itsdesignateddave

I work in Topeka and Harveyville is really bad this morning. Luckily no deaths here as of yet, but more than half the town was leveled and they were life flighting people out most of the night.

First off, four and a half hours each way makes the trip seem to get longer every time! Got down there Monday afternoon and the water was off, fished from the dock for a while and caught 5-6 bows on white gulp, not a single taker on worms. Being new to fly fishing I went up to the dam to get a look at things Tuesday morning. Probably saw 40+ fisherman up and down the banks. In an hour or so I managed one fish on a large white maribou jib (1/8oz or larger). I didn't have a tape measure with me but measuring it against my arm put him at 19"+. Too bad this was on the spinning rod. Water was on Tuesday morning as well, but must have only been one or two units as it was still wadeable (to a point). I caught probably 6-8 bows before the rains came. Wednesday I managed to get in right by outlet one since not many people wanted to fish in the pouring rain. I caught around 30-40 fish during the course of the day all on the same natural light brown worm pattern. It's not really a san juan worm, but I found it at walmart and think I will get a few more for next time. 4 or 5 of these were browns, but they didn't have much size to them, all being 13" or smaller. I got up early this morning to get to the outlet before 8am. Only one fish, but the gentleman next to me caught a large brown, maybe 22-23 inches. (Did I mention I can't guess well on size!) It was big enough it wouldn't fit very well in his landing net. No pictures, but I now know that I need to do some studying before I get back down on what patterns to fish and proper setup as some of the guys were catching them every 2-3 casts, and I was catching them every 20-30 minutes. All in all a good trip, and maybe I'll look into getting a job in the area so I can be closer to the trout streams in the area.....Anyone know where a banker can make good money and have plenty of vacation? lol

Just got back from most of a week at Lilley's. Monday was nice, but it was raining all Tues evening, all day Wednesday, and some this morning. I'm not a good guesser, but I would say at least 3-4 inches of rain on the lake itself.

We have tons of them in the Kansas river around these parts. They are so thick in shallow water that you can net then with a dip net. Otherwise run an upgraded blugill rig, small splitshot under a large bobber about a foot or so down. You can catch them close to where they are surfacing with either pieces of bacon or nighcrawlers. It can get frustrating at they spit the hook about half the time.

Sorry I didn't get this posted earlier, but I have been tending to other things since returning. Was down for the wife's family reunion and stumbled across this place. Friday - I fished the section just down from the dam where there the water starts to get deeper. I had good luck drifting white crappie jigs through the rocks about 24" below a float. Caught 4 or 5 nice bows this way on Friday. I also caught one 16" brown on a yellow/black jig, but nothing else hit unless it was white. Another group came down and was hammering them on small nightcrawlers - probably 15+ fish in an hour or two. Saturday - there was a small tournament so the place was packed. I managed to get to the water about 2:30 and only caught one keeper bow. Several very small bows, 3-4 nice browns under 18", and also about 10 small stripers, if a small one is under 12" Also caught some drum, catfish, sunfish, and carp. I left lots of jigs in the water if anyone needs some all you need to do is wade out in about 5' of water, otherwise it was better than fishing around these parts where we don't have a trout stream without a 4+ hour drive.

Sorry I didn't get this posted earlier, but I have been tending to other things since returning. Was down for the wife's family reunion and stumbled across this place. I fished the section just down from the dam where there the water

Good luck! My most productive day I caught about 15 of them in a couple hours. Nothing huge, but all 3-10lbs. Plenty of fun on a rod and reel. Also, when fishing the rivers you never know what might take a bite.... I've seen things they say don't exist in the rivers around here.

I have had lots of success fishing rivers here locally. My parent's house is less than a mile from the Kansas river, and a friend of mine caught an 80+lb one last year on a bank line. I'm not that old, but I have fished the river since I was in grade school and have found that they feed very differently than any other fish I have found around these parts. You can catch them any time of day, but most are after the sun starts setting in the late afternoon after around 4pm. In times of high water they will feed in less than 2' of water consistently. I've had good luck on worms in high water - but typically 3-4 large nightcrawlers fished about a foot off the bottom. Whatever size bait you are looking at - double it. It can't get too big, trust me. The one last year was caught on a small sunfish who was eaten by a 5lb flathead, which was in turn being eaten by the 80lb flathead. Strangely enough I have had better luck using small channel cat under 12" as bait, and filleted side of drum up to 3lbs. The only thing I have really learned over the years is you have to have a lot of patience for pole fishing for flathead. One bite an hour may be all you get, even in a hotspot.

One of the oldest state records fell last weekend. Good picture as well. http://cjonline.com/stories/051108/out_277836763.shtml

This will be my first trip down when shorts are not appropriate fishing attire. I recently purchased my first fly rod as well, so I won't be doing much of that, but I will give it a try at some point. What colors and baits have been working off the dock lately? I will be coming down Sun-Thurs, and it appears it is going to be near 60 on Wed and Thursday, maybe a good chance to get out a boat or try some fly fishing in the trophy area as well.

