Don

Ahh yes, every cloud has a silver lining. Mortgage rates are still low. I financed my last full tank of gas for 5.8% for 30 years fixed rate. Don

"The report on climate change said that humans are very likely making the planet warmer. To which Hillary Clinton said, 'Hey, can't blame me for that one.'" --Jay Leno

The lake level will be lowered approximately 30 inches for maintenance at the landing. Boaters need to be careful. Level is supposed to be restored around Thursday. It would be interesting to see what the trophy area looks like when water is this low. http://ozarkanglers.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=6537 Don

Yep, Duckydoty was the last man standing. We fished with various pine squirrels and midges. I hooked up about a half dozen but only managed to get two to the net. Duckydoty caught about a dozen. They were running water and we fished about 2-3 hours. Thanks for fishing with me and I'll probably see you at Taney again. Don

Way to go Rusty. Great pics and good memories. I had the opportunity to fish with one of my daughters at RR earlier this year. We didn't catch alot of fish but it was one of my best trips this year. Don

We had an electric site in the D-Loop. We paid $19.00 per night. Don

I can't help but wonder where he placed and how much he has won in previous tournaments. Don

Welcome to the forum Bob. A plethora of info here. Chuck said that you guys were flinging flies lately. I posted a report in the Little Red River section of this forum. Your brother knows I'm going down to the OAF get together 05/19. I hope to see you guys there. Don

My friend Terry can cook about anything in a dutch oven. During the trip, he cooked rigatoni, beef stew, , trout, onion rings, shut up dogs, and cobbler with dutch ovens. I'm grilling brats 05/19. If Terry shows, I'll see if I can talk him into it. Don

I was on the dam side of chute 1. I casted straight out, drifted down and had all takers stripping back up. I also had at least another five LDR's (long distance catch and releases). Don

Arrived at JFK Thursday and set camp in the afternoon. We geared up only to find generation that evening so we didn't fish. We fished the old C&R are near the dam from 8-11 Friday. Generation shut us down the rest of the day. We each picked up 2-5 fish each. My friend Terry caught a 16" brown with an ugly midge. There are tons of baby brookies in the river about 6-8 inches long from a recent special stocking. Saturday, generation allowed us to spend more time on the water. My friend Steve, from Little Rock, caught his first trout on a flyrod that morning up by the dam. It was a pretty 15" rainbow. Things slowed up after the sun started to bear down. We took off to Swinging Bridge but only managed a couple of small ones. I went back to JFK and finally got on them. I picked up 16 fish that day. All of them were stocker size and had good color to them. Most all of them were on a rusty harvester midge in faster water. We had a fish fry that evening with onion rings, huspuppies, and blackberry cobbler cooked in a dutch oven. Fished for one hour about noon Sunday. I picked up 2 bows on the same midge. Good weather and a fun time at Little Red as usual. Don

Stoppped at Taney on my home from the Little Red. Was disappointed to see a couple of units running. Fished from 7:00-8:00PM. I stripped olive woolies with a sink tip line. I caught 4 stocker size bows and an 18" sucker. Don

I am one who prioritizes the reel over all other pieces of equipment. I always fish with the fly line out of my hand because when I hook a lunker, I would rather have an excellent reel and drag system control the drag as opposed to my hand or fingers on the flyline. I would rather fish a $300 reel on my $20 Scientific Anglers rod than fish a cheap reel with a rough drag on let's say a Sage Z axis. I also believe lifetime warranty is a must. My 4 wt is the model before last of Ross Cimmarrons. Tough reel, smooth drag, has caught lots of fish. I like sealed and composite type of drags compared to cork drags for durability reasons. My 5wt is a Galvan Torque. It may be a little too much for local trout fishing but I love that darn thing. Superb drag system, light and strong, and not tinney. My 6wt is a no name brand asian made reel. It is extremely smooth. I haven't even used it yet. It holds my sink tip line and I usually do not fish anything over a 5 wt. I keep an older model Cabela reel and a lower end Okuma around for emergency backups. Drag sysyems on those are not the best. Don

Ron, It's good to hear from you again. I sure hope you're feeling better soon. Don

Way to go Troutbum. I hope you do well in October. Don

Nice fish Phil. Good to hear you guys are getting on them. Don

I have every other weekend with my kids. I would be great to have another one later with the children. I still plan to make this one. I'll also be down early the day before and I plan to score a first-come-first=serve site at the state park camp. Don

I tried out the $100 Swiss Gear at Beaver this weekend. Wow! A hotel on the lake. The interior space was huge and my friend plans to get one because he thinks the size and price will impress his wife. My concern is durability in a storm. I had to use factory stakes because the stake loops were too small to use my heavy duty Army stakes. Troutchaser explained that a solution to that is that he has a tent that larger peg loops have been sown on to alow space for bigger stakes. This tent is made for two people to set up and I took it down myself without problems. The space is great because I like to be able to stand up. There is room for gear, and extra room for chairs if we need to play cards, chess, checkers, backgammon during a heavy downpour. My three daughters will take over this one in June when we go to Stockton. Don

