there are are probably smallmouth bigger than 16" (I have yet to catch one over 15.5"), it would protect the most productive size of fish and allow for many more in the 15" size. That may be true in the larger streams. We have a couple of streams that actually have an over population due to, what we believe to be, much less forage. On one stream in particular, I don't think we saw any crawdads at all. The total fish population was great, but the overall size was a max size of 14". Toss a craw bait of just about any type and you caught a bunch of fish. I think a slot limit would help this stream immensely. Now, if we are the majority meaning C & R fisher people, are you going to take those fish below the slot limit? Even though you know it will help these streams???????????? I would seriously like to know how all of you guys stand on this question.

Sounds like fun. If I hadn't been in the air conditioning today I would have been in a creek somewhere.

I don't know the wardens name but, next time call the "Operation Game Thief" # immediately. 1-800-392-1111

Those are some great looking fish guys. If there ever was a kid who could catch a fish with a dip net it would be Dylan. I would never bet against him.