I try to make several trips a year from this way as well. What is the quickest way to make it down from your parts?

I have seen lots of bobcats in my life, but that one looks quite large, unless that is a very small deer. The one giveaway that I see is the small tail, otherwise it has much larger legs than the bobcats in our area.

I was fishing in about 5-10' of water. The two that I caught together were on nightcrawler as I was fishing for channel cat. The other larger one was caught on about a 1/4lb side of drum. I had caught it earlier on worm and threw it out hoping for the best. I also had one I estimate at 6-7lbs that day, but I didn't have my net close enough so I tried the old heave ho up the bank and it broke the line. There are some massive flatheads in the kansas river, I have seen them while fishing for channel cats. One of the neighbors caught a 53lb one earlier this year on a trotline less than a mile from where I normally fish. What seems to work best around here is Sonny's catfish stinkbait/doughbait. It is sticky enough to stay on in fast moving water, yet potent enough to fish reseviors.

Earlier this summer from the Kansas river. 10.5, 10, and 8lb flatheads on rod and reel. 5lb & 3.4lb channel cats all caught on consecutive weekends.

I am new here as well, but here is what worked for me. I was down a couple weeks ago and had good luck off the dock and had several others that wanted to fish that didn't normally do so. What I found works best was to fish off the end of the dock with the current, and it really didn't matter how fancy the setup. Several were running an egg sinker with a hook about a foot or two down and just letting it sit on the bottom. Power eggs (white especially) corn, worms, and white jigs worked very well.

I'll never tell (at least without reading the rest of the reply!) I had good luck on anything white all weekend. I caught the first couple on an old crappie jig (1/16oz white). A couple on 1/16 oz white rooster tails. After this we rotated between corn, nightcrawlers, and power eggs, and corn/worm/powerbait combos. I tried my luck with a black/gold stick bait, but to no avail. In the same spot I caught the large rainbow a younger guy caught a brown about 22-24" about an hour before I caught mine (of course on a brown/black stick bait). We seemed to have good luck for about 30-45 minutes on baits, then had to switch to something else and it would pick up again. Everyone I was with ended up coming back to the white power eggs at one point or another and landed several fish, including the big one. At one point there were 4 of us on the dock and 3 of us hooked up within about 10 seconds of each other. On top of all the rainbows I think we ended up with about 5 suckers also, all caught on Friday. Oh, and by the way that fish is back swimming in the lake so I can catch him again next year. I only had him on the stringer so I could go get someone to take a picture. We watched several of them swimming under the dock by the guts on Thursday and Friday. I know this was one of the "average" fish as he had a scar on his head that was easily recognizable, even under water. Since he was almost 19" the largest one swimming with him had to be at least 30" (easily could have been approaching 36"). At one point they were right next to each other and he was over twice the length of the one I caught. On another note I will have to catch an even bigger one next year as my co-worker/boss was down there several years ago and caught a 37" 10.5 lb rainbow just north of fall creek. He has a copy mounted in his office so I have to look at it every day.....

Sorry I didn't post up sooner, but I just got registered for this site. I had a great time last weekend (7, 8, & 9th of June) fishing mostly off the dock. I averaged 10-15 fish per day, with almost 30 on Saturday. Nothing huge until the wee hours of the morning Saturday. I was down on the dock with my soon to be mother in law (of all people??) and she caught 3 and I only had one from an hour of two before. I moved places and hooked probably 15, landing 10 within 45 minutes. She finally gave up after she couldn't get her fourth one, so I set off to clean the fish. I set the pole up against the dock and noticed several fish by the cleaning station (as always), so I decided why not.... Not even 30 seconds later I had a 18 3/4 super fat rainbow take my 2lb test for a test drive. Sorry about the bad quality of picture, but it was 2am and the fog was rolling really bad, not to mention the 2 year old $5 disposable camera!

I have been down to Tanecomo twice now. The soon to be wife's family has their annual family reunion at one the resorts there. They used to go to Brill's - demolished, then riverlake - demolished, and this year we were at trout hollow (hopefully not demolished by next year!) I caught all of one rainbow last year in several hours worth of fishing over 4 days. This year I easily limited out each day, along with several family members who decided to join me this year. I have been browsing this forum for several weeks in acticipation of actually catching fish this year, and I did just that. I would say I caught somewhere around 60-70 fish, and would have had another 20-30 if I had bought a net earlier in the week. I have never picked up a fly fishing rod, but spinning reels are the way I fish for everything around here. If I stick around long enough I bet I will have one in hand next year so I can go to the trophy area and try my hand. All I want to do is catch one brown and I will be happy. I do have one fish picture to share, but I will post it in the tanecomo forum. Thanks again for all the help!