First off I'd like to thank Toby for his initiation and work efforts he put into the tournament. Thanks to Steve, Bryce, and the rest of the BDS for accomodating and hosting the special event. It was really something to see Faith's sweet little face and to hear good news on her health satus. It was a great opportunity for myself and all others to combine a passion of flyfishing with a constructive and worthy purpose. It was my first time at Beaver. Troutchaser and I arrived Friday at BDS about 11:30. We became legal and talked tackle and tactics. Talk about customer service! You guys are great. We dropped off a few items at Parker Bottoms campsite and hit the water about 1:00. We fished the lower end of the atrificial zone above Parker. The scenery with the big bluffs along the river was awesome. I could not believe how slow the current was with almost still waters. There were back currents on far edges of the river and slow "seams" here and there midriver. I missed my first 10 hookups . A few misses are normal but the first ten caused some frustration. I missed all of them on a size 20 ginger GBug about 40 ft away. Distance seemed a neccesity Friday. I only had one strike less than 40 ft. I figured a larger bug was needed. I had one size 18 left. The fish I landed swallowed the fly so I cut him off. I later noticed the size 20 had a bent hook that widened the gap. If I'm looking for an excuse, I hope that was it instead of me. Earlier I tried an olive pine squirrel and eggs bodacious without alot of luck. Meanwhile, Troutchaser had landed a few while stripping olive woolies. I later picked up a few more on an olive brown midge with gold bead head and green wire segment, thanks to a few floaters who advised us on their way by. We fished until 6 and I landed 5 fish, one of them a small brown. Kevin and Terry joined us the night before and we headed to BDS within an hour of the horn sounding off early generation Saturday morning. It was good to meet you guys from the forum that I haven't met before and good to visit with others I have met before. Generation allowed a social after sign up, rules, auction, and word of prayer. Water shut off so we went back to camp and watched Kevin tie some scuds while things settled down on the river. We accessed the same place about 11:00 and headed up river. I acted like a sculpin that just had it's tail bitten off and roamed all over the river. Meanwhile, the rest of the team settled in about 100 ft above the end of the artificial zone. Troutchaser landed the first fish so the rest of us could cull. He later landed a 15" brown. Terry asked if it was alright to fish a wooly bugger under an indicator. Afer a few "Huh?"s and "What?"s it seemed it was OK since there are no rules against it. He scored a brownie and several other bows. I left and went downstream to my midge hole when it finally became vacant. A few strikes on egg and leech but no takers. I noticed the team had not moved and there were a few bent rods up there as well. I joined them and Kevin was knocking them out on an olive wooly about 20 ft away, 3-4 ft under an indicator. He caught ten fish in one small hole. I joined the action and finally landed four bows while missing twice as many. We checked back into BDS, submitted results, told fish tales, and determined the winner. Then the real winner, little Faith, and family showed. I smiled as I wathed her arrive as I was teary-eyed and choked up. I fished again Sunday and caught 8 in one hour. None of them were over 12" long. I went to right where Kevin stood the day before, casted a gold beadheaded olive wooly in size 12, 3-4 ft under an indicator, just like the day before, but it had black hackle instead of olive. Kevin mentioned the night before that a slight chop on the water must have bounced that marabou tail in just right way to be attractive. Color of the water was dark and light green patches, depending on the bottom of the river. The only strikes came from 20-30 ft away in the light green patches of water. Wind was unbelievable. No wonder I was the only flyflinger up there. Wind changed direction and started blowing from downstream and eventually the whitecaps were slamming me as I stood in hip-deep water. Time to go. I stopped and visited a family that canoed past me earlier. They were fishng on a gravel island and thay said they couldn't go anywhere downstream because the wind was too strong. It was a quality and memorable trip for all the right reasons that etched a really good first impression. I am a blessed individual. I will absolutely go back again this year. Don

Troutchaser, No need to delete to avoid disagreement. Respectful controversy is almost a must to learn from one another from forums like these. Many others have turned over stones that I have not had and have had the opportunity to explain those situations on this forum. To agree to disagree and set aside some induvidual's egos without overbearing criticism is a classy way to talk, teach, learn, and etc. Acceptance of many other's postings in the same way is the wise side of the coin. Think about it.....Don "All I know is that I know nothing." Socrates

Rolan, Thanks alot for your time and effort. Someday I hope we'll meet, fish, amd tie together. Take care.....Don

Okay, Now that I have put more emphasis on my focus and concentaation to alleviate the over-wrapping problem, I first realized, after some very UGLY flies, that the width of the squirrel strips plays the major factor. I guess the choices of precut are thin, standard, or magnum? I think I need thin cut to get what I need and I'm thinking I'll buy a full skin next time to meet my needs. I can then cut to my own specifics. Thick cut that I used did not match up to good ole Leonards minners. Thinner cut crosscut strips might be the neccesity? Don

Going again the first week of May. I always read Little Red Flyshop report every month. Lokks like a concern with didymo. Beitiful scenery and a different ecosystem than that of the White River basin. Over 60 percent of trout forage is sowbug. Anyhow, trout don't usually take time to distinguish sowbug from segmented scud when fishing down there (based on my experiences) especially in faster waters. One raeson thst this is one of my favorite waters is that I always come up with those beutiful orange brookies when I fish the dam area. That's somethng we don't get here at home in Missouri. I also wish I sould catch a cutthroat there to complete my grand slam. If any of you readers have been there lately, I'd sure like a report. Here's the link I use. http://www.littleredflyshop.com/report.htm Thanks...Don

I wasn't sure to reply. But since "nuthouse" and "insanity" were already mentioned, I'd thought I'd say welcome . I don't do the rock much any more since I lost my boat and I started flinging flies. If you are ready to flyfish Taney, give me a PM. Beware! If you start catching on the fly, you may never go back to the rock. Don

Dano, You are a fortunate geezer, I mean grandpa . I'd forego any get-together if I could talk my daughter into going there with her. She'll be 16 in one year. I'll tell her time is running out. Have fun.....Don